Former Panorama editor Rachel Jupp has been appointed head of BBC News, stepping into the role almost immediately after internal frustrations over the delay in replacing Deborah Turness, who resigned last year following claims of BBC bias.
Turness’s departure came after an episode of Panorama spliced together two parts of a Donald Trump speech. The US president has since launched a $10bn legal suit, though the BBC has said the edit did not defame Trump.
A trusted troubleshooter
Jupp’s elevation confirms her status as one of the corporation’s most trusted figures on difficult editorial issues. Her most recent role, as the BBC’s director of news documentaries and long form journalism, was created after the broadcaster found a documentary about children in Gaza breached its editorial guidelines for accuracy by failing to disclose its child narrator was the son of a Hamas official.
Jupp has spent less than a year in that role, and has now been tasked with overseeing the newsroom, which faces constant questions from all directions over political bias and story selection. She has previously handled politically difficult topics for the BBC, including editing a 2019 edition of Panorama that examined allegations of antisemitism in the Labour party.
Trust in news at all-time low
At a time when trust in mainstream news has fallen, she was seen as the best candidate to retain it. Trust in the news has slumped to an all-time low globally, according to the Reuters Institute. In the UK, it has fallen to 30% of the public, a 20-point fall from a decade ago. But the BBC remains the most trusted news organisation in the UK.
Jupp has also been at the heart of the BBC’s strategy for the use of AI. Transforming the newsroom at a time when short-form video platforms are being increasingly used as news sources will be another major element of her job.
Commitment to impartiality
Jupp said that as director of news she wanted to “champion our vital, independent and impartial journalism, deepen the trust people have in the BBC and meet our audiences wherever they are”.
Matt Brittin, the BBC’s director general, said Jupp was “widely regarded for her news judgment, fairness, and high standards”. He said: “In a world of infinite choice, audiences are fragmenting, trust is scarce and facts are contested. BBC News remains the most used and most trusted news provider around the world and across the UK. It is our duty to recommit to the BBC’s distinctive journalistic mission while reinventing how we serve audiences, and to rise to these challenges.”
“In Rachel, we have someone who can do both, with a fresh perspective to lead BBC News into a new era.”
Jupp was picked from a shortlist of four candidates, which included Jonathan Munro, who had been acting in the role since Turness’s departure, and the Channel 4 News editor, Esme Wren.
