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| Lucy Manning, not Alan Y's favourite (it seems) |
What more is there to say about Yentobgate'?
Apparently plenty.
It's all turning into a bizarre punch-up. And it's hard to keep up. Or care. Anyhow, as everyone else it still talking about it...
The papers (well, The Times and others initially) said that Kids' Club trustee Alan Yentob tried to influence Newsnight over its Kids' Company report.
According to Guido Fawkes, the Guardian then reported that people who Guido described as "BBC spinners" spun the yarn that Mr Yentob didn't attempt to influence the BBC. But (again according to Guido), when he appeared on Channel 4 News, Alan Yentob then said he did but that this was in no way an abuse of his position as a senior BBC boss.
Then, last night, came the Daily Mail with its story that Mr Y had launched a tirade (a "verbal attack") against the BBC reporter responsible - recent recruit from ITV, Lucy Manning.
The Mail persuasively made Mr Y look bad...
...but Mr Y's pals at the Guardian then pounced back, slamming the Mail for misrepresenting the story.
In the Graun's account, Alan Yentob...
...was actually being pursued by Manning and a camera crew at the time through the BBC’s News Broadcasting House corridors and lobby- a speciality of hers that she successfully employed while at ITV on former BBC director general George Entwistle on his way to work
The Guardian suggests that this version of events doesn't "quite fit" with the Mail's angle.
Everyone seems to have an angle here. I bet even I've got an angle (though what that might possibly be is increasingly a mystery to me).
