Please release me

The BBC's Group General Counsel Sarah Jones made a very rare appearance in the witness box yesterday. 

She was being questioned at the Field House Tribunal Centre, just off Fetter Lane; the BBC is defending withholding a range of documents from journalist Andy Webb, all relating to l'affaire Bashir. And here's a funny thing; she wishes some more information had been shared with Earl Spencer at an earlier stage in the investigation: 'I accept that there should have been some consultation with Earl Spencer. If we had, events would have unfolded very differently. I very much wish we had shown him, but we didn't.'

Nonetheless, the BBC maintains it has redacted and released all it can; Webb claims the latest batch of 3,400 emails were so heavily redacted that they were "effectively worthless."  

Some, of course, may fall under the legal privilege of communications between lawyer and client, and Sarah has so far invested close to £450k on external support, most of it from Blackstone Chambers. Their Top Gun, Monica Constance Gunnel Carss Frisk KC, told yesterday's hearing, that Webb is “making very serious allegations on a speculative basis”.

Sarah (Sutton High School and BA Law, Lincoln College, Oxford) has been with the BBC for 28 years and is on £315k+.  The BBC will be back in front of the tribunal on Friday.