BBC's Tim Davie asks if he could 'have done more' over Russell Brand

BBC director-general Tim Davie says he has asked himself if he could ‘have done more’ over Russell Brand’s time at the Beeb – and says issue of bad sexual behaviour in TV is not just in the past

• Channel 4 boss Alex Mahon said Brand’s alleged behaviour was ‘disgusting’ 
• Brand denies any wrongdoing and insists his relationships were ‘consensual’  

BBC director-general Tim Davie says he has questioned whether he could have done more over Russell Brand during his time as the corporation’s radio boss.

Both he and Channel 4’s chief executive Alex Mahon also raised concerns that ‘terrible behaviour’ toward women in the industry that was ‘historically tolerated’ is not ‘wholly historic’ and is ‘still a problem’.

Speaking at the Royal Television Society Cambridge Convention on Wednesday, Mr Davie refused to rule out an external review into what went on with Brand at the BBC.

It comes a day after the director-general announced a BBC probe into Russell Brand’s time at the corporation after the comedian was accused of rape and sexual assault.

Mr Davie, who for a short time was in charge of BBC radio when Brand was still there, was asked whether he regretted more was not done at the time to find out about Brand’s behaviour.

Russell Brand has been accused of rape, assault and emotional abuse between 2006 and 2013, when he was at the height of his fame. He denies the allegations (pictured in 2017)

BBC director-general Tim Davie says he has asked himself if he could ‘have done more’ over Russell Brand’s time at the BBC (Davie pictured above earlier this year)

At the time of the claims, Brand was working for the Channel 4 as well as the BBC and starring in Hollywood films (pictured last Friday in a video denying the ‘very serious’ allegations) 

Tim Davie, speaking to journalist Kate Buckley at the Royal Television Society’s Cambridge Convention on Wednesday, said he was ‘asking those questions’ about whether he could have ‘done more’ about Russell Brand while the comedian was at the BBC

The director-general, who has already said he ‘wasn’t aware of the serious allegations’ against Brand before the comedian resigned over the Andrew Sachs scandal, said: ‘I always look back with hindsight when you hear things coming out and you go “Could you have done more?”… We’re all asking those questions.’

Mr Davie, in his former radio role, was involved in the BBC’s report into ‘Sachsgate’, when on air on Radio 2 Brand and Jonathan Ross left lewd message on the Fawlty Tower’s actor’s voicemail about his granddaughter.

But the BBC chief defended that probe saying the corporation did a ‘rigorous piece of work’ on the situation which led to ‘significant departures’.

READ MORE: Moment Russell Brand jokes about ‘begging for threesomes’ and having an ‘orgy’ with audience members in unearthed clip from his sold-out ‘Shame’ tour in 2006

Both he and Ms Mahon, who was also at the event, raised concerns that this type of behaviour may still exist in parts of the broadcasting industry.

Mr Davie said: ‘I’d echo Alex’s words that I thought were extremely well put which is I think we just can’t be complacent.

‘And this is not an issue that can be just put down as wholly historic, if I’m honest…’

In her speech to the convention, Channel 4 boss Ms Mahon said the Brand allegations show that ‘terrible behaviour’ towards women has been ‘historically tolerated’ in the industry.

She added while this behaviour was ‘less prevalent now’ it was ‘still a problem’.

Ms Mahon added: ‘The allegations made against Russell Brand are horrendous and as a CEO of Channel 4 and as a woman in our industry, I found the behaviours described in Dispatches and The Sunday Times and The Times articles disgusting and saddening.’

When Mr Davie announced the BBC review into Brand on Tuesday, he said it will look into ‘any complaints’ made against the comedian and allegations that a BBC car was used to pick up a 16-year-old schoolgirl and take her to Brand’s house.

Asked if it could eventually lead to an external review of what went on, he said: ‘I don’t rule out anything I just want to get the facts.’

He added there had been ‘deep problems with misogyny’ and ‘abuse of power’ in the industry and ‘we just have to be utterly vigilant’ and be ‘unaccepting of it’.

Brand has been accused of rape, assault and emotional abuse between 2006 and 2013, following a joint investigation by The Times, Sunday Times and Channel 4’s Dispatches.

The comedian, who used to work on BBC Radio 2 and BBC Radio 6 Music programmes from 2006 to 2008, has strongly denied the allegations.

Channel 4 chief executive Alex Mahon (pictured) has said the Russell Brand allegations show that ‘terrible behaviour’ towards women has been ‘historically tolerated’ in the industry 

The comedian released a video last week refuting all the allegations against him. Pictured: Brand leaving the Troubabour Wembley Park theatre after a gig on Saturday night

Alice (pictured) alleges that Russell Brand sexually assaulted her when she was 16 years old. She claims he would send a car to pick her up from her secondary school lessons, which she has since claimed was a ‘BBC car’

Channel 4 and the BBC have taken down shows featuring Brand from their streaming services.

Since the allegations were made public on Saturday, Dispatches claims to have received new complaints about the star, which programme chiefs say they are now investigating. 

Ms Mahon added that her channel had invited anyone that knew about such behaviour to come to them directly as well as noting that they had set up a process for people to contact the broadcaster anonymously if they needed to.

READ MORE: Russell Brand’s friends DEFEND him in the wake of ‘shocking’ rape allegations – and insist wife Laura WILL stand by him: ‘He is vulgar and he is offensive but he is NOT a monster’

‘They are not empty words or gestures from all of us, they are what is meant by our duty of care’, she continued.

‘We will seek to find out who knew, who was told what and what was or wasn’t referred up.’

‘There is still more change that needs to come and Channel 4, along with those others, are at the forefront of that change’, she added.

Brand vehemently denies the allegations, which also include claims of controlling, abusive and predatory behaviour, and said – in a video posted online on Friday night – that all of his relationships had been ‘consensual’.

Alistair Jackson, investigations editor of Dispatches, said: ‘We put our contacts at the end of the programme at the end of the film and our team has spent most of the time since reaching out to people who got in contact.’

Mr Jackson told the BBC’s Newscast podcast the claims included ‘serious allegations’ and his team were advising the women to speak to the police, if they so wished.

The new allegations have not yet been investigated or proven with the Dispatches team saying it would rigorously check them.

A Channel 4 source also told the i newspaper: ‘It is imperative that we respect the bravery and privacy of anyone who comes forward with more information about inappropriate or offensive behaviour. 

‘We must also ensure we do not share any information which might potentially prejudice any future investigation or process so it wouldn’t be appropriate at this moment in time to provide details about information which has been shared with us.’

The comments from the Channel 4 boss come after it was today revealed that Paramount+ has removed Brand’s 2009 comedy show ‘Live in New York City’ – following in the footsteps of YouTube and the BBC in cutting ties.

Brand, 48, was accused over the weekend by four women of rape and sexual assault, as well as extreme emotional abuse and manipulation. 

The show has been taken down, and an error message in its place

Russell Brand’s 2009 comedy special was available on Paramount+ until Tuesday morning

He denies the allegations, insisting all his relationships were consensual, and claiming he is the victim of a ‘mainstream media plot’ to derail his YouTube career as a wellness guru. Yesterday, however, Paramount+ took the show down.

His most recent stand-up special, ‘Russell Brand Re:Birth,’ remains available on Netflix. Netflix has not commented.

Paramount+’s move came after YouTube suspended lucrative adverts on his channel, he was dumped by his book publisher and agent, and discarded by charities.

The tour dates for his one-man stage show have been axed, he faces a police investigation and a probe by the Charity Commission.

His back catalogue of comedy shows is being wiped from Channel 4’s streaming service and from iPlayer after BBC director-general Tim Davie called them ‘completely unacceptable’, with the BBC declaring its former star’s material ‘falls below public expectations’.

Mr Davie pledged a full review of Brand’s time at the corporation from 2006 to 2008, including the presenter’s alleged use of a BBC chauffeur to collect a 16-year-old schoolgirl from lessons for sex.

Brand is seen on Saturday leaving a gig in London – the last time he was seen in public 

The BBC, where Brand was a host on Radio 2 and a guest on other channels, said the ‘limited content featuring Russell Brand on iPlayer and BBC Sounds’ had been removed ‘having assessed that it now falls below public expectations’.

Channel 4, where Brand burnished his name in the mainstream media fronting a Big Brother spin-off show in the 2000s, also erased his shows including a Celebrity Bake Off episode from its streaming service ‘while we look into this matter’.

READ MORE: Is Russell Brand’s £16m fortune now at risk? Star could still earn up to £80,000 a post on Rumble, make sponsored videos or sell exclusive content on his OWN website – despite YouTube cutting off £1m a year he earned from adverts

Brand’s book publisher Bluebird, an imprint of Pan Macmillan, ‘paused all future publishing’ with him, while Comic Relief, where he took part in its BBC telethons, said ‘it would not be appropriate for us to work with Russell Brand’.

The Charity Commission is examining Brand’s role at his addiction foundation the Stay Free Foundation following the revelations.

Brand denies any criminal wrongdoing. More women are now coming forward to accuse Brand of sexual misconduct. 

Among the latest accusations, a woman has alleged Brand taunted her about her looks and sang about the Soham killer Ian Huntley during sex. 

‘Lisa’ told The Times she was invited to the comedian’s house in 2008, when she was in her early twenties, with a female friend of hers for a threesome, and because the two women’s real names sounded vaguely similar to ‘Holly and Jessica’, 

Brand started making vile jokes about the ten-year-old girls who were murdered by Huntley in 2002.

Esme, another woman who spoke to The Times, said she told the comedian ‘no’ when he asked her back to his house about 15 years ago, and was shocked when his driver took them there anyway. 

YouTube suspended lucrative adverts on his channel, he was dumped by his book publisher and agent, and discarded by charities. Pictured: On Comic Relief in 2017

Thought to be one of his main revenue streams, he has 6.6million subscribers to his YouTube channel, allowing him to earn an estimated £1million a year from the adverts shown whenever someone watches one of his videos

Thought to be one of his main revenue streams, he has 6.6million subscribers to his YouTube channel, allowing him to earn an estimated $1.2million a year from the adverts shown whenever someone watches one of his videos.

Sara McCorquodale, of social media analysis agency CORQ, estimated ‘he is most likely making $2,400 to $4,400 per video’, and he has been filming up to five each week. He may still be earning cash from merchandising and sponsorships.

And he is likely to be still earning fees from Rumble, a more Right-wing version of YouTube, where his almost-daily posts have a potential of earning up to $99,000 each.

But since the weekend when he was accused of rape and a string of sexual assaults in a Sunday Times and Channel 4 Dispatches investigation, followed by an allegation from 2003 being investigated by the Metropolitan Police yesterday, his profile has gone into freefall.

The 48-year-old comic and ‘wellness’ guru strenuously denies all the claims and calls them a wild conspiracy by the ‘mainstream media’, saying all his relationships during his ‘time of promiscuity’ were fully consensual.

Russell Brand’s comments in full:  

Hello there you awakening wonders. Now this is not the usual type of video we make on this channel where we critique, attack and undermine the news in all its corruption because in this story I am the news.

I have received two extremely disturbing letters – or a letter and an email – one from a mainstream media TV company, one from a newspaper listing a litany of extremely egregious and aggressive attacks, as well as some pretty stupid stuff, like my community festival should be stopped and I shouldn’t be able to attack mainstream media narratives on this channel.

But amidst this litany of astonishing rather baroque attacks are some very serious allegations that I absolutely refute. These allegations pertain to a time when I was in the mainstream, when I was in the newspapers all the time, when I was in the movies, and as I’ve written about extensively in my books I was very, very promiscuous.

During that time of promiscuity the relationships I had were absolutely always consensual. I was always transparent about that then, almost too transparent, and I am being transparent about it now as well.

And to see that transparency metastasized into something criminal that I absolutely deny makes me question is there another agenda at play. 

Particularly when we have seen coordinated media attacks before, like Joe Rogan where he dared to take a medicine the mainstream media didn’t approve of and we saw a spate of headlines of media outlets around the world using the same language.

I am aware that you guys in the comments have been for a while saying ‘watch out Russell, they’re coming for you,’ ‘you are getting too close to the truth’, ‘Russell Brand did not kill himself’.’

I know a year ago there was a spate of articles: Russell Brand is a conspiracy theorists; Russell Brand is right wing.

I am aware of newspapers making phone calls, sending letters to people I know. For ages and ages, it’s been clear to me or at least feels to be there’s a serious and consorted agenda to control these kinds of spaces and these kind of voices.

I need my voice along with your voice. I don’t mind them using my books and my stand up to talk about my promiscuous sexual conduct in the past. What I seriously refute are these very, very serious, criminal allegations.

Also its worth mentioning that there are witnesses whose evidence directly contradicts the narratives that these two mainstream media outlets are trying to construct, apparently in what seems to be to me a coordinated attack.

Now, I don’t want to get into this any further because of the serious nature of the allegations but I feel like I’m being attacked and plainly they are working very closely together.

We are obviously going to look into this matter because it is very, very serious. 

In the meantime, I want you to stay close, stay awake but more importantly than any of that, if you can stay free. 

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