Freedom Of Information: The Diana interview that changed BBC reporting

The BBC's relationship with the monarchy was never more strained than during its coverage of the troubled marriage of the Prince and Princess of Wales. The Princess's extraordinarily frank interview with Martin Bashir in November 1995, when she spoke about a relationship involving three people, was regarded as a declaration of war by the Palace. But senior executives in the BBC saw it rather differently.

Memos and letters released last month under the Freedom of Information Act reveal how cock-a-hoop the BBC was with its scoop. A memo written by the then Managing Director of News, Tony Hall, praises Martin Bashir for his "interview of a decade - if not of our generation". Mr Hall later claimed in his missive that his colleague had "changed the way we report the monarchy". He gushed:

But equally importantly you handled it with skill, sensitivity and excellent judgement. There were many pitfalls awaiting us - you avoided them all.

One of the biggest potential pitfalls was the handling of the relationship with the Palace, who would require notice of the imminent broadcast of the interview.

The documents reveal that the Princess had requested that she should be allowed to inform the Queen of the interview, which she did on 14 November, nine days after it had been recorded and six days before it was broadcast to a stunned nation.

Further documents show there was also much angst within the BBC about how to capitalise on the interview, in particular the question of whether they should sell copies of the interview to the public. After a great deal of umming and ahhing - not to mention several thousand pounds of licence-fee money spent on an opinion poll asking the public how the profits from a release should be used - the BBC Board of Governors decided not to release a video of the event.

A report by the Deputy Director-General concluded:

Following transmission of the Panorama interview with the Princess of Wales, it was decided not to publish a video release of the programme on the grounds that the public interest had already been served by the transmission and the widespread publication of the transcript.

There is no doubt that since Diana's death the Panorama interview has taken on a greater significance than Mr Bashir and Mr Hall could have ever intended.

But did this outstanding scoop really change the way the BBC and the rest of the media reports on the monarchy? There was a reminder this week how commonplace the one-on-one television interview with the royal family has become when Prince William and Prince Harry appeared on an American network to talk about their feelings for their dead mother.

But what seems to have been lost in the self-congratulatory tone of Mr Hall's note to Mr Bashir is the fact that in June 1994, the year before Diana gave her Panorama interview, Prince Charles had already appeared on ITV talking openly to Jonathan Dimbleby about his own adulterous relationship with Camilla.

Moreover, 12 years later there is still no sign the Queen is prepared to consent to televisual inquisition about her marriage to the Duke of Edinburgh or any other aspect of her private life. If that ever happened it really would be the scoop of the decade, if not the century.

r.verkaik@independent.co.uk