BBC apologises to Bashir whisteblower Matt Wiessler

The whistleblower who tried to expose Martin Bashir’s methods for landing his exclusive Panorama interview with Diana, Princess of Wales has said he wants to “move on” after he received a personal apology from the director-general of the BBC.

Graphic designer Matt Wiessler was sidelined by the corporation after raising concerns that fake bank statements he mocked up for Mr Bashir had been used by the journalist to persuade Diana to do the interview.

Speaking after a meeting at the BBC where he received a personal apology from current director-general Tim Davie, he was asked why the apology was important to him.

He told BBC News: “Because I still felt that to this day that the BBC were just saying things to sort of appease me but I have come away from it feeling no they really really they support me and they feel really genuinely want to, not help me, but clear up the past and start again on a sort of friendly relationship.”

Asked about the prospect of being paid compensation, he said: “There might well be but I’m not involved in that and Tim and I have spoken about that quite openly, it’s sort of confidential but we very much both just want to move on.”

A recent invesigation by Lord Dyson into the interview criticised the methods Mr Bashir used to secure his bombshell 1995 Panorama interview.

The report also suggested the BBC had failed to uphold “governance, accountability and scrutiny”.

A BBC spokeswoman said of the meeting: “It was both constructive and positive, but as you’d expect, we are not going to get into the specifics of a private meeting.”