A former BBC employee raised concerns about “unacceptable bullying” by Tim Westwood when he was a Radio 1 DJ but felt they were warned against taking further action, the Guardian has learned.
The corporation is facing further questions over its handling of complaints made against Westwood after another former staff member described a sexist “boys’ club” culture at Radio 1 during his 19 years as a presenter, mainly in the 1990s and 2000s.
After a joint investigation by the Guardian and BBC News published allegations of sexual misconduct and predatory behaviour against the DJ in April, the BBC director general, Tim Davie, initially said the corporation had no evidence of complaints.
It later confirmed it had received six complaints related to allegations of bullying and sexual misconduct following a freedom of information request from BBC News, and said an internal investigation would be published. Davie had “set out the position as he understood it at the time”, said a BBC spokesperson.
A former staff member, who asked to remain anonymous, said they worked with Westwood in the early 2010s. They provided a timeline of issues they raised on multiple occasions, including alleged “unacceptable bullying”. The staffer said the complaints did not relate to sexual misconduct.
In an email to a BBC executive seen by the Guardian, they state: “I have already had a conversation with you about the ongoing difficulties we’re having with Tim’s staffing/duty of care. We’re in a real pickle now as essentially, there’s no one who wants to work on that show.”
The executive replied with a promise to “work out what next steps might be needed” with other senior leaders, adding they had to “balance our needs to look after the staff with our need to produce some difficult talent”.
The former staff member said they were then spoken to by a different senior executive, and was told to be “really careful about saying the words ‘duty of care’”.
While some executives had tried to find solutions before this point, the former staffer said this conversation felt designed to silence. “What I got from that was: be quiet, don’t say any more, be careful what you say,” they said.
The Guardian approached Westwood for comment. He did not respond.
The BBC said its internal investigation was being carried out by its corporate investigations and internal audit teams and will report directly to the BBC board’s director, Sir Nicholas Serota.
A BBC spokesperson said: “We are taking this incredibly seriously and want to understand what happened with regard to the BBC. At the beginning of the month we confirmed we had received a number of complaints relating to allegations of bullying and sexual harassment. As we have set out, we are fully committed to investigating them and when that work has concluded we will publish findings.”
Westwood stepped down from his show on Capital Xtra in April after accusations by seven women of sexual misconduct and predatory behaviour, which he denied. Ten more women made claims of sexual abuse, sexual misconduct and inappropriate behaviour in a further Guardian/BBC News investigation.
Another former employee, who worked with Westwood for a number of years in the 2000s, described a “boys’ club” culture and said official and unofficial complaints had been made about his treatment of co-workers. “Everyone knew what he was like,” they said. “There was a culture of ‘don’t piss off the talent’, and everyone else was fair game.”
They said the atmosphere around the DJ was “unprofessional” and there was anger among former employees at the BBC’s initial response to the Guardian/BBC News investigation, calling it “a complete whitewash”.
Another former producer who had experience of working on Westwood’s show said she had experienced sexism, such as him asking others to rate her attractiveness while on air. “The culture around it was so normalised that you just dealt with it as part of your job,” she said.
A woman who contacted the Guardian said she went for work experience with Westwood when she was 18 in 1999, after he replied to an email request from her.
There were several other young women in the studio, she said. She asked a member of Westwood’s security detail if she should return the following week, and he asked what she was “willing to do”. She said she suggested picking out records and researching artists. “And then he was like: ‘No, what are you willing to do?’ And that’s when the penny kind of dropped and I was like: ‘Oh, hell no.’”
She said that at the end of the show she met Westwood and asked how she could prepare before his next show. “He was like ‘No, no, you don’t need to do any of that, you just come and hang out with me,’” she said. She added that he asked if she wanted to go back to his flat with him and other members of his entourage.
“I said I had to go to the toilet, hid in the toilet for maybe about 15 minutes. I came out and got a bus back home and never went back,” she said.
