BBC appoints Rachel Jupp as new director of news

BBC has named Rachel Jupp as its new director of news. The corporation said Jupp will receive a salary of £400,000. Her predecessor, Turness, began on a comparable wage in 2022; that figure had risen to between £445,000 and £449,999 during her final year in the post before she departed. Jupp will oversee roughly 4,500 employees and will also serve as a member of the BBC’s executive committee. Jonathan Munro, who has acted as interim head of the news division for the last 11 months, will resume his former position as deputy director of BBC News once Jupp assumes the role. Brittin praised Munro’s tenure, stating, “I would like to thank Jonathan Munro for his professionalism and stewardship of BBC News in the past 11 months. I have been personally grateful for his deep experience, calm head and steady hand.” The director general added that BBC News remains the most used and most trusted news provider worldwide and throughout the United Kingdom, but warned that the organisation confronts significant challenges. Brittin elaborated, “In a world of infinite choice, audiences are fragmenting, trust is scarce and facts are contested.” She continued, “It is our duty to recommit to the BBC’s distinctive journalistic mission while reinventing how we serve audiences, and to rise to these challenges. In Rachel, we have someone who can do both, with a fresh perspective to lead BBC News into a new era.” Turness exited the corporation after an internal memo leaked to the Telegraph revealed that a Panorama episode aired a year earlier had edited a remark by President Trump in a misleading fashion. The then‑director general, Tim Davie, also resigned over the affair; Brittin succeeded him earlier this year. The contested Panorama show spliced together two sections of a speech Trump delivered in 2021, shortly before the Capitol riots on 6 January. In response, Trump filed a $10 billion (£7.6 billion) lawsuit against the BBC. The broadcaster apologised, explaining that the edit had created “the mistaken impression that President Trump had made a direct call for violent action,” but it refused his demand for compensation. The case is presently set to go to trial in 2027.