BBC Trust tightens online editorial rules for journalists

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Stronger guidelines on how BBC journalists use online and social sites professionally have been issued by the corporation's governing body.

The draft version of the BBC Trust's Editorial Guidelines released yesterday said BBC journalists are the public face of the corporation.

"They can have a significant impact on perceptions of our impartiality," said the guidelines, which have been opened to public consultation for the first time .

As such BBC journalists, including those in news and current affairs departments, 'may not express personal views on public policy, on matters of political or industrial controversy or on 'controversial subjects" in any other area'.

"Our audiences should not be able to tell from BBC programmes or other BBC output the personal prejudices of our journalists and presenters on such matters," they said.

"This applies as much to online content as it does to news bulletins: nothing should be written by journalists and presenters that would not be said on air."

According to a Guardian.co.uk report , industry observers have referred to the recommendation as the 'Jeremy Bowen clause', after complaints against the BBC Middle East editor were partially upheld by the BBC Trust in April for online comments about the legacy of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

Speaking to Journalism.co.uk at an event in May, BBC director-general Mark Thompson commented on the corporation's policy towards its journalists' private and professional presence online .

"In the same way we're very careful about the boundaries for our news and affairs correspondents writing columns in newspapers. There isn't really a Chinese Wall you can draw between personal opinion and what appears on the BBC - the same thing with the blogs and the tweets," he said.

"What you can't do easily is take off the cloak of the BBC and put it back on at will."

The BBC's policy towards its journalists' private and professional use of third-party sites is in development.

The guidelines, which are revised every five years, are the first to be issued since the Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross 'Sachsgate' controversy and cover everything from impartiality to the handling of competitions.

Recommendations have also been made for the handling of user-generated content and the use of links to external websites.

A named individual must be in place in each relevant division to take editorial responsibility for any user-generated content published, the guidelines suggested.

Links to third-party sites should normally lead to sites that are factually accurate, unless using an external site to showcase a particular view, they said.

"[I]n such cases we may not be able to guarantee their factual accuracy. But we should not support the message, information or promotions on third party sites," the draft outlined.

In its review of bbc.co.uk last year , the Trust said the corporation should act as a 'trusted guide' to the web. T he news site has since trialled links to third-party sites within articles.

The public consultation on the draft editorial guidelines will close on December 24.