With Peter Rippon stepping aside, George Entwistle is in the direct firing line. One question that he needs to answer at his outing at the Culture, Media & Sport Select Committee this morning is who was in charge of spinning the story last Christmas. This piece from February’s Oldie magazine by Miles Goslett should be read by every single member of the CMS Select Committee:

It was the first publication to state that Newsnight’s exposé centred on underage girls of 14 or 15; the first to reveal that some of the abuse allegedly occurred on BBC premises in 1973/4 after recordings of Clunk-Click; the first to divulge that two other celebrities had been named to Newsnight as also being guilty of abusing girls with Savile on BBC premises; and the first to mention that Mark Thompson knew all about this before Christmas but did nothing.

This is the story that seven papers turned down last December based on this BBC denial:

‘Any suggestion that a story was dropped for anything other than editorial reasons is completely untrue.’

Who approved that line George?