Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, whether she has had recent discussions with the Director General of the BBC on impartiality in its coverage of the Israel and Gaza conflict.

The BBC has a duty to provide accurate and impartial news and information. That is particularly important when it comes to coverage of highly sensitive events. The BBC’s accuracy and impartiality is critical to viewer trust.

The events in Israel since 7 October are terrorist acts committed by a terrorist organisation, proscribed in the United Kingdom since 2021 and designated as such by many other governments and international organisations.

The BBC is editorially and operationally independent and decisions around its editorial policies and guidelines are therefore a matter for the BBC.

However, calling these acts what they are, and accurately labelling the perpetrators, helps audiences to understand what has happened, is happening and its context.

That is why the Secretary of State has communicated with the BBC, and with the public, her disappointment that the BBC has refused to describe Hamas as terrorists, or the atrocities it has carried out as terrorism. The Secretary of State made that point to the BBC on multiple occasions since the terrorist attacks on 7 October.

As the external independent regulator of the BBC, Ofcom is responsible for ensuring BBC coverage is duly impartial and accurate under the Broadcasting Code and BBC Charter. Ofcom has been clear that responsibility lies with the BBC to decide the vocabulary it uses to describe unfolding events. The Broadcasting Code does not prevent broadcasters referring to terrorist organisations, nor does it prevent them referring to Hamas as terrorists.