A BBC newsreader who went viral after visibly reacting while changing the phrase "pregnant people" to "women" during a live broadcast has been found to have breached the corporation’s impartiality rules.
Martine Croxall, 56, was the subject of 20 viewer complaints, which were upheld on the basis that she "expressed a controversial view about trans people", the BBC confirmed.
The incident occurred as Ms Croxall altered the script for her introduction to a brief item on research from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine concerning heat-related deaths.
The Executive Complaints Unit (ECU) considered the complaint in the light of the BBC’s editorial standards of impartiality and said the facial expression, which accompanied the change of “people” to “women”, laid it “open to the interpretation that it indicated a particular viewpoint in the controversies currently surrounding trans identity”.
The clip went viral on social media, with Harry Potter author JK Rowling writing on X: “I have a new favourite BBC presenter.”
Ms Croxall said “the aged, pregnant people … women” in the clip and was reacting to scripting with “clumsily incorporated phrases”, according to BBC News.
Management told the ECU that this included “the aged”, which is not BBC style, and “pregnant people”, which did not match what was said in the clip that followed.
The ECU said critical views expressed in the complaints, alongside the congratulatory messages Ms Croxall later received on social media, “tended to confirm that the impression of her having expressed a personal view was widely shared across the spectrum of opinion on the issue”.
The ECU upheld its complaint as “giving the strong impression of expressing a personal view on a controversial matter, even if inadvertently, falls short of the BBC’s expectations of its presenters and journalists in relation to impartiality.”
The finding was reported to the management of BBC News and discussed with Ms Croxall and the editorial team concerned.
