BBC disciplinary case totals revealed

This article has been amended following a legal complaint. The BBC has recorded about 300 official staff disciplinary cases over the past four years, on accusations ranging from bullying to theft of property and conflict of interest, according to official figures released to MediaGuardian.co.uk under the Freedom of Information Act. Despite claims of excess at the corporation, the category of alcohol dependence/substance abuse accounted for only nine of the cases, with the largest number – 87 – in a catch-all "behaviour/conduct" category, against 42 for absence, eight for poor timekeeping, 12 for bullying and harassment, and 22 for conflicts of interest. The figures cover a period from April 2006, when the BBC first began to list disciplinary proceedings in a central database, to 10 February 2010, and cover a pool of more than 17,000 employees. The drug and alcohol figures were condemned as too low by Sarah Graham, a former BBC producer who used cocaine while working there and believes the corporation has a "cocaine culture". She told MediaGuardian.co.uk: "I am not surprised by the low figures, because BBC management are not skilled in recognising any employees who may be suffering from drug abuse or dependency. "There is a covert tolerance of cocaine abuse across the BBC and other media organisations. Because of the ignorance of cocaine abuse, a lot of the symptoms of cocaine abuse are regarded as 'creative genius'." Graham, who worked on children's programmes at the BBC, gave evidence to the home affairs select committee last year, where she claimed she was offered cocaine on her first day at work at the corporation. Carmen Collins – the mother of Natasha Collins, the BBC presenter who was found dead last year – told the media last year the corporation should introduce random drugs testing on all staff. The corporation commented: "There is no contractual right to test employees and, as is made clear by government guidelines, any such right should only be introduced in the work-place in order to address an identifiable risk to safety. To make random drug testing the norm would be a gross intrusion into the privacy of law-abiding employees." The Sachsgate affair – which followed the broadcast of Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand's prank phone calls to actor Andrew Sachs on Radio 2 in October 2008 – may have been one of the 31 cases that the BBC investigated in 2008/09. However, the BBC refused to confirm whether Sachsgate was recorded in the database. "We never comment on individual disciplinary matters," said a spokesman. In the financial year 2008/09, the Human Resources Case Management database records three bullying cases, one of which is believed to be that of Richard Evans, the former Radio 4 and Radio 5 Live presenter, who also read the news on Zoe Ball's breakfast show. In November 2008, Evans had his contract for a lunchtime phone-in show on BBC Radio Wales terminated after colleagues made allegations of bullying against him. Evans has always denied the allegations. He later took the BBC to an employment tribunal and was awarded £100,000 in compensation. Cases involving employees of subsidiaries such as BBC Studios & Post Production Ltd, UKTV, BBC World, BBC Worldwide and the World Service Trust are not included in the figures. Last night a BBC spokesman said: "The BBC makes clear the standards of behaviour expected of our employees. We take all allegations of misconduct seriously and where necessary will take disciplinary action. "The HRCM database was set up to create a central record of disciplinary action. Before it was created information was held by departments locally. We never comment on individual disciplinary matters." • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email [email protected] or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. • If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication". • This article was amended on 9 March 2010. The original mistakenly said that Sarah Graham told told the home affairs select committee there should be random drugs testing at the BBC. This has been corrected.