Lord Advocate attacks BBC over Glasgow bin lorry documentary

The Lord Advocate has attacked the BBC over its “sensationalist documentary” on the Glasgow bin lorry crash whose claims he said were “simply not true”.

Grieving families of those who were killed by Harry Clarke when he fainted at the wheel of a bin lorry on Queen Street in Glasgow city centre last December told the documentary “Lies, Laws and the Bin Lorry Tragedy”, that they felt misled by the the Crown Office.

Frank Mulholland QC and the Crown Office have come under criticism themselves for their handling of the case.

In the documentary, the families said the decision not to prosecute was taken by officials before they knew about Mr Clarke’s past – he had previously fainted while driving a bus and had not declared this to the DVLA.

It also claimed a senior Crown official called Mr Clarke a “fat, uneducated, west of Scotland” man.

Mr Mulholland and Crown agent Catherine Dyer have defended the prosecution service against the claims in a leaked statement.

The Lord Advocate claimed the Crown were fully aware of Mr Clarke’s driving record when they made the decision not to prosecute him.

The statement said: “It was for these reasons that the Lord Advocate took the unprecedented step of telephoning the controller of BBC Scotland to seek to persuade him not to broadcast these defamatory statements.”

It adds that the BBC refused a briefing from the Crown Office and that it had been contacted by staff asking for corrections to be made.

The pair also lent their support to the official accused of insulting Mr Clarke –head of the Crown’s Scottish Fatalities Investigation Unit David Green.

The statement said: “There were many aspects of the programme with which we take issue including the completely inaccurate assertion that the Crown took not to take criminal proceedings against the driver in ignorance of there being evidence suggesting that the driver had an episode of impaired consciousness at the wheel of a bus in 2010.

“That is not the case.

“However, what really concerned us was the assertion referred to the driver as a fat, uneducated, west of Scotland man at a meeting with bereaved families in March 2015. This is simply not true.

“The allegation that such words were used was made only when the BBC were making the documentary nearly nine months after the meeting.

“When we were advised, a week or so ago, that the BBC intended on broadcasting such an allegation we were very concerned for a number of reasons.

“Firstly it was not true, secondly a colleague confirmed it was not true, thirdly such an allegation was wholly inconsistent with unblemished record of well over 30 years as a dedicated public servant and also that as a civil servant he should not be identified and subject to personal attack attack regarding the carrying out of his official duties.”

A Crown Office spokesman said: “The Crown Office has repeatedly explained in public that we had all the relevant evidence before the decision was taken not to prosecute the driver of the bin lorry.

“We were concerned by the factual inaccuracies contained in a recent documentary and the lack of balance it provided and took steps to inform staff of the factual position.

“The Crown has consistently made it clear that the comments attributed to an official in the documentary were disputed.”

A spokesman for the BBC said: “We stand by our programme which examined claims of systemic and human failures that were raised by relatives of victims of the tragedy.”