South Yorkshire police chief told that Tony Hall may divulge full extent of exchanges with force when he appears before MPs

The BBC may reportedly take the unusual step of releasing off-the-record conversations with South Yorkshire police following the force’s continued criticism of its coverage of the raid on Sir Cliff Richard’s property.

James Harding, the BBC’s director of news and current affairs, in a letter to South Yorkshire police chief David Crompton, said BBC director general Tony Hall may divulge the full extent of the corporation’s exchanges with the force when he appears before MPs on Tuesday, according to Tuesday’s Independent.

Harding said it was not the BBC’s “general policy” to divulge off-the-record conversations, but it may be required to do so in order to address the criticism levelled against it when Hall gives evidence to the home affairs select committee on Tuesday afternoon.

Crompton, who wrote to the committee’s chairman, Labour MP Keith Vaz, about the BBC’s coverage, has accused the corporation of trying to “cover up the fact that it had initiated contact with the force about this story” and said it was “misleading and known by the BBC to be inaccurate”.

Harding wrote to Crompton on 29 August, saying: “Our general policy is that we do not reveal the content of off-the-record conversations that occur in the course of our journalism.

“We have so far upheld this position in relation to South Yorkshire police. But I am prompted to write to you by the particular circumstances in which we now find ourselves. You have made a series of comments about the nature of your force’s engagement with the BBC in a letter to Keith Vaz.

“In order that the BBC can answer the questions put by the home affairs select committee and address the points made in your letter, may we presume that we are free to divulge the nature of the discussions and exchanges that took place between the BBC and South Yorkshire police?”

Both the BBC and the South Yorkshire police faced criticism following the corporation’s coverage of the raid on the singer’s £3.1m Berkshire apartment, footage of which was filmed from a helicopter flying overhead.

The BBC declined to comment ahead of Tuesday’s hearing, with Hall and Crompton due to begin giving evidence to MPs at 3.30pm.

Hall, in a separate letter to Vaz, has previously said that he believes BBC journalists “acted appropriately in pursuing the story”.

“The disclosure of a sex abuse allegation against Sir Cliff Richard and the police search of his property was clearly a significant story and the BBC was not alone in providing extensive coverage,” he said.

The raid was part of an investigation of an allegation of sexual abuse of a boy under 16 at a Christian rally in Sheffield in 1985. Richard has denied the allegation, saying it was “completely false”.

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