Francesca Mary Unsworth (born 29 December 1957) is a British journalist and

media executive A media proprietor, also called a media executive, media mogul, media tycoon, or press baron is an entrepreneur who controls any means of public or commercial mass media, through the personal ownership or holding of a dominant position within a ...

. From January 2018 to 2022, she was Director, News & Current Affairs for

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...

. She was appointed in succession to James Harding. Before then, she served in various senior positions in the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

, including director of the

BBC World Service The BBC World Service is a British Public broadcasting, public service broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC. It is the world's largest external broadcaster in terms of reception area, language selection and audience reach. It broadcas ...

Group. Previously, she was acting director of News at the BBC from November 2012 until August 2013 and a member of the BBC's executive board. In 2013, she was appointed deputy director of News and Current Affairs.

Early life and education

Unsworth was born on 1957 in

Stoke-on-Trent Stoke-on-Trent (often abbreviated to Stoke) is a city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Staffordshire, England. It has an estimated population of 259,965 as of 2022, making it the largest settlement in Staffordshire ...

, Staffordshire. She attended St Dominic's High School, Stoke-on-Trent, a

direct grant grammar school A direct grant grammar school was a type of selective secondary school in the United Kingdom that existed between 1945 and 1976. One quarter of the places in these schools were directly funded by central government, while the remainder attracted ...

. She studied drama at the

University of Manchester The University of Manchester is a public university, public research university in Manchester, England. The main campus is south of Manchester city centre, Manchester City Centre on Wilmslow Road, Oxford Road. The University of Manchester is c ...

but was unable to get into a drama school and so switched careers to publishing in London.

BBC career

Unsworth began her broadcasting career in local radio, working at BBC Radio Leicester and BBC Radio Bristol, before going on to become producer of Radio 1's '' Newsbeat''. In 1990, she moved to Radio 4 and was based in Washington as a radio producer for the network during the Gulf crisis of 1990–1991. She worked as a producer on ''

The World at One ''The World at One'' (or ''WATO'', pronounced "what-oh") is BBC Radio 4's long-running lunchtime news and current affairs radio programme, broadcast weekdays from 13:00 to 13:45 and produced by BBC News. The programme describes itself as "Bri ...

'' and '' PM'' while at Radio 4. She moved to the BBC's Newsgathering Department in 1993, where she had responsibility for UK domestic news, and was a producer and editor for the '' BBC One O'Clock News'' and the '' BBC Six O'Clock News''. Unsworth was appointed Head of Newsgathering in January 2005. In December 2005, Unsworth appeared on the BBC's '' Newswatch'' programme, responding to accusations of double standards in

reporting of racial crimes when white people were the victims. Complainants suggested the BBC buried stories such as the racist murder of Kriss Donald, with comparable murders involving black victims given twelve times more coverage and the opening of an arts centre in

Gateshead Gateshead () is a town in the Gateshead Metropolitan Borough of Tyne and Wear, England. It is on the River Tyne's southern bank. The town's attractions include the twenty metre tall Angel of the North sculpture on the town's southern outskirts, ...

reported in preference to Donald's murder. Unsworth admitted the case had not been covered sufficiently and that there had been space to do so. Her department again failed to cover the case adequately the following year. In 2011, BBC News was criticised for referring to looters in the 2011 London riots as "protesters", even two days into the violence. In response to 62 complaints about the matter, Unsworth conceded that the BBC had been wrong to do so. In November 2012, Unsworth was appointed acting director of News after Helen Boaden stepped aside while Nick Pollard prepared his report into the BBC's non-coverage of the

Jimmy Savile sexual abuse scandal In late 2012, it emerged that Jimmy Savile, a British media personality who had died the previous year, had sexually abused hundreds of people throughout his life, mostly children but some as old as 75, and mostly female. He had been well kn ...

. She ceased working in this role in August 2013 and was appointed deputy director of News and Current Affairs. In November 2013, Unsworth was replaced as Head of Newsgathering by Jonathan Munro. In August 2014, Unsworth ordered helicopter filming of a police raid on a mansion belonging to singer

Cliff Richard Sir Cliff Richard (born Harry Rodger Webb; 14 October 1940) is a British singer and actor. He has total sales of over 21.5 million singles in the United Kingdom and, as of 2012, was the third-top-selling artist in UK Singles Chart histo ...

. The coverage led to Richard suing the BBC for breach of privacy. On 8 May 2018, ''The Guardian'' reported: "Sir Cliff Richard is seeking a payment of at least £560,000 from the BBC following the broadcaster's coverage of a police raid at his home in 2014." In July, Richard was awarded £210,000 in damages and the BBC agreed to pay £2 million in legal costs. Unsworth apologised to Richard and stated that "there were elements of its coverage that should have been handled differently" but criticised the ruling as an attack on liberty and press freedoms. In January 2018, she was invited to present evidence at a parliamentary select committee meeting on gender pay gap at the BBC. This was initiated by the resignation of the then China editor Carrie Gracie in the same month over the same issue. Unsworth defended the pay gap between Grace and the BBC's North America editor Jon Sopel as Sopel was "on air twice as much" and that "The China job sa more features-based agenda". Gracie also reported that Unsworth had privately commented to a colleague that the pay gap was due to her being part-time. Unsworth denied this stating "I did the contract, I knew she wasn't" but apologised to her for causing a 'misunderstanding' due to 'loose' language. BBC and Gracie agreed to an equal pay deal in June 2018 and she donated the back pay awarded to charity. In September 2021, it was announced that Unsworth will leave the BBC in 2022 after 40 years.

Other roles

Unsworth was president of the Society of Editors between 2011 and 2012, and is a board member of the organisation. She is also a board member of the European Union's

Erasmus Mundus The European Union's Erasmus Mundus programme (named after Erasmus, the Renaissance scholar) aims to enhance quality in higher education through scholarship A scholarship is a form of Student financial aid, financial aid awarded to students f ...

programme.

References

External links

*
Unsworth's BBC blog
{{DEFAULTSORT:Unsworth, Fran 1957 births Alumni of the University of Manchester BBC executives BBC News people BBC Radio 4 British radio executives Living people People from Stoke-on-Trent