Editing Ian Trethowan

{{short description|British journalist}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2020}}
{{Use British English|date=April 2012}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| honorific_prefix    = [[Sir]]
| name                = Ian Trethowan
| image               = 
| caption             = 
| office              = 9th [[Director-General of the BBC]]
| term_start          = 1977
| term_end            = 1982
| predecessor         = [[Charles Curran (television executive)|Sir Charles Curran]]
| successor           = [[Alasdair Milne]]
| birth_name          = James Ian Raley Trethowan
| birth_date          = {{birth date|df=y|1922|10|20}}
| birth_place         = [[High Wycombe]], [[Buckinghamshire]], England
| death_date          = {{Death date and age|df=y|1990|12|12|1922|10|20}}
| death_place         = [[London]], England
| resting_place       = 
| resting_place_coordinates = 
| residence           = 
| nationality         = British
| other_names         = 
| known_for           = 
| education           = [[Christ's Hospital]]
| employer            = 
| occupation          = [[Political journalist]], radio and television presenter
| title               = 
| salary              = 
| networth            = 
| height              = 
| weight              = 
| party               = 
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}}

'''Sir James Ian Raley Trethowan''' (20 October 1922 – 12 December 1990) was a British journalist, radio and television broadcaster and administrator who eventually became [[Director-General of the BBC|Director-General]] of the [[BBC]] from 1 October 1977 to 31 July 1982, having previously been managing director of BBC network radio from 1970 to 1976.

==Early life and education==
Son of Major James Jackson Raley Trethowan (1893-1974), of 6, Ashleigh Court, [[Surbiton]], [[Surrey]], formerly of [[High Wycombe]], [[Buckinghamshire]],<ref>{{cite web | url=https://livesofthefirstworldwar.iwm.org.uk/lifestory/4493209 | title=Life story: James Jackson Raley Trethowan &#124; Lives of the First World War }}</ref> [[Order of the British Empire|MBE]], a retired officer of the [[York and Lancaster Regiment]] who worked in business, army welfare, and sports writing for the Sunday papers (including the [[Sunday Times]], [[Evening Standard]], and [[Yorkshire Post]]),<ref>The Author's and Writer's Who's Who, Burke's Peerage Ltd, 1963, p. 486</ref> after leaving the Army, and his first wife, Winifred, née Timms, Trethowan was educated at the independent [[Christ's Hospital]] school near [[Horsham]] in [[West Sussex]].<ref>{{cite ODNB | url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/display/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-40167 | doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/40167 | date=2004 | title=Trethowan, Sir (James) Ian Raley (1922–1990), journalist and broadcaster }}</ref>

==Career==
Trethowan started work as a journalist and parliamentary lobby correspondent. He became a presenter for [[ITN|Independent Television News]] in the late 1950s and early 1960s, co-presenting [[ITN]]'s coverage of the [[1959 United Kingdom general election|1959 general election]].

He moved to the BBC in about 1963, and was part of [[Grace Wyndham Goldie]]'s group of heavy hitting journalists which included [[Richard Dimbleby]] and [[Robin Day]]. Trethowan was a regular presenter of political programmes such as ''[[Gallery (TV series)|Gallery]]'', ''[[Panorama (British TV programme)|Panorama]]'' and general election and budget specials. He presented the BBC's tribute programme to President [[John F. Kennedy]] on the day of his [[Assassination of John F. Kennedy|assassination]].

A [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative]], and a close friend of the former prime minister Sir [[Edward Heath]], Trethowan has been criticised for his support of the [[MI5|Security Service]] "vetting" of BBC employees which has often been seen as a means of weeding out leftists in the corporation. Trethowan allowed MI5 to remove half the content from a [[Panorama (British TV programme)|Panorama]] documentary made by BBC journalist [[Tom Mangold]], this emerged in December 2011, when 30-year-old British government papers were released. Trethowan told the press at the time that nobody from the government had seen the film or put pressure on the BBC but in fact he had met the heads of Security Service ([[MI5]]) and the [[MI6|Secret Intelligence Service]] (MI6), shown them a tape of the programme and invited them to suggest cuts to it.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Winston |first1=Brian |title=A Right to Offend |date=2012-09-13 |publisher=Bloomsbury Academic |isbn=978-1849660037 |page=351 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CzF824TavGQC&pg=PA351 |accessdate=23 August 2020}}</ref> The programme-makers defended their programme and, although changes were made, the transmitted version still annoyed the intelligence agencies.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16358075|title=Secret service pressed BBC to censor Panorama - papers|work=BBC News|last=Corera|first=Gordon|date=30 December 2011}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16369440|title=Panorama reporter recalls BBC censorship|work=BBC News|date=30 December 2011}}</ref> However, his genuflection to those in power ensured that his five years in charge of the BBC were generally very stable and secure for the organisation.

Cautious and conservative-minded, he was responsible for the sacking of [[Kenny Everett]] from [[BBC Radio 1|Radio 1]] in 1970 for making a joke suggesting that the wife of [[John Peyton, Baron Peyton of Yeovil|John Peyton]], the transport minister in the Conservative government, had only passed her driving test because she had "slipped the examiner a fiver".

In 1979, when Trethowan was Director-General, the BBC governors scuppered a plan to broadcast [[Michael Parkinson]]'s chat show three nights a week, probably because the idea seemed too populist.

Trethowan's final months at the BBC saw the [[Premiership of Margaret Thatcher|Thatcher government]] dissatisfied with what it saw as the corporation's insufficiently patriotic coverage of the [[Falklands War]]. From 1987 until his death from [[motor neurone disease]], he was chairman of [[Thames Television]]. He was [[Knight Bachelor|knighted]] in 1980.

In 1994, when announcing her plans to reduce the dominance of [[received pronunciation]] and include more regional accents on [[BBC Radio 3|Radio 3]] and [[BBC Radio 4|Radio 4]], [[Liz Forgan]] (who then held Trethowan's old post as managing director of BBC network radio) said that she wanted to move away from the attitude she said he had expressed when he heard a [[Brummie dialect|Birmingham accent]] on BBC radio and said "What is that sound doing on the BBC? Get it off."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.transdiffusion.org/2007/03/01/halfforgotten_g|title=Half-forgotten great – BBC – Transdiffusion Broadcasting System|website=transdiffusion.org|access-date=5 October 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.putlearningfirst.com/language/12dial/bbc.html|title=The BBC Accent|website=putlearningfirst.com|access-date=5 October 2019}}</ref>

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
*[[Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]] article by Brian Wenham, ‘Trethowan, Sir (James) Ian Raley (1922–1990)’, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/40167] accessed 29 May 2007.

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{{succession box
  | title  = [[Director-General of the BBC]]
  | years  = 1977–1982
  | before = [[Charles Curran (television executive)|Charles Curran]]
  | after  = [[Alasdair Milne]]
}}
{{s-end}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Trethowan, Ian}}
[[Category:1922 births]]
[[Category:1990 deaths]]
[[Category:BBC executives]]
[[Category:People educated at Christ's Hospital]]
[[Category:Deaths from motor neuron disease in England]]
[[Category:Knights Bachelor]]
[[Category:Directors-general of the BBC]]