Another claim was that in 1973, he’d attended a convention of the Italian fascist party, MSI, in the company of two fellow members of the Monday Club — a British right-wing pressure group. There, Hamilton had “thought it was jolly good fun if I did a speech in Italian because I could do a Charlie Chaplin Great Dictator speech which they would not recognize but would give us a lot of enjoyment.” Whether it had worked as comedy or satire, one probably needed to have been there, but as proof of a genuine fascist mentality, it fell short by a substantial measure.
Then, four days into proceedings, before the BBC defense could take the floor, the organization’s management, under pressure from its Board of Governors — which was, in turn, under pressure from Conservative ministers — made substantial settlements.
The BBC apologized for falsely claiming that Hamilton and Howarth were members of a “virulently racist and anti-Semitic” extreme right-wing group called Tory Action, for falsely claiming they had misled the Conservative Party chairman by denying links to Tory Action, and for falsely claiming they had made racist remarks or goose-stepped while on a visit to Bonn in 1983.
Hamilton and Howarth each received £20,000 — a fair whack back then, and libel damages were tax-free.
After the verdict, Hamilton reacted to their victory by channeling one of Winston Churchill’s wartime speeches: “This is a magnificent victory of David over Goliath, and represents, for us, the end of the beginning, but for some on the BBC probably the beginning of the end.” Later, Hamilton and Howarth sought a meeting with the new BBC Chairman Duke Hussey to ensure the organization’s “integrity can be restored, its political impartiality re-established, and its legitimate editorial independence protected.”
Then, as now, there was a crisis of governance at the BBC. Then, as now, there was a wider context of BBC travails. And then, as now, there was an impending political challenge for the BBC to obtain charter renewal and an extension of its jealously guarded license fee.
All media organizations fight to defend against defamation actions, and the BBC is no exception. But while the broadcaster may justifiably contend it has no case to argue against Trump, it would serve us well to remember that in the 1980’s, the BBC was excoriated for wasting license-payers’ money in defending indefensible claims for almost two years — and rightly so.