by Matt Strudwick, Daily Mail
Complaints Unit finds it expressed a ‘controversial view about trans people’
Martine Croxall broke the BBC‘s rules when she pulled a face because her script said ‘pregnant people’, the broadcaster has said.
The newsreader won a legion of new fans and the backing of JK Rowling when she rejected the gender-neutral language live on air.
But now the Executive Complaints Unit has ruled that her facial expression suggested a ‘controversial view about trans people’.
The ECU upheld complaints from 20 viewers saying Ms Croxall had fallen ‘short of the BBC’s expectations of its presenters and journalists in relation to impartiality’.
Ms Croxall was introducing new research on the number of heat-related deaths expected amid Britain’s current heatwave.
But as the autocue prompted her to warn ‘pregnant people’ to take care in the heat, she first read the term out before overriding it, with a smirk and eyebrow raise.
She said: ‘Malcolm Mistry, who was involved in the research, said the aged, pregnant people – women! – and those with pre-existing health conditions need to take precautions.’
Her correction of the autocue won her praise from the Harry Potter author, who called Ms Croxall her ‘new favourite BBC presenter’.