Russell Brand has resigned and Jonathan Ross has been suspended. Whipped up by the Daily Mail, the public is calling for their scalps. But the BBC has been trying to pin the blame on a junior member of staff, Nic Philps, in order to protect the massive egos of its presenters. But BBC staff are fighting back.

A bit of background is needed here. Russell Brand's radio show is produced independently by John Noel Management, through Brand's own production company, and the hairy-faced faux-Victorian is a regular tantrum thrower. He recently sacked a number of people on his show on a whim and so Nic (who is only 25 and has been in the job for a year) had to step in from his usual gig at Sean Keaveney's 6Music show to fix things as best he could. So far, so monstrous-ego-placating.

Nic had to try to mop up a Niagara of piss at the last minute and cobble together the show on a spare afternoon around his full-time job at the BBC. Given that having to handle the BBC's top talent should not have been left to someone so junior and inexperienced (and with the clock ticking and no one to supervise him), it was sadly inevitable that a howling shambles would be the end result.

In classic guilt-shifting, the BBC has been trying to pile all the blame on Nic. But, after Gideon Coe's producer being crucified unfairly last year, the production teams at the BBC are threatening to walk if Nic gets both barrels at the expense of upper management who left him out on a limb.

So now you know.

Let's hope that the BBC's director general, Mark Thompson, can sort it all out without resorting to biting everyone.

by HorseWorm