London: A BBC manager nicknamed ‘The Pimp’ helped to procure women for Stuart Hall and filmed the TV star having sex with them in his dressing room, it was claimed last night.

A former studio worker has told ‘The Mail on Sunday’ that floor manager Peter Barlow had them brought to the BBC’s Manchester studios for fake auditions. The source claims that the women were lured to a room where Barlow filmed them having sex with the ‘It’s A Knockout’ host.

The new accusations increase pressure for an inquiry, similar to the Jimmy Savile investigation, into how bosses turned a blind eye while Hall molested girls at BBC studios.

The latest incidents were said to have happened in Hall’s dressing room, next to the office of news editor Tom German and regional manager Ray Colley.

On one occasion it is claimed Hall and Barlow even approached the studio’s production team to have the films processed.

The allegations echo an account of one of his victims, Susan Harrison, who told how when she was 16 the presenter picked her out at a school speech day and persuaded her to visit him at the BBC on the pretext of recording a song. He later got her drunk and molested her in his car.

Detectives believe other BBC staff may have helped Hall, now 83, trick girls seeking fame into visiting him. Last night the former employee said the abuse took place at the studio for regional news programme ‘Look North’ from the late 1970s until the show moved offices in 1981.

The ex-staff member said: “It was an open secret that Stuart Hall used to film sex videos in his dressing room with women procured for him by Peter Barlow. Peter’s nickname was The Pimp and he was very close to Stuart — he used to drive him to Look North and It’s A Knockout.

“Peter would tell women to come into the Look North studio for an audition and the pair would pretend to film the women while they presented the weather forecast.

“Afterwards they would take them to Stuart’s dressing room and Peter would film him having sex with them.

“On one occasion they approached the processing team to process a video but they point-blank refused, they wouldn’t go near it.

“Women would come by Stuart’s dressing room on a daily basis. Stuart liked the women aged about 18. He would meet them on It’s A Knockout, some of them were score girls, or he also picked up the pageant winners from beauty contests he used to judge.

“Everyone knew what was going on but no one did anything about it because he was the golden boy. As far as the bosses were concerned, as long as he read the news he could do what he liked. It was total mismanagement by the BBC. Next to Stuart’s dressing room were the offices of Tom German and Ray Colley. They weren’t stupid and it was obvious these women were having sex in Stuart’s office. This all needs to be revealed, as it was with Savile.

“I felt sick when I found out Stuart had been abusing underage girls. It’s awful because we used to visit schools around Lancashire and get children to take part in cookery competitions. It’s awful now to think back and know that probably helped him do those disgusting things.

“There were odd things about Stuart. We used to collect tins for charity. I remember getting some salmon and Stuart kept it because he said the pensioners we were collecting for wouldn’t know what to do with it. It’s little things like that that really tell you about someone’s character.”

MPs and Hall’s victims have called on the BBC to investigate his behaviour after he admitted assaulting 13 girls, the youngest of whom was nine, between 1967 and 1986.

In the aftermath of his guilty pleas, it emerged the married father of two told staff that girls he took to his dressing room were his ‘nieces’.

Barlow died aged 86 in 2007 and Tom German died aged 66 in 1992. When approached by The Mail on Sunday, Colley, 83, said: “While Stuart Hall is awaiting sentence it would be inappropriate to comment.”

The BBC has no plans to set up a separate inquiry into Hall, saying it has passed any information on to the Dame Janet Smith Review, which is looking at practices at the BBC during the years of Savile’s abuse.

However, last night Conservative MP Rob Wilson said: “My gut instinct is the BBC are not using the Smith Review to get to the truth and are instead using it to do the minimum necessary to carry on as before.”

A spokesman for The National Association for People Abused in Childhood said: “It’s disgusting the BBC gave Hall unfettered opportunities to carry out his abuse.

“The BBC owes it to his victims to open a new inquiry that can scrutinise his behaviour and the colleagues who may have helped him.”

Hall and the BBC are facing potential compensation payouts after six victims contacted solicitor Alan Collins, a partner at the law firm Pannone who is also pursuing the BBC over the Savile scandal.

The BBC said: “All allegations that have been made to the BBC in relation to Stuart Hall have been passed on to the police or the Dame Janet Smith Review.”

 

Mail On Sunday