6.07am

Today was the second lecture from Richard Tait. And very insightful it was too...

He went into great depth about the Andrew Gilligan, BBC, Lord Hutton, Dr David Kelly, 45 Minute "sexed-up" claim and the rather shocking failings that led to the BBC being dragged across the coals in the Hutton inquiry.

It was fascinating hearing how a short "two-way" between Gilligan and John Humphreys at 06.07am on Radio 4 led to one of the most dramatic examples of shoddy journalism being uncovered and held to account in recent years. Despite the report essentially saying the Government lied about the 45 minute claim, at no point did anyone actually ask Gilligan if his "source" (which we now know was David Kelly) had explicitly said "45 minutes".

As it turned out of course, it was an inference, not a quote. And from this, as Richard Tait said, a potentially award-winning piece of journalism which uncovered serious misgivings from several senior intelligence sources about the Iraq dossier, was instead responsible for Hutton inquiry and all the upheavals the BBC suffered as a result. All because Gilligan went too far with his story.

He, ironies of ironies, sexed-up his own piece of journalism, and in a profession in which "words are precision tools" and there is "no tolerance for error" he paid a heavy price.

A sobering reminder of one of the first, and most basic, rules of good journalism: Check your facts...