The British Academy of Film and Television Arts has added new guidance to its rulebook that will give it the power to retrospectively strip future award winners should they be convicted of a crime.
Citing disgraced former BBC News host Huw Edwards — who earlier this year pleaded guilty to three counts of making indecent images of children — as an example, BAFTA chair Sara Putt outlined the “forfeiture process” that would lead the organization to consider revoking an award.
“Earlier this year we were shocked by the news of the former BBC newsreader Huw Edwards’ arrest and subsequent conviction for child pornography offences,” she wrote in a letter to members. “He won seven individual BAFTA Cymru awards for television presenting between 2002 and 2017. Following the news, deeply complex questions were raised regarding historic awards won by individuals and specifically whether awards won in competition should ever be removed retrospectively.”
For competitive film, TV and game awards presented from 2025 onwards, the new guidance states that the grounds by which they would be “considered for revocation” include the entrant having used duplicitous or illegal methods to make their work or false information that renders their application ineligible. But unconnected to a specific work, BAFTA also now says for awards presented from 2025 onwards it can consider withdrawing the award retrospectively if the “individual named winner is found guilty by the courts of any criminal offense and is sentenced to a term of imprisonment of three months or more (whether or not suspended).”
“As academy members, you are asked to judge your peers on creative excellence, and vote for the best work. The prize is an iconic BAFTA mask, and we know that winning a BAFTA is career defining, sometimes even life-changing,” Putt said in the letter. “But what happens if, many years after the ceremony, a winner falls short of our expectations or, worse, commits a serious crime? Should they have their prize taken away? If so, in what circumstances, and by what process?”
Putt noted that BAFTA was “not the only awards body to navigate these complex issues” and said that “many institutions face difficult questions when the people they associate with fall from grace.”
Following Edwards conviction earlier this year, BAFTA said it would not be stripping the former anchor of the awards he was given for covering various royal events, saying the honors recognized the efforts of production teams, rather than simply celebrating his presenting skills.