ITV News will not reprimand Peston after facing criticism over photograph showing PM in prison cell

ITV News will not reprimand political editor Robert Peston for allegedly breaching impartiality rules after he criticised Boris Johnson for failing to resign over Partygate.

Its News at Ten programme has also faced criticism for featuring a photograph last Thursday of the Prime Minister appearing to look like he was behind bars.

One viewer complained that a graphic showing three lines around the photograph seemed designed to make it seem as if Mr Johnson was in a police cell.

A spokeswoman for the broadcaster said Peston, 61, had not been spoken to over his tweet earlier this month saying that if Tory MPs kept the Prime Minister in office, it would look like Britain was an ‘elected dictatorship’. 

ITV News will not reprimand political editor Robert Peston for allegedly breaching impartiality rules after he criticised Boris Johnson for failing to resign over Partygate

He added: ‘This is not just a slippery slope. It is the bottom of the slope.’

The decision not to reprimand him would have involved ITN’s chief executive Deborah Turness, who is due to take over as head of BBC News this summer.

An ITN staff member told The Mail on Sunday: ‘It is interesting that Deborah has chosen not to have a word with Robert over this. 

‘It does beg the question of how she will deal with the whole anti-Tory bias that the BBC have so often been accused of when she gets there.’

Boris Johnson received the fine from police for breaking lockdown restrictions during a birthday party on July 19, 2020. He and Sunak apologised but never said they would quit