BBC director-general George Entwistle has asked a senior colleague to answer journalists' questions on the dropping of a documentary about Jimmy Savile.
Ken MacQuarrie, director of BBC Scotland, will speak to Newsnight journalists about the aborted broadcast after several of them wrote to Mr Entwistle to ask why the film was not aired, a BBC spokesman confirmed last night.
The director-general asked Mr MacQuarrie as he was a "senior member of management" at the BBC, the spokesman added.
The BBC's reputation is increasingly under fire after an avalanche of allegations that the corporation was aware of claims about Savile's actions, but did nothing about them.
George Entwistle has asked a senior colleague to answer journalists' questions on the dropping of a documentary about Jimmy Savile
David Nicolson, who worked as a director on Jim'll Fix It, claimed to have caught Savile having sex with a girl in his dressing room, but was laughed away when he voiced his concerns, The Sun said.
Grant Shapps, chairman of the Conservative Party, told BBC1's Question Time last night that it "seems unimaginable" that people at the BBC were unaware of the child abuse allegations.
He said: "What happened now appears to be outrageous. It's particularly disturbing that a programme paying tribute, a three-parter, went out just last Christmas after it was already known at senior levels within the BBC that something was wrong, enough to have had a serious Newsnight programme made about it and enough to raise serious concerns.
"I do think there are definitely questions that do need answering."
Mr Shapps backed calls for Savile to be stripped of his knighthood, saying "it can't be right" that he remains a Sir in name following the allegations.
He said: "I would be in favour of the Forfeiture Committee taking a close look at this because it can't be right that somebody apparently keeps the Sir in front of their name when this is the reality of their life."
Fresh claims of sexual abuse have been made against the late TV presenter, following allegations that he preyed on children during hospital visits.
A string of police forces have received complaints and referred them to Scotland Yard, which is leading the investigation.
Greater Manchester, Lancashire, North Yorkshire and Tayside are the latest forces to say allegations have been made.
A woman told Greater Manchester Police of a sexual relationship she had with Savile from the age of 15, while a second said she was groped by him in Salford when she was under 16.
Another woman told Tayside Police she was targeted in the Liverpool area, an alleged victim told North Yorkshire Police she was preyed on by Savile in Scarborough in the 1980s, and two women complained to Lancashire Police about incidents when one was 14, in the 1960s, and the other 15, in the 1980s.
Claims have also emerged that Savile groped young patients at Stoke Mandeville Hospital in Buckinghamshire, where he worked as a volunteer fundraiser, while one woman alleged that she saw him molest a brain-damaged hospital patient at Leeds General Hospital.
Nurses at Stoke Mandeville are understood to have dreaded Savile's visits because of his behaviour and would tell children to stay in bed and pretend to be asleep when he came round.
Caroline Moore claims she was assaulted by Savile at the age of 13 while being treated for spinal injuries at Stoke Mandeville in 1971.
Mrs Moore, from Clarkston in East Renfrewshire, told BBC Radio Scotland: "I was outside a ward or a gym and he came out and just rammed his tongue down my throat.
"I told my family at the time. They didn't take it seriously because he was such a high-profile character."
June Thornton, a patient at Leeds General Infirmary in 1972, said she saw Savile abuse someone she thought was a brain-damaged girl.
Ms Thornton said that when she told a nurse about the abuse, she was ignored.
"I thought he was a visitor coming to see her. He started rubbing his hands down her arms and then, I don't know of a nice way to put it, but he molested her. He helped himself. She just sat there and couldn't do anything about it," she told ITV News.
Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust, which runs Stoke Mandeville, and Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust said they were helping police with their investigations.
Police believe Savile could have abused as many as 25 victims over a period of 40 years, and have so far formally recorded a number of criminal allegations including rape and indecent assault.
The raft of allegations against Savile has been branded a "cesspit" by BBC Trust chairman Lord Patten who pledged to hold an independent inquiry as swiftly as possible after the police investigation.
As more allegations emerged, Savile's headstone was removed from his grave in Scarborough because his family said they wanted to pay "respect to public opinion". The Savile Hall conference venue in his home city Leeds will also be renamed.
Conservative MP Rob Wilson, who has written to Stoke Mandeville Hospital calling for an immediate investigation into the Savile allegations, told the BBC Radio 4 PM programme: "This is fast becoming a scandal that is fast engulfing a much wider part of the public sector than I originally thought it would.
"We can now see evidence developing that not just the BBC is involved in this - we now have parts of the NHS, the Crown Prosecution Service and some are even suggesting the police have some questions to answer.
"This is becoming a very widescale issue."
It comes after a fourth unknown celebrity was identified by woman who claimed she was abused by him as a child, in light of the allegations about Savile.
Commander Peter Spindler, head of Specialist Crime Investigations at the Met police, said the abuse was on a "national scale" and that the allegations against Savile spanned four decades.
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