How BBC 'banned' Johnny Rotten's claims against Jimmy Savile - allowing more to be victims

In a chat with Express in 2024, Sex Pistols star John Lydon, now 69, spoke of his validation when the revelations about Jimmy Savile came out. Over 45 years earlier, he claimed he found himself "banned" by the BBC when he tried to issue a warning about the presenter, who was exposed as one of Britain's most prolific predatory sex offenders following his 2011 death. Speaking exclusively to us, John said: "I found myself in huge trouble back then with the BBC or because of talking about Jimmy Savile [and] all these years later everybody is saying, 'Oh my God, John Lydon was so right.'"

The Public Image Limited singer was clearly still stung by the incident, which happened back in 1978. The interview was never broadcast by the BBC, while Savile was left untouched to amass even more victims. His band at the time, The Sex Pistols, had already found themselves on the wrong side of "Aunty Beeb" when their 1977 anarchist anthem, God Save The Queen, was prohibited from BBC Radio.

Fast-forward a year, and he and the band were participating in the interview for BBC Radio 1 that would never air. John has long claimed this was due to his contentious remarks about the then Top Of the Pops presenter. Asked about his cinematic ambitions, the 22-year-old said he'd like to make a movie where he kills a lot of people before explaining why Savile was one of them.

"I want to kill Jimmy Savile – he’s a hypocrite. I bet he’s into all kinds of seediness that we all know about but aren’t allowed to talk about. I know some rumours,” he added. Clearly realising he had overstepped an unspoken line, he later added: “I bet none of this will be allowed out.”

In 2015, just three years after monster Savile's crimes had come to light in 2012, Lydon addressed the fallout during an appearance on Piers Morgan's Life Stories.

“I’m very, very bitter that the likes of Savile and the rest of them were allowed to continue. I did my bit, I said what I had to. But they didn’t air that. I found myself banned from BBC radio for quite a while, for my contentious behaviour. They wouldn’t state this directly; there’d be other excuses,” he claimed.

A 2016 report by Dame Janet Smith into Savile's crimes found he would commit sexual assaults "whenever the opportunity arose" and incidents took place "in virtually every one of the BBC premises at which he worked". The impartial investigation was set up by the BBC in 2012 to look at the corporation's culture and practices during the period it employed Savile from 1964 to 2007.

Following the release of the report, the then BBC Director General Tony Hall issued a lengthy statement apologising to Savile's victims and acknowledging more should have been done.

"I note that the reports did not conclude that, in a formal sense, the BBC knew about Savile. But I take no satisfaction from that. It seems to me that the BBC could have known. Just as powerful as the accusation 'You knew', is the legitimate question: 'How could you not have known?'

"And much of this was down to the culture of the BBC at the time, which we must reflect on and act on. It was an organisation that was too hierarchical, too self-interested, too siloed to hear or act properly on the disturbing stories and rumours individuals had heard."