THE BBC appears close to implosion over the Jimmy Savile scandal.

A remarkable chain of events over the last few days has seen the corporation engulfed in self-examination on a massive scale.

The editor of Newsnight has stepped aside, last night saw one BBC current affairs programme investigating another as Panorama probed Newsnight’s notorious decision not to broadcast an investigation into Savile’s depraved behaviour.

So was the Newsnight investigation flawed due to a lack of strong evidence or was it pulled from our screens as part of a cover-up designed to protect the reputations of Savile and the Beeb?

Hopefully the independent inquiries being set up will give us the answers to these questions.

In the meantime, the navel-gazing at the BBC seems to be an epidemic. The director general is doorstepped on his way to work, the corporation’s news channels are full of BBC journalists interviewing BBC journalists, and all the while the Beeb’s reputation continues to take a battering.

If it can be proved that BBC bosses knew of Savile’s behaviour or connived to ensure the full story was not told by its own journalists then there will be real questions asked about the future of Britan’s national broadcaster.

The BBC remains a great institution that employs some of Britain’s brightest and best.

But it gets closer to meltdown with every new revelation about this scandal.