The Guardian says Lord Birt tried to stop Michael Grade's appointment:

A defeat for Birt and Cronyism
Matt Wells, media correspondent
Saturday April 3, 2004
The Guardian

Michael Grade's appointment as BBC chairman was seen yesterday as a defeat for the former director general Lord Birt, who had been lobbying against him in Downing Street.

Lord Birt, now a No 10 adviser, fell out with Mr Grade when they were at the BBC and was vehemently opposed to his return to the corporation. Mr Grade joined Channel 4 as chief executive after holding secret talks with the broadcaster's chairman at the time, Sir Richard Attenborough.

It is widely believed that Lord Birt mounted a "stop Grade" campaign within Downing Street, but that his lobbying was ignored by Tony Blair.

Westminster insiders said yesterday that the process had been surprisingly transparent; the recommended candidate had got the job and No 10 had had no direct influence in the process, they said.

The former chief executive of Channel Five David Elstein, welcomed the transparency: "Blair has kept well away from it, Michael applied through a publicly advertised process, he was the best applicant, there was no fiddling around behind the scenes, and that's all good news."

Mr Elstein said Lord Birt's influence was "clearly zero". He added: "That grounds yet another rumour mill to dust. Grade is the last person he would have wanted."

Insiders say Lord Birt had played all his best cards by recommending Howell James, whom he made director of corporate affairs at the BBC in 1987, for the post of government communications chief.

The appointment was made last week, and was widely but erroneously assumed to have been influenced by Peter Mandelson.

Richard Ayre, a former BBC policy chief under Lord Birt, said the appointment signalled that the government, despite claims to the contrary, believed in the independence of the BBC.

"The message is written in letters a mile high - that the BBC is not going to be governed by a political placeman. I think it's a genuine reflection of Blair's view that the BBC shouldn't be under political influence."

Another source with close links to Downing Street said of the process: "It seems to have been a lot less cloak-and-dagger than you would have expected. I was speaking to people who previously would have known what was going on, but didn't."

It is understood that Mr Grade came out on top of the list of candidates after interviews on March 24 by a panel convened by Sue Street, the permanent secretary at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. She was aided by two external assessors: Sir George Russell, a director of ITV, and Peter Ellwood, chairman of ICI. The other leading candidate was understood to be Baroness Young of Old Scone, a former BBC vice-chairman.

The process was overseen by the commissioner for public appointments, Dame Rennie Fritchie and a panel of three privy councillors. She said yesterday: "We were entirely satisfied with the design, implementation and outcome of the process. I hope that this extra guarantee will give the public added confidence that the process was open and fair."

Peter Bazalgette, chairman of Big Brother producers Endemol UK and a Channel 4 board member, said Mr Grade's appointment was notable for being apolitical. "Rather like the appointment of [the Pizza Express founder] Luke Johnson as chairman of Channel 4, it seems the appointments panel has come up with the name of the person it thought was the best for the job, rather than the name they thought the government or the regulator wanted."

Most observers agreed that after a period in which the Blair government became notorious for putting friends in positions of power and influence, the Grade appointment showed that such a practice was unsustainable.