From The Guardian:

Hall: I won't apply for BBC job
by John Plunkett
Monday May 10, 2004

Former BBC News chief Tony Hall today said he will not apply for the vacant director general's post, but stopped short of ruling himself out of the running completely.

Mr Hall, who is chief executive of the Royal Opera House, was considered a leading candidate for the job along with the Channel 4 chief executive, Mark Thompson, and the acting director general, Mark Byford.

He said he had not applied for the job and wanted to stay at the Royal Opera House "for as long as they will have me".

But when asked what he would do if he was approached by the BBC, Mr Hall replied: "That is hypothetical."

"I love my job and there are lots of things I still want to do," he said. "I am telling you that I want to stay at the Royal Opera House. That is where I am hanging my coat for the next God knows how many years, as long as they will have me."

Mr Hall was understood to be on the shortlist for the job before the selection process was frozen following Michael Grade's appointment as BBC chairman.

The hunt for a successor to Greg Dyke is due to begin again when Mr Grade arrives later this month.

"The challenges for the BBC are very large," Mr Hall told the Live with Angela Rippon Show on the ITV News Channel.

"The next person, working with Michael Grade, needs to find the charter for the BBC which will really win popular approval. And that must be based around programmes, because the BBC is nothing if not the greatest place for programme production in the country.

"They have got to look at governance and how the BBC is governed, because the governance too has taken a knock out of the whole Hutton thing."

Mr Hall lost out to Mr Dyke in the last appointments process and quit to join the Royal Opera House in 2001. A BBC "lifer", he joined the corporation as a news trainee 30 years ago, rising through a number of news and current affairs jobs before becoming chief executive of BBC News in 1996.

Mr Hall was also critical of the prolonged internal investigation that has been taking place within the BBC in the wake of the Hutton inquiry.

"You have got to have discipline in an organisation and if things have gone wrong you need to know why. But those sort of things have got to be conducted and sorted out quickly, and without the feeling of blame or retribution," he said.

"The BBC has gone through a complete trial, where the chairman and director have left. In my view: move on, learn lessons but learn them quickly, and then move on to restoring confidence in the organisation."

Mr Thompson remains the leading contender despite his efforts to rule himself out of the race last month, while Mr Byford is the bookmakers' favourite, followed by Mr Jackson, BBC director of TV Jana Bennett and Sky Networks managing director Dawn Airey.