Cilla Black death

We had both BBC news and Sky on at work today, and it was noticeable that it took the BBC nearly an hour longer than Sky to break the news of Cilla Black dying.

What would have accounted for the enormous discrepancy? Don't get me wrong - I think Sky is often too quick to report rumour and nonsense. But surely this couldn't have been such a difficult story to stand up; it must've come from a family/agent statement?

Noticed this online too. ITV was quite slow as well.

According to the other thread, two hours after the news broke there was still no official confirmation.

I swear I heard her credited as the presenter of both "Surprise, Surprise" and "Blind Date, Blind Date" on the radio today (not sure who provides it to our local station).

If it was outside of between 0800-1200, it would more likely be IRN, which is produced by Sky News.

Very few commercial radio stations provide a local news service on a Sunday afternoon.

The BBC will normally wait for proper confirmation and I believe aim to know that family members have been informed before reporting the death of someone. The aim is for people NOT to hear of a close relative passing away by seeing it on the TV or hearing it on the radio.

The story came from a Telegraph quoting an individual police officer. As has been said, there wasn't official confirmation until a long while after that.

I heard the fact Cilla's agent was her son understandably made getting confirmation more difficult that normal in the circumstances.