James Purnell says BBC 'mortified' by failed £100m project

The BBC has apologised after spending nearly £100m on a project which has been abandoned.

James Purnell, the corporation's director of strategy and digital, said "everybody at the BBC is mortified" at the cost of the Digital Media Initiative, which never became fully operational.

He said: "There's been a huge waste of money and we can only apologise to license fee payers and to staff for that waste."