The BBC should overhaul its system of self-regulation, a report will argue tomorrow.

In its study, the Institute for Public Policy Research will call for moves to make the board of BBC governors more independent, and recommend that the corporation face more outside regulation.

The recommendations will be published as the row continues over an article written for the Sunday Express by presenter Robert Kilroy-Silk.

His show has been suspended as the BBC holds an investigation into the column, in which he branded Arabs as "suicide bombers, limb amputators and women repressors".

The Express claims that 97 per cent of those questioned in a poll for the paper defended the former Labour MP, criticising the BBC's decision to take his show off the air.