All that was missing from the BBC’s coverage of the local and European election results was Nick Robinson giving Nigel Farage a wet, sloppy congratulations kiss. Seldom have the BBC elections team been more starstruck, more craven in its uncritical promotion of a political party. Is it yet another instantiation of a putative BBC bias? Maybe. Sure, there is an overall tendency to go soft on the government of the day. Since 2003’s “dodgy dossier” and the fall out of the Gilligan/Kelly affair, the BBC have self-interestedly tiptoed around those who have the power to scrap or change its Royal Charter. But why has coverage been skewed toward UKIP? Why go completely ga-ga for Farage and co and ignore the Greens, Left Unity/TUSC, Elvis, and the melange of other xenophobic, petty English nationalists? Here are three theories.
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Tagged with BBC
The BBC needs defending as well as attacking
Congrats to the TUC’s Duncan Weldon on his appointment as Newsnight’s economics editor. But not everyone is wishing him well. The Tories have made their displeasure known. The Daily Mail aren’t happy either. They’re carrying on as if Yevgeni Preobrazhensky has been appointed. This is Buggers Broadcasting Communism, after all. Replying, Owen Jones has highlighted some evidence that shows far from being a hive of socialist counter-hegemony, the BBC is pro-establishment and mainly rightwing. The response from The Speccie is “yeah, but the BBC is suffused with liberal bias” – characteristically producing no back it up as per usual. Then Tom Chivers has a stab at being reasonable, noting that the left moan about rightwing bias and the right gripe about lefty bias. Continue reading
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Ed Miliband’s response to BBC license debate
The Tories have gotten so excited about the idea of decriminalising the BBC license fee, that it’s difficult to avoid the suspicion that they see this as an opportunity to do down the national broadcaster. Labour needs to have a response, or else the debate will be guided by those who wish to see television controlled by press barons and oligarchs.
Apparently 10% of cases before the magistrates’ courts are for evasion of the license fee. On the face of it this sounds extraordinary, but before we accept this figure on face value, we should first recognise that it came from the Magistrates Association, a body with a history empire building. Continue reading
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What is the point of Parliament? None, according to the BBC
Tonight, in a debate on welfare reform and poverty, the government was defeated in the House of Commons by a majority of 123. The motion stated that “this House believes that a commission of inquiry should be established to investigate the impact of the Government’s welfare reforms on the incidence of poverty.” The debate was called neither by the government, nor by the opposition, but by the Backbench Business Committee in a procedure introduced in the last Parliament to strengthen the power of Parliament to hold the executive to account. The motion was introduced by Labour MP, Michael Meacher (whose opening speeech is here), but with the support of Sir Peter Bottomley (Con) and John Hemming (Lib Dem).
So, did you see the report on the BBC News? Or read about this momentous defeat on the BBC website? You did not. By midnight, two hours after the vote, it had received no coverage on any BBC programme or website. Nor, for that matter on any other news website. What does that say about Parliament, about British democracy, about the accountability of the Government? What does that say about the BBC? The BBC, whose public purpose remit states: Continue reading
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Tory bias at the BBC
The BBC is beholden to an agenda that is anti-British, pro-union, and left-wing. Or so the argument goes. Thing is, there’s no evidence for it. Back in November, I had a bit of fun asking if the BBC’s Question Time was biased. This little study, based on the political allegiances of guests appearing on the programme between December 2008 and November 2012 found there was bias – the number of rightwing panelists outweighed guests from the left. Now a group of academics at Cardiff University have performed a wider content analysis. Funded by the BBC itself, it wanted to know how impartial its reporting really was.
Guess what? This report based on actual, real evidence and not ideas plucked from the hot air of a rightwing dinner party, found there was no leftwing bias. Yet again, coverage was tilted to the right.
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