thus missing the last two or three minutes of Blair’s last session of Prime Minister’s Questions. History, happening live before our eyes, cut-off for the sake of five minutes worth of Wimbledon coverage. I hope someone at the BBC will have an imprint of Andrew Neil’s brogues on their posterior afore long!
Just to add insult to injury, having cut off PMQs, the BBC still had the temerity to show its usual package of tedious self-advertising in the gap between programmes – a trailer for ‘Rome’, a trailer for ‘Jekyll’, a BBC2 ident, and then on to Wimbledon, with a lengthy preamble from Sue Barker and then a non-entity tennis match (this is only the first week of Wimbledon, after all, before it was rained off!) – so BBC2 can’t have been that desperate for time.
Either they have no sense of history and public service, or perhaps they do, and this was the BBC’s way, post-Hutton, of showing Blair and everyone else who’s really in charge, at least as far as the BBC Monster is concerned.
Update: Helen Boaden, Director of BBC News has blogged that:
After looking into this, I can at least reassure you that this was cock up rather than conspiracy. A wrong scheduling decision was taken for which the BBC can only apologise. Believe me, no one involved would have wanted you to miss any part of this important event.
Well, never mind Helen, we at Biased BBC know what it’s like to run a quality service as a bunch of amateurs with zero funding – it’s not like you’re professional broadcasters with a £3-billion per annum budget, is it?
Iain Dale has more coverage of this, the latest, monumental BBC News cock-up. We await to see whose career prospects reflect this dreadful stupidity – but we won’t be holding our breath…
It’s their way of getting back after Blair’s valedictory Reuters speech attacking Britain’s (BBC-dominated) anti-democratic “feral media.”
The BBC’s sickening coverage is clearly in breach of good taste.
Thank goodness for Sky.
Very glad you brought attention to this absolutely disgraceful and pathetic bit of scheduling. How many times have they let programmes over-run for the sake of sport? We all known the BBC never got over the Hutton report and have never failed to vent their personal animus against Blair in an entirely and wholly biased way (whatever you think of Blair’ politics). This was the valedictory bit of spite. And of course they always treat Andrew Neil as a second class citizen in the beeboid universe – they only put up with him because of his ratings.
Another point worth noting is that the Daily Politics was actually scheduled in the Radio Times to run until 1pm – so they actually changed the schedule for this piece of spite!
The BBC reserves its valedictory tears for dead terrorists cf. Barbara Plett and Yasser Arafat’s departing helicopter. I doubt nothing will be allowed to intrude on the coverage of the obsequies of Fidel Castro. I’m sure they are lining up the solemn music and “pay your tributes” webpages already.
Some of us would rather watch sports than tosser politicians. 🙂
I cannot believe anyone ould be that incompetent. If I did my job as badly as the BBC’s current affairs then people (including me) would die. Of course they do with the BBC’s incompetence (Mohammed cartoons, anyone? Middle East?).
There are many people trying to break into the world of media. Surely with the pool of talent there is someone competent out there. Indstead they have overpaid fools who have BBC running all the way through and follow the leftist line.
ALL HAIL SHIEKH BROOUN, ALL HAIL SHIEKH BROOUN
“I will reach out beyond narrow party interest, I will build a government that uses all the talents, … I will try my utmost”
Sounds like a call for Iqbal Sacranie and is MCB thugs to call number 10 …
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iqbal_Sacranie#Controversies
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_Council_of_Britain
“I will reach out beyond narrow party interest, I will build a government that uses all the talents
The one party state starts today.
Oscar,
Judging by Cameron and the Tories giving Blair a standing ovation it already had started!
Speaking of Sir Iqbal Sacranie (above), is he intending to return his knighthood following Sir Salman Rushdie’s award?
This is bias how?
Surely BBC 2 stands for Ball by Ball Coverage too, it’s another Bungled British Caper, but I think I’ve got the picture.
BD,
Great, a Beeb supporter. If you’re in the business of defending BBC bias, please could you explain why they requested permission for a BBC staff member to travel into Gaza and then denied said person existed?
K: don’t ask BD questions. He is a DISCREDITED LIAR
bob,
Not all people who support the BBC on this site are liars. Surely.
And I have to say that some BBC journalists are the best I have ever listened, viz. Mark Urban and Richard Watson. Maybe we could shrink the licence fee just to pay for them.
It may be a sense of history missed and the BBc were probably trying to get their own back, but the one party state started in 1997 with the BBC and Blair. I personaly cannot listen to Blair without my skin beginning to creep and that goes for all politicians these days. The less we hear from them and the BBC the better.
K:
bob,
Not all people who support the BBC on this site are liars. Surely.
TPO has provided evidence on another thread that BullshitDetective deliberatley tells untruths.
Bullshitter Defective, just because the blog is called Biased BBC it doesn’t mean that everything we cover has to concern BBC bias – we are equally at home dealing with BBC incompetence, BBC stupidity, BBC anti-competitiveness etc. etc. – it’s just that the blog name would be too wide to fit even on a wide screen.
It’s a bit like the BBC – the first ‘B’ is supposed to stand for British, but there is a great deal of what the BBC does that has little to do with Britain, and in many cases is positively anti-British.
And I have to say that some BBC journalists are the best I have ever listened, viz. Mark Urban and Richard Watson.
Mark Urban, fact checker par excellence — NOT…
http://dailyablution.blogs.com/the_daily_ablution/2004/04/the_unbearable_.html
“…a BBC news editor should know better than to make a public display of his political bias by smirkingly repeating a debunked story.”
Beeb cuts last words
MILLIONS of TV viewers missed Tony Blair’s final bow when BBC2 pulled the plug on his Commons swansong.
Producers cut short live coverage by two minutes — to show trailers for drama shows.
The Beeb received 200 complaints after the Daily Politics show cut Mr Blair’s final words: “That is that. The End.”
Presenter Andrew Neil said: “I’m disappointed the public did not see the historic moments.”
Producer Peter Horrocks admitted making “the wrong decision”.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2007290672,00.html
This is bias how?
Bullshit Detective | Homepage | 27.06.07 – 7:38 pm |
You still here?
If not already aware, people need to aquaint themselves with this about bullshit from the BBC.
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/patrickcrozier/3861044074615880734/#361936
This doesn’t make the BBC biased.
The BBC did not for example, make much of the anti war protests outside no. 10. Sky News did.
Did they ever show the end of Blair’s Swan PMQ? Even a snippet of it on a later news broadcast? We certainly got an eyeful on last night’s BBC World News. It was almost touching the way it went down, especially with the standing ovation as he left.
Of course, this was immediately followed – and rightly so – by the announcement of Blair’s appointment as a special Middle East Envoy, and the reporter (forgot the name) tells us a bit about the position, and that he is supposed to focus on the Palestinians, and that he needed to find something “for his legacy, other than Iraq”. Those last words are verbatim. Naturally, we then get the obligatory Palestinians vox pops, saying how Blair would be no good because he sided with the US/Israel, because of Iraq, etc. Only the very last one said, in a far more articulate manner than the others, that Blair would be good at it.
It’s back to the studio, and without a pause the presenter asks for an opinion from some talking head from the über-Left “Center for American Progress”. The BBC producers really had to scrape the bottom of the barrel to get someone to appear, I guess. He knows for sure that Blair would be a disaster. Apparently Blair’s mandate is limited to the Palestinians only, so he can have no influence on problems in the Middle East at large. Which is kind of silly since the mantra from the Left has been that solving the Palestinian problem would practically solve everything else. He constantly refers to the “State of Palestine”, or just “Palestine”, as if it already exists, but curiously does not define its borders. Oh, and he repeats all the things the Pally vox pops said.
No interruption from the presenter, except to ask if there was just no way that Blair could succeed. The leftoid then says, “well, he might pull a Blair,” which he goes on to define as expanding his role and powers, just like he did for the position of Prime Minister. Nice one, that. The presenter thanks him, and it’s off to a report about something in Africa that the US is supposed to be fixing or whatever. I’m not sure because I switched over to the Cartoon Network at that point.
I wonder what it would have been like if the BBC let us hear from anyone with anything remotely positive to say about Blair? Just from listening to the whole presentation, one might draw the conclusion that despite the BBC’s love for Labour, Blair is no good because of his association with Bush and Iraq. This applies to the Left in the US as well.
Regardless of what one thought of Blair’s tenure as PM (which I could have sworn involved much more than Iraq and the Israeli/Palestinian situation), it seems a bit unprofessional – without even going into bias – to just rubbish your own Prime Minister on an international news broadcast before he’s even finished cleaning out his desk. Shouldn’t the BBC at least make a gesture towards holding up the British end? What other national, citizen-funded-on-threat-of-imprisonment, supposedly responsible news organization do this? This wasn’t a broadcast meant for British subjects only. This is how the BBC represents itself to the rest of the world.
Marc, see my earlier comment (10.18pm yesterday) for a reply to your comment. Read and think before commenting next time – saves us all some bother.
This is how the BBC represents itself to the rest of the world.
David Preiser | 28.06.07 – 8:17 pm | #
Shows how much they really care about the palestinian/Israeli conflict – they’d rather see Blair fail than solve what in their (entirely wrong) view would solve all other problems in the ME and beyond. It is amazing quite how parochial the worldwide BBC is.
The thoroughly left/liberal Ha’aretz reported it rather differently:
Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayad welcomed Blair’s appointment as Mideast envoy.
“We welcome this appointment and look forward to working with him,” Fayad told reporters in the West Bank city of Ramallah.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Blair would be an asset to Palestinian attempts to establish an independent state alongside Israel.
“Mr. Blair’s expertise and knowledge of the situation will enable him to help us in terms of economic development, institution building and good government,” Erekat said, adding “His commitment to a two-state solution is genuine and sincere.”
And Saeb Erekat used to be a beeboid favourite – before they discovered their new best friends in Hamas.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/876190.html
And from the Jerusalem Post:
Analysis: Four reasons why Blair is the perfect envoy
The expected appointment of outgoing British Prime Minister Tony Blair as the international Quartet’s new envoy to the Middle East was greeted with a chorus of skepticism and downright derision by much of the British press on Tuesday.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1182409649985&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
I cannot stand Blair. I detest what he did to this country, and the corruption he wrought. However even I cannot think of any argument against him working in the Middle East, or of any statesman who would be better at the job.
Good Morning.
David Preiser is on good form-hat-tip sir.
As I keep saying TB will be the last sane voice you’ll hear.
As I keep saying TB will be the last sane voice you’ll hear.
IiD | 29.06.07 – 8:52 am |
I second that – with the qualification – “the last sane voice amongst politicians” – because of course there’s still our sane voices! (and this has nothing to do with TBs other policies). It is now an absolute orthodoxy across the MSM and the political elite that the Iraq war caused terror – that Israel attacked Lebanon – that Hamas was forced into a coup because the West wouldn’t negotiate with them and provide aid. In other words an absolute inversion of the truth.
And for all those trolls and beeboids reading this site –
1.The massive Islamist terror machine is causing the war in Iraq and Afghanistan (and acts of terror worldwide).
2. Hizbollah attacked Israel having built up a massive supply of weapons in the years since Israel withdrew from South Lebanon in compliance with international law. Israel’s acion to defend itself was entirely legal under international law.
3. Hamas, on orders from Damascus and Tehran, overthrew Fatah as a first step in an Islamist strategy in the Palestinian terrorities to overthrow Israel. The West would not negotiate with them because they are terrorists.
Oscar:
Of course when TB warned us about the ‘arc of extreamism’ that’s “scare-mongering” and when he called out the tanks at Heathrow that was “scaring us into war”
Judging by this mornings events-those who think that getting rid of TB was going to solve the worlds problems better think again,because if that car bomb HAD gone off it would of been the ‘luvvies’ and the ‘trendies’going up in a fireball.
Who will they blame after GWB has gone….?
I was amused to see this comment highlighted in a certain newspaper:
“Mr Blair is the most qualified person on earth to resolve the Middle East issue”
Dave, London, UK
Which paper? – Al Jazeera.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/EBCBC552-6DB7-4046-8B44-774E636F4F4C.htm
Who will they blame after GWB has gone….?
IiD | 29.06.07 – 10:38 am | #
Yeah – I’ve been wondering that.
Tony Blair did many excellent things and some truly appalling things but his role in Northern Ireland shows he is clearly the man for the job re: the quartet and the palestinian peace process.
Suggestion otherwise is bizarre, exactly who is being suggested as an alternative?
TRA
Yes……Don’t see Bono and Yorke rushing down to Gaza to have tea with head choppers.
exactly who is being suggested as an alternative?
The Real Agenda | 29.06.07 – 10:57 am
The last envoy James Wolfensohn threw in the towel after less than a year and no-one came rushing to replace him. I’d say they’re lucky to get TB and most people in the ME know it.
‘and this was the BBC’s way, post-Hutton, of showing Blair and everyone else who’s really in charge’ – You can call it a monumental cock-up, incompetence or whatever else but the suggestion here is that it was done to spite Blair or for some ‘post Hutton’ reason which really belongs to the realms of conspiracy theory. Or maybe you consider that a ‘lie’?
Bullshitter Defective, if you’re going to come back for another go at my post, at least have the decency to quote me properly, rather than using that typical BBC technique of taking quotes out of context.
The crucial word in particular that you have omitted is ‘perhaps’, although really, you should have quoted from the beginning of the sentence in full – but then you wouldn’t be able to lie about what I said, to use your own term, if you’d done that. TTFN.
Who will they blame after GWB has gone….?
IiD | 29.06.07 – 10:38 am | #
Yeah – I’ve been wondering that.
Oscar | 29.06.07 – 10:43 am
Everything bad that happens will then become “Bush’s legacy” (if a Dem becomes president, that is).
Everything bad that happens will then become “Bush’s legacy” (if a Dem becomes president, that is).
Anonanon | 30.06.07 – 4:07 pm | #
That’s for sure. And it seems that Broon is going to be allowed to get away with pinning the blame on ‘Blair’s legacy’ – even tho’ his mitts are all over every policy decision of the past 10 years.
Everything bad that happens will then become “Bush’s legacy” (if a Dem becomes president, that is).
I have always taken it as understood in all democratic politics:
“If things go wrong it is the previous administration’s fault even if the accuser had supported the move at the time. If things go right the current office-holder claims credit even if he had previously opposed the decisions which led to the positive result”.
Human nature, I suppose!
The fact is that there is now plenty of ground to the left of the Democratic Party. If a Dem president comes to power and rules in any way like a sane person, Soros, the Kos Kids and the rest of the lunatics will immediately start treating him/her just as they are treating Bush now.
Awfully sorry for not reading all 20 odd comments before posting. I think you should change the name of this Blog to something less misleading! Most readers will assume that an article posted on a Blog called “Biased BBC” will be making a point that that the BBC is biased. So as a Blog owner, you should keep your posts on topic else make it clear that the topics covered are more varied.