It’s like re-living the early 1990’s again with the BBC in its default position of leading the charge against the sleazy Conservative Party. The lead story today is actually located in the 1990’s with the shock horror! news that Conservative Party chairman Caroline Spelman has admitted using her MP’s parliamentary allowance for payments to her children’s former nanny. Spelman told BBC’s Newsnight that the money, paid in 1997 and 1998, was for secretarial work the nanny did. Following on from the revelations concerning Conservative MEP Giles Chicester, it’s like the good old days are back. A story that is TEN YEARS OLD is the single most important issue for the BBC this morning. Now I have no sympathy at all for our rapacious political caste and the fact that they abuse their expenses does not surprise me in the least but this is OLD news. I am sure the beleaguered Mr Brown will be thanking the BBC for doing all it can to shift the news agenda away from his serial woes. Naturally Labour MP’s are squeaky clean when it comes to their own use of parliamentary expenses. Mr Speaker Michael Martin is a good example of Labour financial propriety I suppose.
THOSE SLEAZY TORIES.
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Just watched early morning paper review on beeb.
After a quick look at soom of the headlines guess what was the first inside pages story that they talked about.
bodo:
Remember when Ruth Turner, one of Blair’s closest aides, was arrested on suspicion of wrongdoing in cash for peerages scandal, including the very serious charge of perverting the course of justice?
Remember what Newsnight lead on on that particular evening? A one-year-old e-mail from a Tory activist (not an MP, not even a councillor — despite some reports). His crime? The e-mail used the word “cripple”. This, we were told, revealed that the Tories were still a nasty party.
Strange how the BBC weren’t bothered about sleaze that night, despite the unprecedented involvement of the police.
bodo | 07.06.08 – 6:57 pm | #
And, if memory serves me right, the man presenting that story on Newsnight was a certain Mr Crick.
Reminds me of how the BBC dealt with a poll by a far left Israeli group that “concluded” that the majority of Israeli Jews were racist towards Arabs. They ran with it as the second most important story on every “newscast” on the World Service for at least ten hours (while I monitored them) and went into more depth on the issue in programmes like World Briefing. It was also prominently featured on the website:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7136068.stm
A few months later, a poll of Palestinians by Palestinians concluded that the majority favoured suicide attacks against Israelis. How did the BBC handle that information? With complete silence.
The BBC, with its tunnel vision and lefty sympathies, is utterly incapable of judging the relative importance of items of news. I wouldn’t trust its “editors” to edit a college newsletter.
Sunday morning and still the BBC won’t let this one go. They currently have an ‘analysis’ piece on the front page of their ‘news’ website, wondering ‘what damage’ might have been done to the Tories.
Not enough, Beeboids. Not enough to achieve what you so clearly hoped for.
“”My roles and responsibilities were general administration which entailed tasks such as posting of letters, answering phone calls at the home address, (and) faxing or posting documents to Mrs Spelman whilst she was in London.
“This was performed during the hours that her children were at school. On Fridays any help with directions to constituency events was given.”
BBC correspondent Gary O’Donoghue said the statement went some considerable way to support Mrs Spelman’s account of events.
But Ms Haynes does not specifically say she was employed as the constituency secretary, or that this role amounted to 30 hours a week.”
What’s the betting that this little shit GO’D is a Zanu activist?
GCooper,
yeah – I’ve just read that Beeb website piece, on your pointing it out. Absolutely pathetic as a piece of journalism.
Obviously the hack was told by the editor to write a piece to keep the story alive, and this he manages to do – just.
“What’s the betting that this little shit G’OD is a Zanu activist?”
Nearly Oxfordian, I think the odds are pretty high.
This is a response to the latest poll putting labour in Lib Dem country.
Strange that the bbc didn’t show the same zeal, when investigating the Smith Institute ( Sith) scandal, where millions of pounds of taxpayers money was funneled into a fake think tank fronting for gordon brown. How ? By providing free use of No 11 Downing St and commercialy valuable free access to ministers to companies bidding for govt contracts!!!
Or, indeed, Backwoodsman, the way the government has stolen millions from taxpayers, laundered it through the unions as ‘modernisation grants’ etc, who ‘donate’ a portion, in return.
It’s quite interesting that because the media (especially the BBC) tend to bury scandal’s involving McLiebour.
Does anyone have a definitive list of all McLiebour scandals, going right back to the start of the Bliar days?
Peter Hain anyone?
Ecclestone
The Minister for Wasting Money on the Olympics
Blair
Blair witch
.
.
.
.
The BBC covers a story about accusations of corruption involving a Tory MP and it’s biased. How laughable. It’s your own bias you fools!
I don’t see you making the same complaints when stories involving Labour MPs were covered!?!?!
What an absolute joke, I am only glad that extremists like you only represent a tiny minority.
joel: Care to remind us of Peter Hain and how the BBC covered (or didn’t that story) that?
How about Harriet Harman?
The Labour bint in Scotland
Gorbels Mick?
Don’t remember them being top story for 48 hours.
“What an absolute joke, I am only glad that extremists like you only represent a tiny minority”
Joel, do you really not see what a tosser you are? Half of Zanu’s ministers in the last 10 years have been involved in mega-corruption, and BBC has not reported on them in such obsessive detail.
Joel: “The BBC covers a story about accusations of corruption involving a Tory MP and it’s biased. How laughable. It’s your own bias you fools!”
I think you’ll find the accusation was the bias was in running it as the top story for almost the entire day – a feat not replicated by any other news source, nor replicated by any Sunday paper.
As someone once said: “One objective measure of the BBC’s coverage is to look at the coverage given by the rest of the ‘msm’ as you like to call it…
Its not rocket science… just think about it.” (copyright Joel)
That’s a win by an innings and 25 runs, Hugh 😉
Yes, and I also said the headlines were often more about WHEN something occured, ie it being ‘new’.
It was a BBC ‘exclusive’, which explains to a degree why the BBC gave it significant coverage and other sources didn’t give as much. Many of the other sources are newspapers, printing the story the day after its emerged.
Reading this blog, you would think that that expenses scandals involving Labour were hidden and Tory ones are given saturation coverage. There is simply no basis in reality for that assertion. You cannot be watching and listening to the same BBC as me.
One of the points I was making was that there are a whole host of factors, all subjective, which go into deciding what makes something newsworthy. Or how much coverage it gets, were in the running order and so on. To ignore all of this and decide it must be biased shows a fundamentaly flawed logic.
Thank you for your constructive point however, its rare that a reasonable point is made here.
Did anyone see Derren Brown’s final episode of Trick or Treat about superstition?
I thought Brown was talking about Biased BBC when he summing up after the experiment featuring David Tennant. I’m trying to get hold of a transcript.
Geoffrey Robinson,
Peter Mandelson,
John Prescott
Hinduja Brothers.
I’d go on but Joel is getting distraught
this Spelman story is truely a case of pathetic “bash Tories at any price”…
there’s enough with Prescott to last a lifetime
hello property deals, organised by his son?
and why was the head of common purpose Prescott’s HR director?
“Joel | Homepage | 08.06.08 – 12:34 pm |”
c’mon mate – she wasnt exactly enriching herself at the trough, just paying a nanny.
and considering how a woman like her would have to balance worklife with rearing her kids, i wouldnt begrudge her that – it should have been more above board, but it doesnt bother me. its not exactly corruption in the true sense of the word.
“It was a BBC ‘exclusive’, which explains to a degree why the BBC gave it significant coverage and other sources didn’t give as much”.
It was written and produced by the BBC,based solely on an interview by a dick named Crick.A story ten years old about the earnings of some poor working class nanny.Hold the front pages,this is a scoop!
Does Crick have links to the Labour party.
the far BIGGER story this weekend is the MEP expense row.
its a pity that Guido Fawkes went for the easier target of Spelman – a non story if ever there was one.
“One of the points I was making was that there are a whole host of factors, all subjective, which go into deciding what makes something newsworthy. Or how much coverage it gets, were in the running order and so on”
Subjective,like the editor being a member of the Labour party?
“Does Crick have links to the Labour party.
Peter | 08.06.08 – 3:22 pm ”
He joined the Labour party at 15 and wrote a book about Militant, the Trotskyist faction of the Labour party, soon after graduating with a first in PPE from New College, Oxford.
Until the age of 30, he had every intention of becoming a Labour MP, but when the opportunity to become the candidate for a safe-ish seat presented itself, he agonised briefly, then decided not to take it. It clashed with another opportunity that had come up: to be Channel 4’s Washington correspondent.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2007/06/17/svcrick117.xml
having said that , all of us have made silly mistakes when age 15.
but there’s no evidence of Crick having current connections to New Labour. he seems to be a bit of maverick outsider compared to your usual Beeboid.
“Reading this blog, you would think that that expenses scandals involving Labour were hidden and Tory ones are given saturation coverage”
Joel: The BBC was handed documents detailing the sleaze surrounding Livingstone 12 months ago — they decided it was a nonstory and ignored it.
In May Labour health Minister Ann Keen was exposed charging her life insurance policies to the taxpayer. Sleaze were sea of exposure surely, but totally ignored by the BBC.
When it comes to Conservative sleaze we find the BBC conducting their own investigations into events more than 10 years ago, and featuring them heavily on the news reports. But they can’t even Google “Ann keen” or check any of the national paper to discover what she’s been to.
The BBC should report on sleaze in all parties fairly and without bias. As it is, their one-sided reporting looks less like news and more like a campaign.
There’s a long history of former BBC editors and producers, including those on Newsnight, later moving on to prominent positions within the Labour Party. It looks like that is a tradition which is set to continue.
bodo ->in light of the upcoming Irish referendum, isnt it notable how quiet the BBC has become regarding the MEP expense scandal.
in my view , that is a huge story, and is one of genuine corruption – and i dont care what “party” is involved – far more so than the easy target of Spelman.
(in fact, if nanny expenses were allowed as a perk of being an MP, i dont think many folks would object…)
The amazing thing about the Beeboids is that every man Jack and Jill of them supports their families,lifestyle and habits on public money.
Joel: “Yes, and I also said the headlines were often more about WHEN something occured, ie it being ‘new'”
That doesn’t really account for a UK story about a fairly unknown politician being billed as the top story in the World for the whole day. Nor the fact it was a BBC exclusive. Yes, being ‘new’ and exclusive are advantages, as readers are less likely to have seen the story and therefore more likely be interested. As it happens, visitors to the BBC’s website, despite its best efforts, proved spectacularly uninterested in this.
And that, I would suggest, is because it’s not a terribly important or interesting story. And the importance and interest of a story – its significance – tend to be the deciding factors when determining the lead. The fact that by an international measure this was fairly trivial should have ruled it out from the top spot on the front page – let alone the blanket coverage elsewhere.
“Many of the other sources are newspapers, printing the story the day after its emerged.”
Generally, unless they have their own exclusive, that’s what papers have to do, Joel. Hilary is a top story on a lot of front pages today.
“Reading this blog, you would think that that expenses scandals involving Labour were hidden and Tory ones are given saturation coverage.”
Then I’m sure you’ll be able to point me to the last Labour scandal that was given this prominence.
“[T]here are a whole host of factors, all subjective, which go into deciding what makes something newsworthy… To ignore all of this and decide it must be biased shows a fundamentaly flawed logic.”
I’m not ignoring them. I’ve just decided that your explanation is unconvincing and that your argument’s weak.
The BBC has in the past admitted to failing to provide balanced reporting on certain occasions. It’s own independent reports have concluded the same. A large number of journalists – including some present and former employees – also believe it fails in its duty to report impartially (whether frequently or on occasion). The real minority are those, like yourself, who seemingly deny that it is ever biased. In light of the evidence it shows a fundamentally flawed logic.
archd – The BBC always seems very coy about reporting any sort of bad news about the EU. Unfortunately such censorship by omission is one of the hardest things to counter. If they cover a story badly or unfairly it can often be fairly easily criticised and pulled apart. If however, they simply do not cover a story, what can a critic do? They simply respond with the excuse; more important news to cover, question of opinion what should run etc etc.
As for the substance of this so-called sleaze, I’ll admit that what I was most surprised about is that MPs’ childcare isn’t provided free or at least at a discount by the House of Commons. In many other organisations, especially public, it is. Including, I think, the BBC.
“Hugh | 08.06.08 – 3:49 pm ”
as an example of the bbc losing the plot when it comes to news, i must admit i was shocked when ABC News reported last night that Mexico is virtually in a civil war, with 5,000 dead in the past 12 months.
drug cartels versus government kind of war. 500 cops killed, in just 12 months.
i would bet that hardly anyone reading this blog knows about it.
“bodo | 08.06.08 – 3:50 pm”
my guess is that the Commons doesnt provide it – the hypocrites that they are , are all for imposing “equality” on the rest of us, but it never applies in the Commons.
(prime example: the smoking ban.. that doesnt apply in the EU parliament either..)
joel is a joke. Again I say PETER HAIN.
The BBC story has been blown out of the water. A 10 year old story with a single source (who has now contradicted what Dick said on Newsnight)
Why doesn’t the BBC investigate Gorbels Mick? That is a story with real public interest?
Here’s how the BBC covered Peter Hain.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7206812.stm
Oh yes, the BBC really went for the throat on this story. NOT!
the bottles of fine wine discovered by Boris in Ken’s office is curiously under-reported as well. (reminds me of that scene in Band of Brothers, where they discover the wine cellar of Goring…)
i cant wait for Boris to start going over the Olympics accounts… god only knows what he’ll discover there.
Mandelson #2.
“Martin | 08.06.08 – 3:56 pm ”
as tabloid editors know only too well, the story is all “in the headline”
note how the bbc choose to use the phrase
“innocent mistake”
to frame one of the paragraphs.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7206812.stm
‘the importance and interest of a story – its significance – tend to be the deciding factors when determining the lead’
As is the story being the latest in a long list of similar stories that have emerged about MP’s expenses, an issue of considerable public concern.
Archduke said:
“… and considering how a woman like her would have to balance worklife with rearing her kids, i wouldnt begrudge her that – it should have been more above board, but it doesnt bother me. its not exactly corruption in the true sense of the word.”
Quite. I’d begrudge her that money far less than the Beeboids who take the licence fee money, spend it on cocaine and LSD, and then end up dying in less than pleasant circumstances.
LOL. Isn’t it fun to see Joel wriggle and twist and turn?
Kindly address Martin’s list or shut up, sad person.
Quite. I’d begrudge her that money far less than the Beeboids who take the licence fee money, spend it on cocaine and LSD, and then end up dying in less than pleasant circumstances.
David | 08.06.08 – 4:04 pm | #
Sorry, Mr Ross can’t come to the phone, he’s tied up all afternoon.
Joel: “an issue of considerable public concern.”
Yes indeed, but as has been shown, it didn’t come anywhere near being the most read story outside the politics page; other cases, involving government ministers no less, didn’t have anything like the same treatment despite being more sensational; and no other news group felt this was that great a story, despite that public concern.
Sorry if I seem to be repeating myself, but the argument that this was the biggest news story in the world yesterday is just extraordinarily weak.
joel: THe story has not facts to it!!! How stupid are you lot at the BBC?
It was a single source and I’d like to know what Michael Dick(head) said to her (the nanny) to get her to say what she said. Or did Dick “exagerate the facts?” Will he release his transcripts of the interview (as Gilligan did)
Did she claim for a new kitchen? Did she go through the John Lewis list (I wonder how many Labour MP’s have)
Joel. Suppose for ONE second this story were true. She was a new MP at the time and may not have fully understood what she could or could not claim for. There would be no excuse for that, but in light of what the Blairs’ got up to, McBean claiming his TV tax on expenses, Gorbels Mick, PETER HAIN (I mention him yet again), Peter Mandelson, Bernie Ecclestone etc.
All of the above were given an easy ride by the BBC. IF you can show EVIDENCE Joel of where the BBC were seen to really go for McLiebour in the same way as the Tories, I’d like to see it.
I wait with interest……
Address Martin’s list?
Geoffrey Robinson,
Peter Mandelson,
John Prescott
Hinduja Brothers.
I remember all these cases recieving extensive coverage. Selective memory?
The story was on the Radio One news as well 2 1/2 hours ago.
Joel: Evidence? I’ve just posted links that showed the BBC spun the Peter Hain story.
Can you remmeber one Newsnight special into sleaze with Nu Labour or a Panorama special? What have the BBC done about Gorbels Mick and his wife?
After all McLiebour does have rather a history of sleaze. In fact it’s rare to see the BBC mention “sleaze” with Nu Labour.
Jack Bauer: Yep or rent boys.
But today’s top story is New Labour 16% behind in the polls. Doesn’t look as though fighting the 1997 election all over again is doing Labor any good.
I notice that Joel ducked Ecclestone et al.