The BBC is leading the way in blunting the Conservatives’ revival with this special coverage of… well, what exactly about Ray Lewis? Headlined “Mayor’s aide in sex claims enquiry” it’s never clear what the sex claims are in fact. The article is filled with something else on the financial side apparently pursued by the oh-so-upright Church of England back in the 90’s. It’s basically a mess of conflation. The usual suspects, the rat pack of journos, can be heard on the BBC’s televised clip from Deputy Mayor Ray’s press conference- Jon Snow et al getting very snooty indeed. Boris is getting a going-over and the BBC is desperate to be in the vanguard.
I didn’t notice this level of zeal, or even any interest at all, in the case against Lee Jasper.
BBC London’s political editor Tim Donovan was on Radio Five Live earlier and he was almost breathless with excitement over the Ray Lewis revelations. He wasn’t so enthusiastic when he chose to ignore those juicy Lee Jasper emails he’d been given.
As hippiepooter, with great prescience, commented at the time:
“Imagine the jamboree the BBC would have had if even a slither of the evidence against Lee Jasper existed against Ray Lewis!”
(I see some BBC-friendly types at the Independent have removed the original story about Donovan from the Feral Beast column. At first it was updated in an attempt to divert the blame from Donovan, but now it’s gone completely.)
this is incredible. this is on the front page of the bbc website.contrast with lee jasped this is a joke.
the evening standard covered the lee jasper story alone from december 2007 onwards.
it barely got a mention on bbc london until the new year let alone any mention at all on the national bbc.
And on the 6 o/c radio 4 they were almost wetting themselves to get the report out. Problem was apparently there wasn’t any evidence to report, so as often is the case they really illustrated how biased they are.
Listened to 5 o’clock news – all seems rather tenuous “some parishoner gave him some money to give to charity that has now been repaid” – don’t they just love it though?
It may be that Lewis’s appointment as deputy Mayor was partly driven by ‘multiculturalist’ sentiment.
Problem was apparently there wasn’t any evidence to report, so as often is the case they really illustrated how biased they are.
They don’t need it. Johnson gave the story traction by announcing an independent inquiry. He’s almost certainly done the right thing, but such an announcement means every news medium is likely to run the story….
Guess what the first question will be on Question Time tonight? And to think most people hadn’t heard of Ray Lewis before today
Funny that the Bum Bandit Corporation didn’t feel that the headline “Ray Lewis I’ll clear my name” was more suitable.
Oh hang on, they only use that for Nu Labour types don’t they?
Wendy Alexander
Harriet Harman
Peter Hain
Anyone?
There are supposedly sexual and financial allegations.
1. What are the sexual allegations? If people have accused him of sexual assault that’s serious, but if it’s fraternizing with a parishioner while he was a priest, many will think it’s his own effing business. The Church might have to be seen to take stuff like that seriously, the rest of us don’t.
2. The financial stuff should be easy to check out. Where money has been spent there are records.
Perhaps the people making these allegations disapprove of Lewis or disapprove of his boss?
Until these allegations are fully investigated the BBC should do the decent thing and shut up.
Andy: On Sky they reported that the Church had insisted they’d made no official statement on the story. So where did the original story come from. i’m betting the friends of red Ken have said something ot the BBC>
Next the Police investigated the money allegations and took no action. Why is that sufficient for Nu Labour financial investigation s(like cash for honours) but not Ray Lewis
As for anything else. Hmm. The BBC are quick to attack the Church when it comes to them talking about men sticking their willies up each others bottoms but not so if it involves a man and a woman (oh HOW disgusting that must seem to Beeboids all that hetrosexual stuff)
Well, did anyone notice how Ken basically admitted to stalking Boris on the Marr show on Sunday? Marr of course chuckled sportingly- but this kind of thing brings in a whole different perspective.
Read about this in the London Evening Standard today.
Another Standard story was about the forensic accountancy investigations into the London Development Agency, Jasper’s old balliwick. Indications are that departments of the LDA were competing against each other to see who could spend ratepayers’ money. Grants under £6m were too small even to bother the board with.
You can read all about it on the BBC website…..er no you can’t.
Ah. Good to see that Newsnight are going to give us the low down on this story. I’m betting the really vile awful creature that passes for a human being (just) Michael Prick will be in the thick of this.
some websites are reporting that a female prisoner gave him £25k to look after and he didn’t give it back.
yes that’s right. a convicted prisoner had £25k and gave it to him. that’s the evidence.
the bbc has gone all out on this flimsy witness evidence. no need for a corroborative witness presumably – just gowith the loon convict.
just print the garbage you’re given because they are tories.
if it’s zanulabour they require 2 sources and cast iron documentary evidence.
Is that Prisoner like a good friend and Mr Lewis’ parishioner?
Another BBC hatchet job, judging by the agressive interview on BBC 24 website. You’d never see this with a Nu Labour suspect, or a Muslim, come to that.
According to the Grauniad – who kicked off this whole farrago – the woman who gave Lewis the 25k to invest, and later got it back with interest, is now happily working alongside him again at his young offenders institute.
…But yesterday the woman, Mary Massey, issued a statement saying that although there had been problems with the investment during 1997 all the money had been returned to her, with interest, by Lewis by 2004. Massey presently works at Lewis’s Eastside Young Leaders Academy in the east London borough of Newham, the “respect” centre Lewis founded and runs.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/jul/03/london.boris?gusrc=rss&feed=networkfront
Apparently back in 97 she complained to the police and the church because she thought he’d buggered off to the Windward Isles with the loot. He paid her back with interest, the police weren’t bothered but the church blacklisted him.
Seems to me this would hardly register on the NULAB Hain/Levy/Abrahams/Wee Wendy/Harperson
sleazeometer.
Hi Ed,
Seems like you and David are playing hyperbole ping pong
You state:
“I didn’t notice this level of zeal, or even any interest at all, in the case against Lee Jasper.”
Searching the BBC online contributions, one finds many stories:
http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/search/results.pl?tab=ns&q=lee+jasper&scope=all
jimbob’s contribution:
“the evening standard covered the lee jasper story alone from december 2007 onwards.”
is equally wrong:
Here the BBC article:
Mayor’s aide in funding dispute
One of London mayor’s top advisers is being looked into over the distribution of grants.
89% relevance | 5 Dec 2007
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7129278.stm
Hope your research for the upcoming book is somewhat better.
Good luck!
That money was just resting in his account, and let’s not bring up the Lourdes thing.
And only for 7 years.
Will yis have a nice cup of tea?
While the replacement of Ken by Boris was for many a cause for celebration, for Beeboids it was a bitter pill indeed. We can expect them to use every trick and technique in their bias repertoire to hit back over the coming months.
Gunnar: there certainly wasn’t this level of zeal with the Jasper story – it was never given anything like this prominence when the BBC (eventually) decided to cover it.
In fact, now I think of it, I remember some of the big developments on the Jasper story being filed straight under ‘England’ on the website, not even making it onto the politics page – let alone the front page. And I must have missed the mass of coverage on national programmes that covered it as extensively as this Boris thing.
The reason I said no interest at all, with the link I gave, was because the BBC received the Lee Jasper story on a plate a year before the rest of the press and sat on it as being beneath the public interest.
Who’s Lee Jasper?
I am afraid Mr Lewis has committed the cardinal offence of being CWB (Conservative While Black) which is enough to damn him in the eyes of the liberal/left establishment.
Add to that the fact that he is in charge of an educational establishment ‘based on a regime of strict discipline’ and it was inevitable he would be targeted.
Gunnar: I love you Beeboids when you always refer to the BBC website (as if most people in the UK EVER look at it)
I look at the BBC TV and radio output (which the majority of people DO listen to and watch)
Every piece of ‘Tory’ sleaze gets mega attention from the BBC (Caroline Spelman for starters) but Lee Jasper, Peter Hain (anyone?) WEndy Alexander, Harriet Harman, Tony Bliar, Gordon Broon (the Bernie affair) and so on attracts NO investigation from the BBC.
Well Tory Party lurkers – are you convinced yet that al-Beeb must be thrown down the well after the next election?
Thrown down the well? Better to break it up into small parts and sell it off. God knows we need the money. We could sell BBC News to Al Jazeera – it would fit right in.
“Searching the BBC online contributions, one finds many stories:
http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/…asper& scope=all”
The pimping of the BBC on line is amusing since most people watch television or listen to the radio.The areas where the BBC does the most damage.
The salient point is that the BBC does not merely report the news,but decides what is to be news.
BREAKING NEWS
Ray Lewis HAS resigned. Red Ken and the BBC got their scalp.
Much crowing on C4 news – “Calls into question the whole strategy of Cameron’s Conservative revival…..etc…etc…etc” (ad nauseam).
Funny how ethnic folk are beyond reproach in the liberal media – until they reveal themselves as Conservatives.
Then it’s “back to the plantation for you – boy”.
….. are you convinced yet that al-Beeb must be thrown down the well after the next election?
Anonymous | 04.07.08 – 4:38 pm | #
I like that, Anon – it has a catchy ring.
Could be the B-BBC anthem:-
Throw the beeb down the well! (is it ‘cos I’s a liberal)
I’ll go for that – thanks.
Tim Donovan (BBC London political editor) has just been on News 24, saying; “This is immensely damaging for Boris Johnson, and it reveals his lack of preparedness for becoming mayor”. This would be the same Tim Donovan who was reported in the Independent (story now removed) as regarding the Lee Jasper allegations as being a “nonstory” when he was shown the ‘leaked emails’ a full 12 months before they were taken up by the Evening Standard, followed by Ken Livingstone’s downfall. Donovan went on to write that the allegations were instrumental in his demise.
Channel 4 reported yesterday that these allegations raised serious doubts about Johnson’s judgement and Cameron’s judgement
It looks like the media have really got it in for Boris. What a surprise. I expected it of the BBC, but I had hoped that Channel 4 were a little bit less biased.
…I had hoped that Channel 4 were a little bit less biased.
bodo | 04.07.08 – 8:37 pm | #
Not a chance……..
Jon Snow is the archetypal media liberal –
Impeccable upper middle class background – dad was a bishop.
Academic failure – failed his A levels and booted out of uni for student protests.
Got a telly job courtesy of his cousin Peter Snow.
Asserts his “independance” by refusing to wear a poppy on remembrance day.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Snow
We should declare him an honorary beeboid.
Oh ffs, the Beeb has dug out every video clip of Lewis with Cameron to illustrate this story, AND they’ve blurred bystanders in the clips, which as any photographer knows, is done to draw attention to the UNBLURRED faces, ie Lewis and Cameron. Blatant manipulation and anti-Cameron smear job.
I can put the BBC hatchet job on Cameron on YouTube if anyone wants to see it. A textbook lesson on how to smear a politician.
bodo- please do.
Ok, so in the news tonight Al Beeb was trumpeting that they had uncovered that this guy, even though Boris and him said yesterday, wasnt nor has ever been a JP according to someone in the Justice Department.
Anyone got an update on this?
Also, has he resigned yet as suggested by Al Beeb in this evenings news as they waited with baited breath for Boris’s news conference.
Mailman
Ed, minor computer glitch. I’ll put it up tomo, lunch-time ish.
Lead item on ten o’clock news.
Well it’s not as if youngsters are being stabbed in the streets is it?
Notice that the BBC don’t use the headline “Ray Lewis resigns to clear name” like they did for Peter Hain, WHO unlike Ray Lewis is facing a Police investigation.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7490687.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7206812.stm
Compare and contrast the BBC
Sorry to disappoint you all but the BBC have had to make a choice and they have decided to put their lot in with Labour 100%. They realise that an incoming Conservative government may take revenge for the shit that the BBC has flung at the hateful Tories for 25+ years and so will be in slur mode until the next election. I warned that the BBC would try and get Boris and his team once they were elected and the BBC have done just that. They have accumulted two easy scalps in 2 months and now they scent blood. Just like in the last days of the John Major government the BBC see their role as attacking the Tories and that is what they will do. An incoming Conservative government will have to tackle the BBC very early in their first term or they will fall foul of the same tactics.
bbc hatchet job
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7491167.stm
Apparently the Tories are in disarray. Brought to you by the Labour Party press office. I’d say it’s a sign of a party being in disarray when likely candidates for incredibly safe seats don’t turn up to get selected through fear of losing:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/scotland_politics/7491181.stm
“Apparently the Tories are in disarray. Brought to you by the Labour Party press office.”
Yup, and faithfully reported by the BBC. ‘Labour criticises Tories’ – is that news? Only in BBCland.
Look at the youtube clip above. Someone at the Beeb made the decision to find and then show clips of Lewis featuring Cameron – a blatant attempt to show ‘guilt by association’ ie Lewis is dodgy, therefore so is Cameron.
And just in case we don’t get the message that the BBC is trying to put across, they have manipulated the footage by blurring details at the edge of the picture which draws attention to Cameron and Lewis. It’s a tried and trusted photographic trick — it makes their intention clear. None of this happened by accident, it’s a deliberate attempt to smear Cameron. The person responsible should be sacked, but they won’t be, cos it’s the BBC and it’s what they do.
Note the look of glee on the studio presenter’s face when the camera cuts back to her at the end of the clip.
are comments playing up?
bbc on boris.
Comments seem to be ok-ish, with the odd glitch. Very interesting video. Thank you.
Does anybody know what word it is that the BBC journalist signs his report off with? Johnson is “left with some huge grab????
I wonder if this last word somehow explains the newsreader’s smirk that goes with it?