Did you get a chance to listen to Sarah Montague interview David Cameron? Here it is in case you missed it. Wonder what you think? My view is that Cameron was OK – in what was clearly a hostile environment for him. Some of his responses disturb me and he still uses Blairist vocabulary on some issues and is wary of stating clearly that the State MUST be rolled back. He waffled on about teacherndoctorsnnurses too much. Montague’s tone (I know it’s subjective!)was simmering hostility and she was out to make Cameron say something Thatcheresque which could then be seized upon by Labour so I can understand his hesitations. Comments?
THE CAMERON INTERVIEW.
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Out to make Cameron say something Thatcheresque? Have you developed psychic powers that only work on interviewers now David?
If the likes of Montague treated all the politicians they interview in the same way she treated Cameron this morning I could have some respect for her and her ilk. But contrasting her Cameron interview with the “please may I kiss your arse minister” aproach she adopts for labour ministers and St Cable clearly show her bias. If I wasn’t forced to pay for this I wouldn’t care but I do so I do.
I’m not a big Cameron fan but I can understand why he would hesitate to state clearly where public spending would have to be cut back. The BBC has in the past been only too willing to publicise Labour attacks for this kind of thing.
I think it is true to say that the public now knows it has to be done, and will be less willing to listen to that sort of Labour attack. But they would still like the spending cuts to apply to someone else, not them, hence the lack of specifics from David Cameron.
I do wish Sarah Montague would stop interrupting though. Sometimes politicians need to be interrupted but they also need to be allowed to answer the question. I thought he dealt with the interruptions quite well.
The interview was decidedly antagonistic, I thought dripping with acid – with the pacifist interviewer pressing twice on Trident as a possible cut. Was cutting Trident pressed on Darling ?
One way for Cameron to have stopped Montague in her tracks would have been to mention that £3.5 billion could be saved tomorrow by abolishing the TV tax.
Cameron had a difficult time, not just because of Montague’s aggression but because, until August last year, he and Osborne were still relaying the mantra of “sharing the proceeds of growth” between an incontinent government machine and the taxpayer. It’s laughable (and creates warranted cynicism out here in the real world) for Cameron to turn round now and seek to claim that he – and the “New” Conservatives – were keen on limiting state expenditure and the borrowing culture from the moment of his accession in 2005.
Even Thatch didn’t start saying ‘Thatcheresque’ things until she was firmly behind the door of Number Ten. He will be aware of this, but here is a bit of balance:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8015000/8015817.stm
Umbongo | 24.04.09 – 10:42 am
One way for Cameron to have stopped Montague in her tracks would have been to mention that £3.5 billion could be saved tomorrow by abolishing the TV tax.
Except, of course, the TV Tax is both income and expenditure giving no benefit either way. Scrapping the TV Tax saves the public money not the Government.
Still, I’d vote for it.
As for Cameron, he is playing Bliar’s game of pre-1997 by making vague statements in the hope that no-one will notice the lack of tangible policies. It’s a stupid policy for a Tory as it only worked for Bliar because the BBC refused to press for details. However, with the Tories playing the same game the BBC know the score and keep chipping away at Camerons very thin armour. The man is a either a fool (he chose to emulate Bliar just as the public were getting sick of smarmy spin meisters) or is playing a delicate game of tag with the media. Either way it’s not very inspiring is it?
It was a disgrace. Ms Monatgue even managed a weary sigh on air at the end of the interview. She should be sacked.
Yesterday they tried to distract from Evan Davis’ realistic interview with Darling by playing (without any context) the “Fleets lit Up” which Montague thought was the funniest thing she’d ever heard. I was worried that we might have been nuked by North Korea and this was the latest variations on the Kind Hearts and Coronets last things broadcast. Still I look forward to more random Imperial nostalgia.
It is scanadalous not because the BBC news and Current Affairs resembles something from the DDR (which it does) but because it is so stupid. Everyone I know knows what they’re doing. Their reputation for impartiality is down the pan, and attempts to portray sites like this, and similar threads of opinion, as ranting by anti-progressive “Daily Mail” types just wont wash beacuse its no longer true. This is how most people feel about them.
“Their” party is going to get destroyed at the polls next year and the incoming government whether it admits it or not is bound to get even with those who have covertly and shamefully campaigned against it.
Having said that its not all bad, Nick Robinson has emmerged from his break a changed man and slaughtered Darling yesterday.
I would of loved it if call me dave asked her why the bbc has not asked hard questions of labour !
I wish the cons at every interview state the bbc bias that they know it has. It would certainly make more people aware as the bbc could not edit everything!
If ever a country needed another Thatcher to run things it is the UK in 2009.
No bullshit, no turning but a vision of what may be possible in the future.
History has been rewritten to cast Thatcher as an ogre with which to frighten the children who are not old enough to know better. Anything that links Cameroon to Thatch will take the votes of the under thirty fives away from Conservatives. Young voters believe the Spitting Image puppet version of history – its enemy territory. Cameroon is wise not to offer the BBC an own goal.
Cutting government expenditure will mean closing skoolsn’ospitals, they’ll say. Labour has demonstrated its complete inability to run the country, except into the ground. Their only possible hope is if they can inflict as much damage on the Tories as they have on the country. Damien McBrides strategy to smear them was right, given where Labour are. But in true Labour form, they couldn’t even run a smear campaign right.
Cattle Prod
“Except, of course, the TV Tax is both income and expenditure giving no benefit either way. Scrapping the TV Tax saves the public money not the Government.”
Please explain how that works. Unless the government steps in and coughs up £3.5 billion from the general taxpayer pot, the expenditure stops right there. If you or I want the BBC we would cough up £x/year subscription for the BBC to expend on what we the subscribers want. If we don’t cough up directly and the government refused to cough up or some corporate mug out there doesn’t buy the franchise (at its – not our – expense), the BBC collapses – job done!
Good piece by Ross Clark on how Boris has frzen the GLA precept and nobody’s even noticed. There’s so much waste out there that Cameron would have no difficulty in cutting spending without affecting services, none at all.
Getting rid of the telly tax would help VAT receipts as people spend the money saved by abolishing the tax on something more interesting and useful than the BBC, like, say, a new lawnmower. Or a Spacehopper. Maybe a barbeque. Anything other than the Toady gang, anyway.
PS That Kirsty Wark’s looking a bit ropey nowadays, don’t you think? I think her lighting man’s got it in for her. To quote WS Gilbert, “She could easily pass for forty-three. In the dusk. With the light behind her.”
Meant to say the Ross Clark piece is in the Speccie.
So Cameron is new conservative, which is nothing more than new labour.
Anyone who thinks this useless twat will run the country any better than the current useless twat is living in a dream world.
Vote BNP.
“I can understand why he would hesitate to state clearly where public spending would have to be cut back. The BBC has in the past been only too willing to publicise Labour attacks for this kind of thing.”
In Newsnight last night Esler admitted that “Tory Cuts” had never really happened, as spending rose by 1.5% in real terms during the the 18 years of Tory misrule (Grossman even said that we are now looking at the worst cuts “since the last Labour government ran out of money”)
But I guess Newnight will soon forget those facts.
Umbongo | 24.04.09 – 12:19 pm |
Please explain how that works.
You said that scrapping the TV Tax would save £3.5 billion. It won’t because the £3.5 billion is income. You only rarely save money by reducing your income.
The TV Tax is also expenditure because it is ring-fenced for the BBC and the licensing authority (to hire the thugs that prey on the elderly). In effect, as far as the public purse is concerned, the TV Tax money doesn’t touch the sides as it passes from the public to the BBC et al.
Without the TV Tax there are only 3 options for the BBC. Go private, be funded directly from the public purse or cease to exist. Non of which seem like fantastic ideas to me.
Personally I’d be happy to pay the TV Tax (it is peanuts after all) if the BBC were unbiased as that is an (idealised) useful business model for a state broadcaster. Unfortunately it isn’t and currently produces mostly unwatchable crap; so option 3 is tempting but option 1 is probably better.
Simples
Come on folks, this is the Today Programme – copy takers & propagandists for McMental & his Jock Junta – what did you expect her to do on behalf of her friends? Show fairness & impartiality to the evil Tories?
TV Tax cheap? What planet are you on?
37p is cheap – but when the only BBC programmes I watch are TOP Gear (which is about 6 – 12 new ones a year) and MotoGP (18, 2 hour programmes)- which used to be on Eurosport until last year.
Everything else I like is on Channel 4, various Freeview Channels and YouTube!
So, £130 odd for 50 hours of viewing per annum – £2 per hour – the cinema is almost cheaper!
Montague told a little fib about Vince Cable having a “whole list” of things the government could do to cut spending. On Wednesday, the BBC’s Sage of the Credit Crunch was talking about redirecting spending (in a sensible way, perhaps, but nothing about reducing), that the country couldn’t afford tax cuts, except for the lowest earners, and threw out a couple of other vague statements about how somehow spending will have to be reduced for a while.
He had no list, not a single suggestion for actual spending cuts on anything specific. Sarah Montague is dishonest.
Cameron was not going to say anything rash. He is too smart to rise to the bait of a nobody like Montague.
All our next Prime Minister needs to do is quietly bide his time. Brown and his cronies are doing more than an adequate job at destroying themselves.
That Cameron has been reasonably vague about the licence fee I find encouraging and probably means he has plenty up his sleeve.
Cameron and Montague probably share an equal dislike of each other, only Montague lacks the intelligence to adequately conceal it.
“I wish the cons at every interview state the bbc bias that they know it has. It would certainly make more people aware as the bbc could not edit everything!”
I think the problem has become all too apparent in recent months. Fact is that far too many in the media in total are biased in favour of Labour – the only time truth comes out it is via Guido Fawkes. Which means the leakers know the only way to get the truth out is via Guido. What does that say of the relationship between Labour and the 4th estate?
It is a very sorry state of affairs all round and a dangerous one. For years Labours used the “the media are against us” schtick as a cover for infiltrating the press and ensuring that the next time they got into power the press would be 100% onside. Luckily for us the internet sprang up in the same period or the press would be just like the press during Goebbels time. Thank God for Guido – but how much is being kept from us that Guido never finds out about?
I can understand completely Camerons desire to keep his opinions close to his chest in the current climate. Sadly if you are a Tory sympathiser it means you can have no idea what he stands for. But now it has come to the point where a leap in the dark is still far better than a leap towards Labour.
Cattle Prod
I don’t think we disagree except on one point: you would be content to pay the TV tax as long as the BBC became unbiased. On a point of principle I am unhappy with the licence fee although I would be less unhappy were the BBC impartial. I also agree that £140/year is neither here nor there but, put it all together, and you have £3.5 billion which ain’t chicken feed.
Quite why we have to have a gigantic state-funded entertainment and news conglomerate is beyond me. If we were starting from here no-one (well apart from the Guardianista tendency) would suggest the creation of such an outfit. All I would be interested in paying for from a “public interest channel” (a la NPR – or whatever – in the US) is Radio 4, a small bit of radio 3 and odds and sods on TV which could be contained on one channel. All the other output of the BBC is provided by the commercial terrestrial channels or on cable. I am happy to subscribe to cable and ignore ads on the commercial stations. I would be happy to subscribe to a (severely) truncated BBC. I don’t see why anybody else should be expected to pay for what I want and, conversely, I don’t see why I should pay for what you or anybody else wants.
Ryan | 24.04.09 – 3:39 pm | #
Umbongo | 24.04.09 – 4:12 pm | #
Gentleman, and umbongo,… well put.
Umbongo
Yes – good points – but to someone on a pension £140 and rising is NOT chickenfeed.
We need someone with Thatcher’s courage, and conviction, even more in 2010 than we did in 1979. Although I doubt that even she could have sorted out the mess then if we were as subserviant to the EUSSR as we are now.
I have always hated Montague with a passion, her silky smooooth and fawning tone with her socialist idols fellow travellers and her screeching and hate filled acidic tone with her political enemies.
The Tories need only to have a comparative speech analysis done by experts and then present the report to her bosses, the tonal difference is huge and so obvious.
Cameron is right not to reveal any policy in interviews- given that predictions made by those supposedly in possession of all the facts have proved ludicrous, he would only be setting himself up for lefty ridicule and need to rethink when he comes to power in any event, as the economic outlook is shifting so rapidly. Plus it gives nothing for Brown to steal, which is what has tended to happen in the past (inheritance tax anyone?)
As much as I would love to see Cameron destroy the BBC in the way he hammered Darling yesterday, it would only aggravate the problem. Far better to wage war when in office than opposition.
“Cameron is right not to reveal any policy in interviews”
The trouble with this line is that we don’t find out what his policies are.
What the conservatives need is someone with a backbone – they certainly don’t need smarmy “I think I’m God” Blair mark 2.
Someone who can put the BBCs sorry excuse for interviewers on the back foot. An interlectual heavyweight – but where can they find one of them?
404 error on the link to the interview.
Jon | 24.04.09 – 7:57 pm
i listen to rightwing and libertarian talk radio from America – and ANY of those presenters would eat the wimpish Tories for breakfast.
fact of the matter is – the Tory party is not “conservative”. its now just a PR stunt, designed to get Cameron into power.
and power is all that matters to them.
(rather like New Labour…)
Will86 | 24.04.09 – 6:53 pm |
you dont HAVE to reveal policies – you just have to bang on about your principles.
but then , cameron doesnt seem to have any.
Conservative communications, and indeed most of their recent communication strategy, seems to be based on not making themselves an easy target for the BBC.
Cameron et al know that when they are interviewed by the BBC, that they are effectively being interviewed by an unofficial Labour Party representative.
I don’t blame The Conservative Party for doing this, even if it is frustrating for those of us who want to hear some clearly articulated conservative policies. The BBC will just misrepresent these policies and try to stitch up the Tories on behalf of Labour, which is something that they’ve been doing for decades anyway.
I agree with many here that are concerned with how the Tories are *presenting* themselves during mainline interviews on the BBC and other media.
I think the issue is to do with the Tories own lack of firm certainty with how to deal with this era of modern Politics but also an absence of fundamental principles different to Nu Lab which bring self-belief and confidence.
Cam & Oz are trying to hide the fact that voting for them will be the same as turning over a Vinyl LP to play the “B-Side” – it’s the same band, with slightly different lyrics, but playing the same chords.
It’s very difficult to appear to be something different to the present incumbent’s policies when you agree with the concept of state force.
Cameron and Osborne possess an innate woolliness of mind, they do not come across as strong intellectuals who would cut The BBC’s Today’s interviewers to shreds.
Watch, if you can, the Budget response from Osborne which was particularly weak and a demonstration of a man lacking firm principles in which he believes with a passion.
The BBC will have an easy time making mincemeat of the Tories in the next year. Yet the Tories will win in 2010 by default – due to NU Lab’s incompetence – not by being demonstrably anything different to red.
Cameron’s OK, but Osbourne is completely out of his depth.