Whilst Eddie Mair on R4 attacks Bankers as ‘greedy, unscrupulous liars’ nowhere to be seen is an expose of Labour’s underhand and corrupt methods where it funds ‘charities’ that then go out and promote a Labour agenda…..if a ‘mere’ blog like Guido Fawkes can dig up these stories the question is why can’t the all powerful and well resourced BBC?
Perhaps the will is missing.
Asked and answered, Alan
The whole ‘state’ and beyond is riddled with leftism, like a cancer: every quango, ‘lobby group’, fake charridy, a plethora of “independent” companies finding jobs (i.e. 100% funded by government) etc etc.
It will take far more than the lifetime of this government and the next to clear it up a bit.
the teaching profession, Universities, Local Government, the BBC, all with lefty placemen.
Don’t get me started on fake charities or Quangos – absolutely infested with leftism and costing the taxpayer an arm and a leg. This Government have had 2 years and have done nothing. Mark my words – they will come to regret their inaction.
That’s not a story, it’s campaigning journalism. None of Guido’s revelations are new, these ‘charities’ are well known and known to have an agenda. To be fair to Mair, he was commenting on an event in which a bank was punished by a regulator for, erm, cheating, lying and being unscrupulous. Comparing the two is utterly specious.
We seem to have a whole new Olympic sport here, called “Missing the Point”. The bank’s money is its own, or the free markets, cheating lying or being unscrupulous its simply caveat emptor, or whatever. The Charidee Quango shebang EU and HMG funded is all OUR money taken by force.
…and you’ve just won a gold medal. Guido hasn’t revealed anything, he’s just pursuing a campaign. That’s fine, and it’s a worthy cause. But the comparison made by Alan is nonsensical.
No, it’s you with gold (good at something). The comparison isn’t between the two issues it is the BBC’s treatment: two issues of greedy, unscrupulous liars with underhand and corrupt methods; one gets full-on bashing by the BBC whilst the other gets nary a mention!
‘Well known’ corruption but totally ignored by the BBC….a BBC all too ready to chase down bankers but not Fellow Travellers….after all who broke the Banks of England, and Scotland? A Labour Chancellor and PM….and yet the BBC seem to have forgotten all about him…incredible how 13 years of corruption and madness can be so soon forgotten….whilst nary a day goes by when Mrs Thatcher isn’t being denounced from the old trots in the BBC pulpit.
You admirably reinforce my point. Many thanks.
Alan, you seem to be missing the difference between a news story and a situation that a blogger doesn’t like. You say that Guido ‘dug up’ this story, but anybody who follows the activities of these so-called charities appreciates that they a) receive public funding and b) pursue an overtly leftist agenda. That isn’t surprising, it isn’t new, and if you took it to a news editor anywhere on Fleet Street they’d say “So what?”. It didn’t require any investigative journalism, because it’s all out in the open. Guido has decided to go big on it, and good luck to him, but to contrast a blogger pursuing a campaign over something he thinks is unjust (and totally legal – it may be wrong, but it’s not ‘corrupt’) with a news journalist repeating what was said by a financial regulator is simply to misunderstand the nature of journalism.
You say ‘it’s all out in the open’. We know how these so-called charities were funded by Labour to help cement their permanent place in government (and let’s face it, they only just missed at the last election despite them trashing the country), but each time one of their ‘spokespeople’ is introduced on the BBC as a head of such-and-such a charity, what percentage of listeners are actually aware of who they are, how they are funded, and how politically motivated they are? They are no less than a government-funded mouthpiece for Labour, and it’s mind-boggling that Cameron hasn’t sorted it out.
Everyone knows that little jimmy down the road is a serial burglar…so what? Let’s just ignore it as everyone knows about him.
Like your thinking…that’d solve the prison population problem…though I won’t be leaving my windows open any more!
Funny how the “fake charities” all pursue a leftist agenda. Somehow I don’t believe the BBC would be quite so sanguine about it if they were all funded by Tory governments to pursue right-wing agendas.
…exactly the jumbo sized point that redwhiteandblue is missing (intentionally we have to presume)
I cannot defend the banks. They have bought the free market into disrepute and provided ammunition for the extreme left. What they have done is appalling. Not only have they kept profits private and socialised losses( the taxpayer can pay) they have persuaded us they are too big to fail and we have believed their lies. Now they are rigging markets at the expense of all of us including all those in business. For once the BBC is probably in tune with the public. The bankers need to be bought to heel not for any left wing reason but for the good and proper regulation of the free market.
The IT scandal with the Nat West etc is yet another result of the bankers greed for profit at the expense of good business practice.
“socialised losses( the taxpayer can pay)”
Dave, you are confusing fiddled about with Scottish banks by Scottish-constituency Labour ministers with the rest of the banks who have not taken a farthing of public money. Or does that spoil the hyperbole?
I agree to a certain extent here. This use of the phrase ‘the banks’ as if they have ALL failed or fiddled, when in fact the majority have no connection to the current financial chaos, the bail-outs or the resulting recession. This is not to excuse those that ARE culpable, but every story about a single bank is now fed into this narrative of ‘the banks’, as if they are collectively responsible for the failings of the few. It’s lazy, agenda driven journalism.
I take your point. However I have a suspicion that every bank is complicit in the last few years of financial chicanery.
This latest IT mess is a result of what the Americans call ” jobjacking” Purely driven by a desire to maximise profits. Incidentally the IT mess reveals just how vulnerable our financial world, and all of us, is to mistakes or more worryingly to deliberate attack by a hostile power
Jobjacking? Is it?
There was a story on the BBC web-shite yesterday (but now MIA) concerning a group of Russian hackers who had raided ‘a number of European banks.’ There are also industry rumours that RBS did not have a computer issue (why didn’t they restore the back up etc?) but had been hacked.
Who knows what the truth is? The BBC don’t or at least won’t tell us what it is.
Interesting. By jobjacking I meant the transfer of jobs to a cheaper country. Your point about hacking is new to me but sounds all too likely. An IT man I met said the banks use vulnerable ancient( in computer terms) systems so maybe there is something in your hacking comments.
‘An IT man I met said the banks use vulnerable ancient (in computer terms) systems ‘. Wrong, in that the statement is not true of all banks. I would also like to know what he means by ‘vulnerable’.
It was only a short general conversation. I remember he did mention that the Stuxnet virus that affected Iran was a warning to us all. I think that was what he meant by vulnerable, that 100% security is perhaps an illusion.
I thought Lloyds and NatWest were largely taxpayer owned and funded. It remains true that most of the B of E provided funds have been for the benefit of the banks and the Government. ‘We give you very cheap money and you buy our bonds and keep the rest’ as far as I can see. The interest payable on the bonds is from tax revenue which means us.
Indeed! (though Northern Rock and B and B were in there too). A Scottish chancellor stripped the B of E of its very effective supervisory role then turned a blind eye to the lending frenzy that ensued to create a debt-fuelled boom (125% self-certified mortgage anybody?).
But here’s the point most people miss, or would rather ignore: greedy bankers – yes, but don’t forget the greedy borrowers and greedy government who made it all possible too.
“But here’s the point most people miss, or would rather ignore: greedy bankers – yes, but don’t forget the greedy borrowers and greedy government who made it all possible too.”
…well said johnnythefish: the hypocrisy is breath-taking.
Yes, I’ve just finished watching The Secrets of Our Streets on BBC2-fair play to the Beeb on this one. They actually let working class people speak for themselves for a change-rather than some trendy middle class writer putting words into their mouths (Eastenders etc.). Anyway cutting to the chase the programme interviewed a banker living in a multi-million pound des res and guess what he said: ‘the bank bailouts didn’t help small businesses, they helped bankers buy houses in Notting Hill’
‘the bank bailouts didn’t help small businesses, they helped bankers buy houses in Notting Hill’
That may indeed be true but the speaker was one Henry Mayhew, a member of one of the founding families of Barclays and, there’s a surprise, featured by the Mirror in its gloss on the programme. Forgive my reading into his contributions a certain bitterness aimed at, mostly, his wife (from whom – I also presume – he is now separated/divorced) who, he claimed, “forced” him to buy in Portland Road. I suggest that Mayhew is far from being a typical banker as the nude scene on his trust-owned country estate at the end of the programme showed.
Mind you, the programme illustrated nicely the vacuity of having far more money than sense and how it’s not only benefit-supported immigrants from the third world who have ruined parts of London. The recent moneyed immigrants do quite enough of the same. As Mayhew (I think) said, London is a collection of “villages” and Portland Road runs through (at least) two of these. However, forget about the “social housing” village, the up-market “village” is marked by the absence of anything which makes the description “village” meaningful in this context (except to an estate agent).
liked this article on media bias in Mexico in the Guardian.
Replace “Mexico” with “Britain” and “Televisa” with “BBC”, well you get the idea:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jun/26/spotlight-televisa-mexico-tv-station
I particularly liked this quote: “It’s a lie that we can invent a politician. Politicians need a long time to create an image. But what we can do is destroy them quickly.”
‘if a ‘mere’ blog like Guido Fawkes can dig up these stories the question is why can’t the all powerful and well resourced BBC?’
A question has been asked.
My answer would be that it appears to be something to do with uniqueness.
Though the several non-answers attempted above suggesting that no questions should be asked at all, or fail to conform to a narrow format definition, are as eloquent in explaining the arrogance of some mindsets out there.
A senior position at BBC CECUTT is suggested for such a poster.