Monthly Archives: June 2013

There’s an ongoing furore over the ever more bloated international aid budget whilst things at home are austerity stricken.

Perhaps Cameron might have a change of heart and start repatriating some of that money to help the homegrown refugees that the BBC has discovered roaming British cities. ( 9 minutes in)

Yes that’s right, British refugees.

The BBC tells us that Birmingham has  ‘increasing numbers of refugees from the South East, Newham in particular’ caused by a housing shortage in London.

That’s the South East of England not South East Asia.

The cause?   The Government cap on welfare and lack of house building.

No mention of immigrants causing the housing shortage …despite the majority of the ‘refugees’ on the BBC’s piece being, er, immigrants.

‘Refugees’ was repeated a few times so no mistake, no slip of the tongue…an obviously deliberate choice of words…..wonder why the BBC editorial meeting decided on that highly emotive form of wording?

An unfortunate irony that Derbyshire’s programme was followed immediately by Sheila Fogarty’s which had genuine refugees from the Syrian war telling their stories.  Having to move from London to Birmingham just doesn’t compare somehow…unless you work for the BBC and have a political point to make I suppose.

 I suppose I could just put up this heading from an article on the BBC’s website and let you work the rest out for yourself….

Criminal tendencies

The psychopathic traits that make some prime ministers great

…but you might have been confused by that ‘great’…you would have thought…BBC….doing an article on psychopathic Prime Ministers….it’s got to be Thatcher…but they wouldn’t call her ‘great’…so maybe not…it couldn’t be Brown, he was a psychopath…but very, very far from ‘great.’…and the BBC refuse to mention him if at all possible anyway.

As they say…always go with your first instinct:

Churchill, Thatcher and their psychopathic tendencies?

Of all the Prime Ministers in all of British history….the BBC picks the two it most hates, both Tories…both representing everything about the world and Britain that the lefties of the BBC despise.

Apparently Thatcher and Churchill share traits with some of the most ‘dangerous, violent members of society‘…the criminal psychopath.

…But wait..it’s not all bad…you need to be a psychopath to be successful…you need to be able to take hard decisions and not care about the consequences for other people….that’s what makes a good PM.

All kind of a backhanded compliment from the BBC…they just couldn’t resist calling Thatcher a psychopath but had to dress it up a bit to make it ‘acceptable’ excusing it as a serious academic piece of work.

Did you know that Thatcher didn’t want to be liked or loved…she wasn’t kind, caring or cuddly….though that wasn’t at all the impression I got from all the biographical stuff that came out after her death…and Churchill seems the most unlikely psychopath enjoying the good things in life way too much to be so ruthlessly focussed and uncaring.

Personally I think the word ‘psychobabble’ was invented to explain stories just like this….though ‘load of old bollocks’ might have done just as well.

Good old BBC….never misses a trick.

Former BBC presenter Robin Page has uncovered a blatant piece of agenda-driven editing in a recent edition of the BBC’s Countryfile:

The woman talking about hedgehogs to John Craven was the excellent Rebecca Willers from the Shepreth Wildlife Park – she too was featured in my last Diary. On the programme she attributed hedgehog decline to road kills and loss of hedgerows, and then it was clear to me that she had been edited. I know that Rebecca believes badgers are serious predators of hedgehogs as she would not let the CRT put hedgehogs on Lark Rise Farm because of the local badgers.

I telephoned her. “Yes,” Rebecca said: “I mentioned that predation by badgers was an important factor in hedgehog decline several times and it was edited out.” So there we have it – Countryfile changing the story to avoid the facts, or so it seems.

Is it just coincidence that this editorial decision by Countryfile was helpful to those activists opposed to badger culls? I doubt it.

(h/t the BBC’s David Gregory-Kumar)

‘It will be vital to challenge apologists for terrorism.’     Prevent Programme

Margaret Hodge said this in 2010:

‘We need to have an honest conversation about what’s going on in our working class communities. The very mention of immigration causes controversy and the whole debate is often seen through the prism of racism.

‘The result is parties like the BNP tap into people’s frustrations and that’s why we’ve seen a rise in support for them.

The BBC refuses to talk fully and openly about race, religion or immigration….which is why you get the rise of the EDL…which the BBC then campaigns against….an organisation that in effect they helped create.

When Tommy Robinson was interviewed on the Today programme the Left had a moment of anguished horror….someone whose views they disagree with had been allowed onto the radio…the Left’s ‘house radio’ at that….the BBC.

Mehdi Hasan was so outraged he penned a quick note in the Huffington Post advising the BBC where they went wrong.

He even went so far as to formulate some questions that the BBC could have asked Tommy Robinson.

Someone at the BBC read his advice and decided to run with it. They decided to bring the unsuspecting Tommy Robinson back onto the airwaves and subject him to a vitriolic show trial, designed to attack him personally and assassinate his character and reputation.

Andrew Neil was given the task of skewering the upstart EDL ‘racist thug‘….the questions Neil asked coming almost word for word from the pen of Hasan with no pretence at an attempt to debate or engage in an intellectual argument…it was an out and out exercise in abuse and mud slinging to blacken Robinson’s name….and all done to appease the BBC‘s left wing censors and Islamist propagandists.

As Brian Sewell said about the BBC’s output:

We deserve better. It’s patronising rubbish.  The BBC clearly think it’s good to have programmes presented by people with no knowledge or experience.  There’s no debate, no critical discourse or differing viewpoints.

Of course that’s a bit of an exaggeration…there are ‘differing viewpoints’ on the BBC…you just have to make sure that your viewpoint is within the BBC’s acceptable bounds for discussion….should you have views that the BBC finds unacceptable you find yourself in the position of Tommy Robinson in the EDL getting rail roaded by Andrew Neil.

EDL motivation

What did Neil start off with?:

Neil tells us that: ‘The EDL is motivated by hostility to all Muslims.’

Really? Who said? Why not let Robinson speak for himself before you put words in his mouth? Is he hostile to Muslims or to Islam the ideology?

Tommy Robinson’s name

Neil, in a breath taking example of investigative journalism goes on to ‘reveal’ Robinson’s real name…or that of his long lost father, telling him…

‘We did find your birth certificate….you changed your name because it concealed for some time your BNP past….you were hiding your BNP membership.’

Extraordinary bit of detective work by the BBC…no?

But doesn’t everyone know that ‘Tommy Robinson’ is an alias by now?

Did Lennon adopt the name ‘Tommy Robinson’ to ‘hide his BNP past’…and did that ‘conceal it for some time’?

In August 2009 the EDL was set up…in June 2010 ‘Searchlight’ had an article which revealed Lennon’s real name and previous membership of the BNP:

Searchlight Magazine June 2010

by Nick Lowles and Simon Cressy | Wednesday, 23 June 2010

Searchlight can exclusively reveal that the leader of the English Defence League is a former British National Party member who has served 12 months’ imprisonment for assaulting an off-duty police officer.

Self-proclaimed EDL leader Tommy Robinson is really Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, from Bedford.

Robinson said he changed his name firstly to ‘Lennon’ because he had no contact with his birth father…and used the name ’Tommy Robinson’ for the EDL because of threats to his life….he had only been in the BNP for one year and left when he realised they were not what he had believed originally.

Andrew Neil ignored all the explanations and carried on insisting the name change was to hide his BNP past.

You’re a violent man

Neil then brought up a video where Robinson was heard to say if there is anymore violence by Muslims against British people they would ‘feel the full force of the EDL’

Neil insisted that this meant that the EDL was going to inflict violence upon Muslims.

Robinson insisted that he meant the full force of democratic law.

Neil refused to accept that saying:

‘Force’ is a threat of violence in any language…’they’ knew you were talking about violence.

Really?…that’ll be news to the UK Energy Minister:

‘Oil executives caught fixing the price of petrol will face the ‘full force’ of the law, Energy Secretary Ed Davey vowed today as calls grew for those responsible to be jailed.’

Neil goes on to make some slanderous allegations which had little basis in truth or evidence…..

‘I would suggest that you are not interested in democratic politics…it is just street thuggery. It’s the politics of the street you’re interested in which is the hallmark of extremism, Fascism and Communism throughout the ages.

As many people in this country are frightened of you and the EDL as they are of the extremists.

Mehdi Hasan Says: ‘You’re quite a violent man, aren’t you?’

Andrew Neil parrots Hasan:

‘You are a violent man making violent threats.

Let’s add this up…you are a violent man with a violent record, you are a former member of the BNP, you and others threaten Muslims with violence, EDL demonstrations are menacing and intimidating.’

Help For Heroes doesn’t want anything to do with the EDL

Neil claimed that…

‘The fact is that ordinary people don’t want anything to do with you…the EDL is using the death of Lee Rugby to carry out attacks.’

Unfortunately research by the BBC’s own favourite academic, Matthew Goodwin, says that at least 40% of Tory voters and 33% of Labour voters agree with the EDL…not only that but 50% of people believe that there will be a war between white British people and Muslims.

Andrew Neil made another spurious, and wrong, point….that the charity ‘Help for Heroes’ didn’t want anything to do with them and nor did British soldiers..due to ‘disgust’ at their activities….Neil conveniently forgot this:

The charity said it does not accept donations from any political party…

“It’s the same for any political party, we don’t allow political fundraising. As a charity, we’re non-political.”

Not only that but many British soldiers agree with the EDL…and most intensely dislike and distrust the BBC.

A final point is that Neil  readily accused Robinson of violence and the EDL of various crimes and violent intentions but when Robinson mentions that two Muslims killed Lee Rigby Neil jumped in and said ‘you must say alleged’….really? 

So that was how Andrew Neil treated the EDL’s Tommy Robinson…essentially making up lies about him and his views based on Neil’s own prejudiced interpretation of the facts…ignoring whatever Robinson said….Robinson might as well have not been there…at least for Neil…to those watching a different picture might have emerged.

Contrast that with how Neil talks of G8 protestors and Owen Jones, ironically later in the same show.

Does Neil think that Occupy or the UAF or the G8 protestors are engaged in ‘street thuggery’ the ‘hallmark of extremism, Fascism and Communism’?  No.

Andrew Neil on the G8…’The authorities are bracing themselves for some aggro…protestors plan to make themselves heard…G8 has been accompanied by protest and violence for years.‘’

To Owen Jones he says…’You stand shoulder to shoulder with the protestors’.

Jones says he hopes to stimulate a national and global debate, holding leaders to account….there must be anger at how things are and hope for how things can be.

Neil asks where are the protestors?…it’s not like the good old days when he was a student he says…he wants to know why there aren’t more protestors…people have a right to be furious.　

So here we have Owen Jones…standing ‘shoulder to shoulder’ with violent, anti-establishment protestors and Andrew Neil gives him the red carpet treatment…and wants to know why there aren’t more like him out there on the barricades being ‘furious’.

Curious how the BBC panders to the violent, anarchists seeking to destroy Capitalism whilst the likes of Tommy Robinson are ‘tarred and feathered’ and run out of town.

It was the just same with the London riots, Occupy and the Student protests…all  violent…all excused by the BBC….which fully supported the student protests sending in Victoria Derbyshire to spend the days with them.　

Andrew Neil is happy to be Hasan’s dogsbody but what about Hasan himself? What questions might be asked of this slippery Islamist?

Hasan presents himself, at least in the non-Muslim press and TV, as a ‘progressive’ Muslim…and yet he also states that he is ‘devout’. Are the two statements compatible?

If you are devout you follow the Koran and the strictures of the religion….how can you be ‘progressive’? The Islamic religion is anything but progressive.

Hasan is not all that he seems, the public image  is not the real one, the real Hasan is just below the surface for those who look.

Hasan has a plan…that plan is to further the Islamic cause by ‘capturing’ the media…by flooding the media with positive images of Islam…whether true or not.

He urges his fellow Muslims not to be doctors and engineers but to be journalists and media poppets…in order to ‘ help influence the industry’s coverage of issues such as terrorism and integration.’
… “I see people like myself – who happen to be both a professional journalist and a practising Muslim – as a bridge between the Islamic community and the media, and by extension between Muslims and wider society,” In other words he means to get Muslims into positions of power and influence to push a media assault that presents Islam in a way they want you to see it, but not as it really is.

Mehdi says:

“I grow tired of having to also endure a barrage of lazy stereotypes, inflammatory headlines, disparaging generalisations and often inaccurate and baseless stories.’

I would suggest that Tommy Robinson must feel exactly the same way…only with more justification, after his treatment by the BBC.　

With all that in mind what sort of questions might you ask Hasan?

Perhaps we could start with this one….What is the difference between you, your mindset, Mehdi Hasan, and that of the killers of Lee Rigby who make similar statements about Kafirs to those you did…all based on the Koran?

Adebalajo said, in his speech: “We are not scared of Kufar … my brothers remain in your ranks and do not be scared of these filthy Kufar. They are pigs … Allah says they are worse than cattle.”

The Koran says:

‘Believers, know that the pagans are unclean. Let them not approach the sacred Mosque after this year is ended.’ 9:27

“They are only like cattle – nay, they are even further astray from the Path – even worse than cattle.”  25:44

Mehdi Hasan, the Huffington Post and Guardian and New Statesman contributor was caught on video stating, “The kaffar, the disbelievers, the atheists… the Quran describes the atheists as “cattle”, as cattle of those who grow the crops and do not stop and wonder about this world.”

And in that 2009 speech at the Al Khoei Islamic Centre he also quite openly states:

“The kaffar, the disbelievers, the atheists who remain deaf and stubborn to the teachings of Islam, the rational message of the Quran; they are described in the Quran as, quote, “a people of no intelligence”, Allah describes them as; not of no morality, not as people of no belief – people of “no intelligence” – because they’re incapable of the intellectual effort it requires to shake off those blind prejudices, to shake off those easy assumptions about this world, about the existence of God.”

Are non-Muslims ‘animals’ Mehdi…are they immoral?…you seemed to think so when you said this:

“We know that keeping the moral high-ground is key. Once we lose the moral high-ground we are no different from the rest of the non-Muslims; from the rest of those human beings who live their lives as animals, bending any rule to fulfil any desire.”

As a devout, practising Muslim Mehdi, can you tell us if Islam itself is extreme?:

The Prevent project defines extremism so:

“Extremism is vocal or active opposition to fundamental British values, including democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect and tolerance of different faiths and beliefs. We also include in our definition of extremism calls for the death of members of our armed forces, whether in this country or overseas.”

There is evidence to indicate that support for terrorism is associated with rejection of a cohesive, integrated, multi-faith society and of parliamentary democracy. Work to deal with radicalisation will depend on developing a sense of belonging to this country and support for our core values.

What does Dr Kalim Siddiqui, director of the Muslim Institute in London think: ‘We are not a pacifist religion. We don’t turn the other cheek. We hit back.’ 

Mehdi you support the Islamist student body FOSIS and Tower Hamlet’s Islamist mayor, Lutfur Rahman, don’t you?:

You were very keen to have the BBC ask Tommy Robinson some searching questions…and yet you utterly failed to do the same for the Islamist mayor of Tower Hamlets:

Mr Hasan unfortunately declined to put to Lutfur any of the detailed evidence assembled by Channel 4, the Telegraph and this blog about his close links with people who very much don’t believe in a secular Britain, set out here. Nor was he rude enough to mention the filmed evidence of Lutfur’s vote-rigging in Tower Hamlets which we obtained. Instead he asked largely general questions and was content to accept Lutfur’s denials without further challenge.

What, Mehdi, do you think of the IFE, an Islamic extremist group, which believes in turning Britain into a sharia state under Islamic law?

‘Mehdi Hasan has form on defending the IFE – in a debate with me on Sky News last summer, he denied that they were an Islamist organisation.’

Do you support the UAF?:

Scores of young Asian men chased the group back to Harrow and Wealdstone station, leading to a stand-off with police who had formed a protective ring around the men who had been chased.

As hundreds of UAF supporters spilled out into Station Road, pandemonium broke out as protesters, some armed with sticks, rampaged up the road and began attacking riot police, throwing stick, rocks, glass bottles, and firecrackers.

What do you think of the UAF’s Vice chairman the Islamist extremist Azad Ali?

Isn’t it true that ‘Unfortunately, UAF’s counter-demonstrations often seem to cause as much, if not more, trouble than those by the EDL and BNP.’

Last weekend, Tony Brett, a Liberal Democrat councillor in Oxford and the city’s deputy lord mayor, found what he called a “disgraceful rabble” of people climbing on the city’s main war memorial — squashing, he said, the flowers that mourners had placed there, then trying to remove half of them altogether and “jeering” other visitors as they paid their respects.

That day, the memorial was supposed to be the scene of a wreath-laying by the far-Right, racist English Defence League. But none of the people laying flowers and being jeered bore any kind of EDL insignia and none of the wreaths had any kind of card or message from the group.

Neither Mr Brett, nor a local newspaper reporter on the scene, saw any sign of any EDL presence.

All the aggro, Mr Brett said — he called it the “hate” — came from the self-appointed opponents of bigotry, a group called Unite Against Fascism (UAF).

You claimed that Cameron doesn’t know the difference between Islam and Islamism so what is Islamism Mehdi…is it extremism…or is it the devout practise of Islam?

You support the Iranian nuclear programme….do you support the Iranian regime?

Is Islamic terrorism cultural or religious?:

Gentleman in audience – “The root cause of terrorism is bad teachings in religious schools.”

Mehdi – “Rubbish”

Mehdi – “Terrorism is not a cultural problem, terrorism is a political problem”.

Douglas – “And it’s a religious problem as well”

Mehdi – “In your view Douglas it’s a religious problem”.

Douglas – “I’m perfectly willing to talk about foreign policy as would David Cameron be, but you cannot pretend that there is no religious component to the terrorism because there is ”

Mehdi – “I thought you said it was cultural. Culture and religion is not the same thing”.

Dimbleby – “Mehdi, you’re saying there is no religious component?”

Mehdi – “I’m saying there is a religious component; I’m saying there’s not a CULTURAL component”.

Do you support Ken Livingstone despite his comments about Jews and his support for Qaradawi?

Mehdi, what do you think of these statements?

‘Mr Blair, the former prime minister, used a column in the Mail on Sunday to call on the Government to “be honest” and admit that there is a widespread problem with the religion.

In a major intervention following the murder of soldier Lee Rigby, Mr Blair said “the seeds of future fanaticism and terror” were being sown and that children in the UK and abroad must be educated about the place of religion in society.’

[This] is not the province of a few extremists. It has at its heart a view about religion and about the interaction between religion and politics that is not compatible with pluralistic, liberal, open-minded societies.’

And…..　

A significant section of young Muslims have already rejected the cultural values and norms of the society in which they live. It is their rejection of European societies that motivates people to search for alternatives.

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that what we need is not rhetoric about the forces of radicalisation, but a more scrupulous attention to what constitutes a way of life worth defending.

I don’t suppose the BBC will ever get round to asking Hasan those questions or the leaders of the UAF any similarly rigorous questions to those that they asked Tommy Robinson.

I guess some things are best left unsaid for the BBC.

From the BBC’s From Our Own Correspondent:

Phil Goodwin on how war has changed Syria from a hospitable, friendly place into one that’s brutal, paranoid and vicious.

Goodwin asks the friend of a dead Syrian Air Force pilot how Syria can be so friendly and yet so brutal at the same time.

The answer…… “It’s religion…there’s a beast inside us.”

Wonder which religion that might be?

I guess in far off foreign lands you are allowed to say that sort of thing….just not here in the land of democracy, free speech and freedom of thought.

Here is Brian Sewell at the 2013 Sandford St Martin Trust Awards talking about the lack of intelligent debate and investigation, especially around the subject of religion, on TV..and in particular on the publicly funded BBC.

The BBC, as a broadcaster which doesn’t have to bother with the restrictions of the commercial world, can ‘afford to make serious programmes based on subject, argument and intellectual necessity.

Among them programmes that deal with religion.

We live in times much troubled by religion. It forms the politics of modern nation states from Burma and Indonesia in the Far East to the shores of the Mediterranean in the Near where it is torn apart by the divisions in Islam, Christians are menaced minorities and Jews are prepared to do battle in the Holy Land.

Christians might better understand if we knew more of other faiths. Those who are not Christians should know more of Christianity for not only does it lie at the core of British culture, history, law and social attitudes it is politically important in the Hispanic Americas and in extreme Protestant form is a vital force in the politics of the United States.

Religion still effects the future of humanity and the world. It is too important to be neglected by broadcasters.’

So if I read that correctly…religion is at the heart of politics and shapes the world…it also has a seriously violent downside. 

And yet the BBC refuse to countenance anyone who expresses similar views….not only refuses to countenance them but actively tries to demonise and discredit them….as they have with ‘Tommy Robinson’ and the EDL.

Serious, intelligent argument?  Not on the BBC.  Just look at the BBC’s attack on ‘Tommy Robinson’ by Andrew Neil.  Character assassination the preferred method of dealing with his line of argument.

After  Harriet Harman declared that the BBC is the ‘gold standard’ that other broadcasters and media must look to for inspiration and guidance I thought no more could be said about the glorious Beeb…clearly I was wrong, the last open thread is bulging and Brian Sewell’s (H/T George R & Buggy) own assessment rings very true…‘Bollocks…it could be ten times better’……

‘One lesson well understood in both Stalin’s Russia and Nazi Germany was that propaganda is most effective when it is backed by terror.’…Sir Alan Bullock.

 We refuse even to face it, let alone to stop it.

The Met’s head of counter-terrorism said that there had been an increase in reported hate crime in the wake of the Woolwich attack: “Every single incident is horrible but compared with previous times we have had slightly less,” she said.

Dick added that while there had been “horrible” attacks on Mosques there had not been any very serious assaults reported. “It has started to reduce now,”

The BBC however has taken a different view and continue to push the narrative that Fiyaz Mughal of  ‘Tell Mama’ put out…that Muslims were under attack….and the attacks are still rising in numbers.

After the Woolwich incident, Tell Mama claimed that there had been a “sustained wave of attacks and intimidation” against British Muslims, with 193 “Islamophobic incidents” reported to it, rising to 212 by last weekend.

 Mughal, said he saw “no end to this cycle of violence”, describing it as “unprecedented”. The claims were unquestioningly repeated in the media.

Perhaps the BBC should have asked Saif Rahman about his experiences as an ex-Muslim, an Apostate….how he has been under constant threat and how he has received 139 death threats for leaving Islam.

He’s just one person…and that’s 139 death threats for him alone….Tell Mama claimed it had 212 examples of ‘Islamophobic incidents’ for the whole population of near 3 million Muslims in the UK.

Is the BBC interested in Saif Rahman?  No.  Are they concerned that one man has received 139 death threats?  No.

But then again the good people of the BBC love Yusuf Islam…they love his music and go to his concerts…and yet he is the man who said not only should Salman Rushdie be killed but he would personally execute him if he were in an Islamic country.

Curious now though that the BBC have stopped referring to ‘Tell Mama’….but now refer to Fiyaz Mughal as coming from ‘Faith Matters’:

Fiyaz Mughal, from interfaith group Faith Matters, said Mr Robinson’s condemnation was “hollow”. 

Why might the BBC not want to refer to ‘Tell Mama’? 

Could it be that the group is now widely discredited?

Mughal’s claims under the guise of ‘Tell Mama’ of a wave of Islamophobic attacks has been debunked…..but even before Woolwich ‘Tell Mama’ was being sidelined by the government for presenting figures and data that ‘didn’t stack up’:

‘However, The Sunday Telegraph has now learned that even before Woolwich, the communities minister, the Liberal Democrat MP Don Foster, called Mr Mughal to a meeting and said that Tell Mama’s grant would not be renewed.

The organisation has received a total of £375,000 from the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) since last year.

“Mr Mughal was giving data on attacks to DCLG which wasn’t stacking up when it was cross-referenced with other reports by Acpo [the Association of Chief Police Officers],” said one source closely involved in counter-extremism.

“He was questioned by DCLG civil servants and lost his temper. He was subsequently called in by Don Foster and told that he would receive no more money.”

A senior Liberal Democrat source confirmed the sequence of events, saying: “There was a bit of a spat. He was called in and told that Acpo had cast doubt on his figures. He was told that he would be closely monitored for the remaining period of the grant and that there would be no more money.” ‘

£375,000…for one year, adding up police statistics…not bad work if you can get it.

Could there be a link between ‘Tell Mama’ having its funding withdrawn and the sudden ‘spike’ it found in Islamophobic attacks after Woolwich?  Could it be that it hoped to ‘encourage’ the government to think again and start dishing out the handouts once more? 

It’s a shame that the BBC can’t find the time or will to investigate organisations like ‘Tell Mama’ that milk the System dry and far from helping to reduce ‘community tensions’ actually helps raise them by exaggerating any threat levels. 

Perhaps the BBC could start with claims that ‘Tell Mama’ had been using its funding to launch legal attacks against people that criticise it as reported in the Telegraph:

Tell Mama has also been using its budget to threaten members of the public with libel actions for criticising it on Twitter.

In mid-May, before Woolwich, one Jewish activist, Ambrosine Chetrit, received a threatening letter from solicitors after she tweeted that “Tell Mama are sitting on Twitter on the EDL hashtag, threatening anyone and everyone whose comments they do not like about Islam”.

Tell Mama also objected to a tweet in which Ms Chetrit said it was “trying to close down pro-Israel [Twitter] accounts daily”.

Other recipients of legal threats at the same time include Atma Singh, a former race adviser to the then Labour mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, who received a legal letter from Tell Mama after tweeting that it “gives a platform to Islamists”.

Tell Mama did not claim that either of these individuals was racist or anti-Muslim. But it said their tweets were false and “defamatory” of Mr Mughal, had “damaged” his reputation, causing him “distress and embarrassment”, and demanded immediate apologies and damages. Up to four other people are believed to have received similar threats.

The letters were written by Farooq Bajwa, a solicitor who has acted for a number of Islamists and Islamist sympathisers, including the Palestinian radical leader Raed Salah and the Respect MP George Galloway.

The letters to Mr Singh and Ms Chetrit were sent to their private home addresses, neither of which are in the public domain. Ms Chetrit’s lawyer, Mark Lewis, who has acted for many phone-hacking victims, has reported Mr Bajwa and Tell Mama to the police after they refused to say how they obtained the information.

“I have been instructed to resist the claim,” said Mr Lewis. “It has no merit. I have not had any response as to how my client’s name and address were obtained.”

Mr Singh said: “I find it absurd that someone can threaten people on this kind of basis and use libel in this political way. This is nothing to do with Islamophobia – they are just trying to shut down debate.”

Ms Chetrit said: “It is very worrying and scary. All the people who have been threatened by Tell Mama are pro-Israeli.”

Charles Moore in the Telegraph spells out exactly what is wrong in this country when the BBC and government get into bed with the wrong people:

‘I sing no song for the once-proud country that spawned me,’ wrote a sailor who fought the Japanese in the Far East, ‘and I wonder why I ever tried.’

Harriet Harman spoke and the BBC listened. 

Harman, Deputy Labour Party Leader, Shadow Deputy Prime Minister, Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport gave her speech last night on capping Media monopoly and the BBC have already started to implement her ideas…capping their news output…by not reporting anything she said.

 Nothing.  Zip.  Nada.  Zilch.  Sweet Fanny Adams.

A speech from someone in her position on a subject of unique interest to the BBC….and yet not a dicky bird today.

The speech is all over the internet and the newpapers…..but one of the world’s most powerful news gatherers and providers has decided not to report the speech…how so?

Amusingly Harman says:

There’s an absolute aversion to that [political interference  in the press] from all sides of the House of Commons.  No parliamentarian has called for political interference in the press.

And:

….this isn’t just about Rupert Murdoch.

 Pull the other one Harry!

Actually the BBC didn’t miss the story…on the 8th of May they broadcast an interview with Harman on this very subject on the Media Show. (3 mins in)…but not reported in the ‘news’ as far as I can see.

…and yes…it is ALL about Murdoch….the ‘culture of invincibiltiy….dictating the political agenda’.

The interviewer was reasonably rigorous and fair and put the question to her:

‘Do you include the BBC as part of your calculations?‘

 She ignored that.

He asked again:

‘Do you think the BBC is too big a force…it had 59% share of the news in 2003 and that rose to 74% in 2011?’

Harman replied that ….no, the BBC is not included…there is all the difference in the world between a privately owned broadcaster and a public broadcaster which has its own mechanisms for accountability [ha ha] and no I don’t include it as a monopoly…it’s not a private monopoly.

I put it on one side….the standards the BBC offers are important..it offers a gold standard for other broadcasters…the role of the BBC is absolutely essential…there is no need for protection from the BBC, far from it, we need to strengthen the BBC.

So the BBC has 74% share of the news…and that will only get bigger as Harman’s regulation would be implemented and other news providers reined in…..nice plan…especially as the BBC supports Labour and left wing political narratives.

One interesting point was raised….as newspapers are struggling and some may ‘go under’….that makes the survivors bigger by default….Harman’s regulation would mean that they would then have to cut their newspaper sales to reduce their share of the market…a never ending death spiral resulting in one state controlled media provider running the show.

No political interference?    Doesn’t she know that Communism doesn’t work?

Patten, BBC, Trust…oh and Europe.

All words which are increasingly hard to put together in one sentence that you could say out loud without laughing.

Thinking of complaining to the BBC Trust about the BBC’s coverage of Europe?…shouldn’t bother judging by Patten’s latest bit of thinking out loud:

 ‘Conservative Eurosceptics could be sending the party down the path to “political suicide” if they show they are unwilling to accept British membership of the EU in any form.’

Impartiality in his DNA.

He also seems to believe that the BBC in its present form is sacrosanct and cannot be reduced in any shape or form:

“I have got no doubt at all that a smaller licence fee would result in cuts in services. Every time in the last couple of years we have tried to reduce services there has been a storm.

“I think we should be realistic the next time we negotiate the licence fee about what the consequences would be if the licence fee was substantially reduced.”

Well…what exactly would those consequences be?  Think we could live with them somehow.

This is already going strongly on the Open Thread but I think it deserves top billing for a while:

 Harriet Harman is due to give a speech  in which she will outline a plan to limit media ownership….can’t see any mention of the BBC funnily enough….maybe that’s the Guardian’s editing.

 A media ownership cap as low as 15% across newspapers, broadcasting companies and online sites must be considered to stop companies feeling they are “above the rule of law”, according to Harriet Harman.

“Media monopoly matters in a democracy. The concentration of unaccountable media power distorts the political system. The media shapes how we see ourselves and how we see the world. In a democracy, the free flow of information, of different points of view, is crucial for open debate.

“Too much power in too few hands hinders proper debate. Plurality ensures that no media owner can exert such a damaging influence on public opinion and on policy makers. It ensures that no media company can have so much influence that it feels itself immune, above the rule of law. It ensures no private interest can set itself above the public interest.

I see absolutely no reason why such a cap shouldn’t apply just as readily to the BBC as any commercial company…the BBC is all the more ‘influential’ because people expect it to be impartial…and often give it the benefit of the doubt and so genuine bias by the BBC slips by unnoticed as such whereas a commercial company is expected to have a particular political or social outlook and its reports are viewed with that in mind.

The BBC smothers national debate, distorts and corrupts politics and turns a democracy into a one party state by forcing politicians to dance to its tune….hence all politicians look and sound the same.

Too big, too powerful and too unaccountable.

Time for change.