Ian Duncan Smith tore a strip off the BBC this morning for orchestrating a politically motivated campaign against government welfare reforms:
‘Cabinet minister Iain Duncan Smith today accused the BBC of launching a ‘politically-motivated’ attack on government plans to cap benefits at £26,000.
In an extraordinary on-air blast, the Work and Pensions Secretary accused the Corporation of using ‘lots of little cases’ to claim that limiting welfare payments would not get people back to work.
The confrontation live on Radio 4’s Today programme marks a significant escalation in the political row between Mr Duncan Smith and the BBC over reforms to the benefits system.’
IDS’s claims that the BBC use ‘little cases’, that is highly personalised cases which supposedly show the disastrous consequences of the reforms on the ‘vulnerable’ and which therefore illustrate no less than the futility of the whole policy ….or so the BBC hopes.
Of course the BBC rarely bothers to present the other side of the argument, those who suffer under the present regime or those who will benefit from the new one.
It’s one of the BBC’s favourite ‘tricks’. The ‘little case’. Used to especial effect in any debate about immigration or asylum. The BBC briing on ‘an immigrant’. The BBC paints a picture of dire need and danger if that person is not allowed to stay….and uses that single story to illustrate how immigration or asylum are vital and necessary if we are to be a humane, caring society.
Curiously today, by coincidence, on the Sheila Fogarty show we have the perfect example of that in action.
In support of refugees she brings on not one but two advocates…Maurice Wren, Chief Executive of the British Refugee Council and Maria Hennessy, the Senior Legal Officer at the European Council on Refugees & Exiles.
Think we know what they will be saying.
Then Fogarty plays her ace card, or should that be the ‘Grace card’?
At 12:37 Fogarty introduces ‘Grace’s story’ a refugee from the Ivory Coast. She came here in 2000 but her claim for asylum was rejected…she appealed three more times…each one rejected…she made another appeal and is awaiting the result.
Fogarty is concerned at how long it is all taking….she basically ignores the fact that ‘Grace’ has been refused entry 4 times already…and all funded by legal aid….her claim based upon the fact she is Muslim and will suffer female genital mutilation on return to the Ivory Coast….she feels safe here..nobody gets killed, nobody’s after you.
Fogarty is thoroughly on board and accepts totally that ‘Grace’ should be here….the sole concern seems to be how she is treated here and the speed of the asylum process.
Personalising the story is intended to elicit sympathy and make you think ‘oh my god, she must be allowed to stay’….and thereby also think differently about the immigration/asylum debate as a whole….in other words…. fling open the borders.
It is in essence, bluntly, a BBC propaganda drive to brain wash you into agreeing to allow anybody and everybody into the country.
At 42 mins Fogarty reads out an anonymous text from Glasgow in which someone claiming to be an ‘Asylum decision maker for the Home Office’ says that they are on a productivity drive, being forced to make more and quicker decisons about cases…he/she claims this leads to bad decisions….he/she says the Home Office is only interested in the numbers….which is counter productive and morally repugnant.
Astonishing that Fogarty can use an anonymous text to then provide evidence of the ‘human suffering’ caused by the asylum system.
The irony is that the programme was based upon the premise that the asylum system took too long to deal with cases…the text claimed this was being dealt with one way or another……but Fogarty still wasn’t happy….speed meant ‘human suffering’…but so apparently does slowness.
A paradox but what to do?
The BBC has the answer…open the borders…agree to every asylum claim and hand out houses and money….simple.
Its an approach that the opposition uses frequently in the house of commons. “what as the honorable member got to say to my constituent [insert name] who [insert sob story]”
Apologies dayday, I went for the reply button and hit the report button by mistake. Note to editors, it would help if the Reply burron and the Report button were placed on opposite sides of the page.
Now back to the reply- I would suggest that Ministers start dealing with the tactics of using sob stories to demonise them and their policies by informing the person using those tactics that they should pass all the information they have, in full, to the Minister who would then seek all the details of the matter for himself in order to give proper attention to what is obviously a private and personal issue for the person concerned.
you have to wonder if that ultra liberal shelagh fogarty has forgot that radio 5 live presenters are supposed to be impartial at all times when covering a story,sorry,but from nicky in the morning to vicky and shelagh midmorning to richard supergob bacon mid afternoon the rules of impartiality does not apply to these presenters,when you have a station called radiod 5 live filled with left wing liberal presenters you are going to get biasd left wing liberal views and opinions from there presenters,that is the reality and a damm discrace.
It was the BBC campaign against plans to means-test child tax credit that disgusted me the most – as if its employees don’t make enough money out of the public purse.
The BBC just LOVES to personalize. Interviewers don’t want to face the hard decision of limiting immigration to small and manageable numbers, so they appeal to emotion. “She only wanted a better life for her children”, “their fears of persecution”, “he’s already been turned down five times”, etc.
Just think about the logic of this: even if you only allowed in those in genuine fear of persecution, then in an unruly and chaotic world, millions of people would have an equal claim. To these you could add more who claimed persecution but really sought economic advantage. And if merely “wanting a better life” gets you in, then Britain, Europe and the Americas will be the target of mass waves of population movement … forever, or until they start to disintegrate under the strain and become less attractive.
The BBC, ever keen to restrict what you can say and think, seems unable to understand the need for restrictions on how many people are let into Britain, how much benefit they are paid, and how much is spent on health. It is almost as if money and space no longer exist in their crazy universe of infinite capacity and infinite entitlement. Is this because their own levels or remuneration and quality of housing mean that they are largely out of touch with reality?
I wonder which political side BBC-NUJ is on here?:-
“Brixton squatters clash with police as they are cleared out from mansion blocks where they have been living rent-free for 32 years.
“A road in central Brixton was trashed as angry squatters were evicted.
“Other residents were terrified as bins were torched and bailiffs assaulted.
“Many of the squatters had enjoyed rent-free living for at least 13 years.”
By SAM WEBB.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2364056/Brixton-Squatters-clash-police-Rushcroft-Road.html
EASY – BBC does not allow copies of Daily Mail on its premises according to ex-newsreader Peter Sissons in his book.
So, the story will be ignored. Simples !!
If you read the highest rated comments you have to go along way to get anyone NOT in favour of the cap and most thinking it should be lower.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23306092
There’s been a concerted effort by the latest comments to balance things…
Most of them echo this one
“444.kaiser-sose
6 Hours ago
The government should go further still. No one should get more in benefit than the minimum wage. Why should unskilled people with nothing to offer get more money on benefits than those who have studied, learned a trade, work hard and only just above the minimum wage?
It’s still a scandal. £500 a week tax free and no expenses incurred in obtaining that money. It’s a joke and should be stopped.”
The BBC knowingly and deliberately continue to disconnect their narrative from consensus reality ,while expecting the hoi-polloi they so despise to fund them, because they have the arrogance of religious zealots. possessing as the do a received truth that transcends all need of justification.
It is beyond all reform and can only be abolished
This one has also for some reason struck a chord: ‘And the biggest receivers of benefits which should also be capped….. BBC pundits, and management.’
Possibly from a section of the nation does not speak for, would prefer not to listen to, and whose views are most certainly not wanted.
He writes… whilst slumming it in a Travelodge.
Although they will not receive £500 in tax-free cash, as such. That is the monetary value of all benefits including the biggest burden – housing benefit. Then there is child tax credit, jobseeker’s allowance, child benefit, etc. which all count in aggregate towards the cap. For singles it is a £350 limit. This problem is one that has been in the making for many years and I think it is right to at last tackle it. The minimum wage is unlikely to work in London in the short term because there it would not even cover off the ancilliary benefits as above. I think as the shock wears off from this first stage change and the affected individuals adapt (yes, BBC, they can), a lowering of the cap will be a natural stage 2 progression, lubricated by the hoped-for drop in general claimants owing to hoped-for changes in work behaviour.
“her claim based upon the fact she is Muslim and will suffer female genital mutilation on return to the Ivory Coast….she feels safe here..nobody gets killed, nobody’s after you.”
Sounds a bit Islamophobic to me………….
Do you mean she misunderstands her own religion?
“nobody gets killed, nobody’s after you.”
Unless your a soldier on your way home that is.
‘Sounds a bit Islamophobic to me………….’
***
I was going to suggest she never take up the drums, but, well, there’s a whole new hustling industry lurking right there too.
“Meet the BBC’s poster girl for welfare ‘cuts'”
By RICHARD LITTLEJOHN.
[Opening excerpt]:-
“She sounded African, but I couldn’t swear to it. We were only told that her name was Rebecca and she lived somewhere in London.
“Rebecca was wheeled out by the BBC as a victim of the latest ‘savage cuts’ in the welfare budget, which came into force yesterday.
“The plight of this poor woman was considered by the producers of Radio 4’s Today programme to be the most important story in the world.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2364521/Meet-BBCs-poster-girl-welfare-cuts.html
I read this too. I’m not a big fan of Littlejohn but in this instance he articulated very well the farcical nature of ‘Rebecca’. I would guess that ‘Rebecca’ doesn’t exist except in the minds of some BBC apparatchik who created a caricature of someone who appeals to the BBC and their ilk and is a complete anathema to everybody else.
If she really does exist then Littlejohn’s shredding of her and the BBC’s usage of her was even more correct.
I think we should ask that the Statue of Liberty is moved to Heathrow. We are accepting, feeding, treating & housing all the world’s poor. But we are a fraction of the size of the US & we will have no where to put our windmills.
So she fled to London to escape FGM?
Oh the irony.
http://www.trustforlondon.org.uk/special-initiatives/female-genital-mutilation-fgm/
On 5 live yesterday the questioning of the Labour shadow minister (Stephen Timms) was noticably lame.
He would have been quite easily floored with the following questions:
1. So, shadow minister, you do support the concept of a benefits cap and yet you say there ought to be a regional difference to allow for high housing costs – a London weighting. In other words you support a cap just so long as no one at all would ever lose any benefits!?
2. Considering Labour was in power between 1997 and 2010 the current state and indeed culture of the benefits system is your direct responsibility. Since you never previously supported any cap on benefits are you now apologising for your Party’s mismanagement?
3. Although you are opposing any benefits cuts to please your core support – those on benefits – you spin a line about controlling spending. In reality your policy makers are considering making entitlement to benefits a ‘human right’. This would put policy in the hands of unelected liberal minded lawyers. Your leader talks about a ‘squeezed middle’. Are you not once again sqeezing that middle between the two groups who supporter Labour – the benefits claiments and the liberal elite?
And he was stabbed by a mad Muslim woman in his Mp surgery a while back too was he not?
He must have provoked the attack by being tall, stupid-looking and…nominally Christian.
See-it`s not only the likes of “Rebecca”…Sunday School teacher of Haringey…who are always the victims of Tory cuts is it?
There ARE Muslim ones too, but they don`t get a mention, just a test card instead.
“BBC accused of bias in row over welfare.
“IAIN Duncan Smith yesterday accused the BBC of using ‘politically motivated’ people to attack his welfare policies.”
By Alison Little.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/415117/BBC-accused-of-bias-in-row-over-welfare?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+daily-express-uk-news+%28Daily+Express+%3A%3A+UK+Feed%29
“IDS vs BBC: Work and Pensions Secretary blasts Corporation for ‘politically-motivated’ criticism of his benefits shake-up”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2363924/IDS-vs-BBC-Work-Pensions-Secretary-blasts-Corporation-politically-motivated-criticism-benefits-cap.html
SYRIA.
There is evidence that PM Cameron may be shifting from his (misguided) policy of arming what is, in effect, part of the Islamic jihad opposition in Syria.
Will INBBC now do the same?