Author Archives: Ed Thomas

Economical with the news

By | | ,
20 Comments

I see on several sites- likes Alice’s for example, or the Times– that UK manufacturing output is falling at the fastest rate since 1981. I can’t find a story about it on the BBC UK page, and no-one has mentioned any coverage of it in the comments. On the other hand, I have seen repeatedly that the EU is to support UK car manufacturing. Can it be the BBC doesn’t like to remind us too much of where Labour’s economic genius has led us again? Why on earth would they prefer me to notice EU funding for UK jobs? Why don’t I notice BBC stories about personal hardship in the slump such as I remember from the days of Major? Questions. Questions (maybe I am trying to fathom why 30% might still support the incumbent troughers). I can remember when more moderate manufacturing declines and weakness in the early nineties were essential topline stories for the BBC.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

General BBC-related comment thread!

By | |
160 Comments

Please use this thread for comments about the BBC’s current programming and activities. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog – scroll down for new topic-specific posts. N.B. This is not an invitation for general off-topic comments, rants or chit-chat. Thoughtful comments are encouraged. Comments may also be moderated. Any suggestions for stories that you might like covered would be appreciated! It’s your space, use it wisely.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

Legal purposes crossed

By | | ,
18 Comments

There’s been an interesting story recently which might tell us much about the BBC’s editorial bias. I was reminded of it by this article by William Rees Mogg in the The Times. According to him, senior judge Lord Hoffman, who has spoken out against the Strasbourg law court the European Court of Human Rights, “has supported the shift to judicial liberalism that followed the passage of the Human Rights Act 1998”

So, a liberal judge.

Who attacks a European institution.

What to do (for the BBC, who are attached to both)?

Well, interestingly, the BBC immediately reported Hoffman’s attack– they may have even broken the story to the wider public – but they made special points of saying where he might be acting from a sense of personal injury, “In 1989 Lord Hoffmann had a decision of his overturned”, or untrustworthy, Hoffman “had contributed to a decision that the former Chilean leader could be arrested and extradited for crimes against humanity, without emphasising his links to human rights group Amnesty International.”

As this kind of background is normally quietly left aside when reporting the thinking of liberal leftists, and in those cases the BBC simply rest on the seniority of the source, we can be sure that this time the BBC came down in favour of supporting a European institution. As Russell Crowe said to Marr on Sunday, pointedly and deliberately- “objectivity is a myth”.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

General BBC-related comment thread!

By | |
Comments Off on General BBC-related comment thread!

Please use this thread for comments about the BBC’s current programming and activities. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog – scroll down for new topic-specific posts. N.B. This is not an invitation for general off-topic comments, rants or chit-chat. Thoughtful comments are encouraged. Comments may also be moderated. Any suggestions for stories that you might like covered would be appreciated! It’s your space, use it wisely.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

Brown Boosting Choreography

By | |
11 Comments

It was interesting listening to BBC world service reflections on the G20 summit. The analysis focussed almost totally on the mood music- no mention was made of actual outcomes, as for instance the UK press has focused on. It was left to commentators to discuss that in a debate section.

The summit was presented mainly along the lines of personality. The BBC presenter couched the question as: the Obama – Brown relationship; respectful courtesy or something better?

How about utterly predictable, without political cost, and mainly for the cameras? In other words, no room was given for a genuinely critical perspective

The presenter continued:


Are we seeing the birth of a new and incredibly significant special relationship?

10 more years, I tell you!

The next question involved the comparison of the so-called “London Summit” with Camp David, Yalta, etc. Wow, that big huh?- until we were called on to remember that most summits are finally not too significant. Thus it was that expectations were lowered and Brown’s reputation elevated in the same broadcast.

Icing on the cake was the little ad for the BBC’s economic coverage which followed the broadcast, beginning with Brown’s gutteral “no time for a novice” soundbyte from one of the Great Leader’s top hits.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

Icing the cake with many layers.

By | |
124 Comments

I’ve been watching the BBC live coverage of the evening’s G20 dinner. Interesting to watch the BBC modus operandi. It all begins with sweeping positive comments for Gordon- Gordon “couldn’t have wished for better from Obama” blah blah… “could have scripted it himself” blah blah. Typical Gordon-boosting. That basic line is then refined with sometimes contradictory observations. The subtext to this has been unquestioningly about increasing regulation (taken for granted, never scrutinised, awaited with barely contained impatience). I’ve just heard, by the way, Bridget Kendall say that “no-one would say France and Germany are socialist countries”. It all rather depends on your definition. Communist no, socialist- I would say yes. There’s plenty more of stuff like that- I am sure you have noticed more…

I’ll add that I’ve just now heard Nick Robinson say that “not so long ago” Gordon “couldn’t have dreamed of such praise” as he got. What? Nick seems to be on a planet where that hasn’t been a recurring and obvious wet dream of the hapless Brown ever since the One descended to become POTUS- and also an entirely predictable gesture. He also seems to have attended a press conference where Obama wasn’t as routine and laid back as he appeared to me on screen.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

Picking winners

By | |
14 Comments

Could Bono be the arch-example of the BBC’s corrosive effect on Britain? The BBC recently delighted in U2’s “surprise” little open air concert . Think about how the age profile of the BBC and that of Bono’s boys have so many synergetic properties. Combine that with Coldplay’s and you have a fait accompli. Both gangs of lads coincide wonderfully with the BBC’s ideology- enviro-sappiness and redistributive politics; the air-headedness of Bono and the soft-girlyness of Martin don’t harm the feminist agenda, neither. Little wonder then that for years the BBC has selected them as cultural representatives, preserving them as cultural artefacts even beyond the point where their natural pop-appeal would have waned. Since at least Band Aid and St Bob the BBC have been dabbling like this, or rather controlling like this, and today a little squeak goes up against their cultural hegemon. Overreach? One can but hope. And get a little angrier.

(I should add, I actually quite like(d) all the above-mentioned acts, but they should stand and fall- as once they did- solely on the basis of the freest possible popular vote. Which they certainly no longer do)

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

BBC guest selectivity

By | |
31 Comments

: it’s not just David.

“I should point out that Labour’s tax trap soon brought me a phone call from the BBC. Would I like to go on to condemn the 45p? If I said yes, that would make the story “Tory tax wars”, which they would love. Meanwhile yesterday an offer to appear on Newsnight to discuss the debt petered out without any explanation before I had the details of time and place, and an accepted offer to do the Today programme this morning on the same subject was cancelled. Was it something I said, or something I would not say?”

John Redwood reports on the Left’s agenda

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

General BBC-related comment thread.

By | |
76 Comments

Please use this thread for comments about the BBC’s current programming and activities. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog – scroll down for new topic-specific posts. N.B. This is not an invitation for general off-topic comments, rants or chit-chat. Thoughtful comments are encouraged. Comments may also be moderated. Any suggestions for stories that you might like covered would be appreciated! It’s your space, use it wisely

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

General BBC-related comment thread!

By | |
Comments Off on General BBC-related comment thread!

Please use this thread for comments about the BBC’s current programming and activities. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog – scroll down for new topic-specific posts. N.B. This is not an invitation for general off-topic comments, rants or chit-chat. Thoughtful comments are encouraged. Comments may also be moderated. Any suggestions for stories that you might like covered would be appreciated! It’s your space, use it wisely.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.