Here’s Kuenssberg’s thoughts on the debate…it will be chalked up as a win for Corbyn…
She attacks May for not turning up and yet has nothing but praise for Corbyn who changed his mind and took the opportunistic chancer’s route of suddenly saying he will join the debate trying to wrongfoot May.
It is quite probable that this was the Corbyn plan all along, did the BBC know?, just as the ‘leak’ of Labour’s manifesto was quite likely deliberate…giving it enormous publicity and giving it time to assess reaction and then alter anything that got a bad reception without being accused of changing anything as it was a ‘draft’….unlike May’s change which has brought enormous criticism upon her including the charge that she changes her mind….unlike Corbyn who has had no criticism for changing his mind on the debate…if it suits the BBC then they won’t criticise.
Look at the BBC write up from last night [original version]…BBC debate: Rivals attack Theresa May over absence…and you won’t find anything about the debate being a complete shambles or about a biased audience.
The BBC are doing Corbyn’s work for him as it concentrates on criticism of May by her rivals…..and lines up quote after quote from the debate…as there were far more anti-Tory people in the debate this leads to a long soundbite of anti-Tory messages that the BBC is more than happy to keep pumping out.
The BBC is blaming Comres for the biased audience and the fact that as there were so many parties represented they all had to have their supporters in the audience and thus together outnumbered the Tories….that seems like a system that is not working then…even if it was done properly with the correct percentages of representation. A system designed to produce a hugely, disproportionately, anti-government audience.
Pienaar came on to smooth things over…he admitted it was a bunfight and that he wasn’t sure we’d learned anything useful and that will have done nothing to change people’s minds[lol] however he claimed it was good as it showed the character of the leaders and how they’d cope in a bunfight. You’d hope serious political negotiations, such as Brexit were conducted in a serious manner and not a bunfight. He went on to say Boris would have been there [if PM], so sly dig at May, and goes on to say May is too measured and she wins no points for reducing risk…in his assessment….and May is ‘not a media performer’….er…not a performing seal for the BBC’s own delight….the debate was a circus from which we learnt nothing.
Even the Daily Mirror thought the debate was crap and pointless…
This could have been an opportunity for a serious debate on Brexit, the economy, defence and public services.
Instead we got a cross between the Jeremy Kyle show and the Weakest Link.
Unfortunately there was no way of eliminating any of the shouty seven when they talked over each other, uttered banal soundbites or offered a duff answer.
Pienaar then went on to praise Corbyn as someone open to argument[er…kept the same marxist pro-terror ideologies for decades] and that he was a ‘thoughtful man’.
Nicky Campbell naturally defended the BBC and attacked May and the Tories as he talked to Boris…calling him ‘disengenuous’…and of course bringing up the £350 million…when have you heard the BBC bring up the Remain camps’ lies about economic armageddon, families reduced to poverty, world war 3, an ’emergency budget’ to rescue Britain after the vote, 3 million people on the dole due to Brexit, investment down and businesses fleeing Britian in droves..oh…and Cameron wouldn’t resign after the vote…nuff said.
Such debates are entirely worthless and more showbiz than a useful tool to inform the Public about the issues in a rounded and measured way.
The BBC knew the Tories would be outnumbered and they’d get a ream of anti-Tory soundbites that the could play endlessly for days just a week before the actual vote.
The Independent headline says it all…
This is the BBC turning the election into a pantomime…a pro-Corbyn, or at least a Pro-Labour one.
