If you’ve had occasion to read any of the Labour websites recently you will have noticed that Labour, behind the scenes, is in turmoil.  The most damaging revelation perhaps that the backstabbing u-turner, Ed Miliband, isn’t trusted by many in the Labour Party.

Falkirk and his craven surrender to the Unions and his knowledge and worse, his approval, of their vote rigging activities were hidden from view by the BBC with its decision not to report such goings on in their full gory detail.

Today the Observer/Guardian reports:

Secret memo shows key role for Blairites in Labour’s election team

Alastair Campbell and Alan Milburn to advise Ed Miliband, according to leaked plan that will infuriate party left
One senior Labour party figure described the three-page leak as “dynamite”, saying it would intensify already bitter power struggles at the top of the party and exacerbate tensions over how ambitious and bold central policy messages should be over the next 17 months. “This is a power grab by Douglas,” the source said. “It looks like a return to New Labour tactics, with the old caution and everything driven by focus groups. There will be a massive row about this. Key people look like they have been sidelined.”

‘Dynamite’…..’a power grab’…..’a massive row’….

The BBC haven’t got round to reporting this…will they ever? It does seem to be an eminently reportable scoop..but once again no signs of interest from the BBC political journos.

Covering up dissent and disarray within Labour?

Trying to keep up the myth of Miliband as the strong, powerful, in control leader?

Maybe they’re just doing the usual trick they apply when they get what appears to be bad news for certain favoured segments of society….wait and wait, think things through, and work out the best line to take that limits damage and if possible actually turn it on its head so that what appears highly damaging is in fact presented as some sort of victory.

Poverty (relative of course) is almost at a record low.

Living standards have been declining since 2003…not since 2010.

Fewer working adults were in poverty in 2011/12 than in 2008/09 under Labour.

Child poverty is lowest for 25 years.

Pensioner poverty at lowest in decades.

Funny…none of those are the attention grabbing headline message from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the BBC.

The BBC of course chose a headline that, by coincidence I’m sure, parallels the Labour line on living standards.

Most people classed as being in poverty ‘have job’

But the reason for the ‘rise’ in poverty amongst working people is in fact a good one…pensioners are being  taken out of poverty….it isn’t that more working people are in poverty…because as said, there are fewer in poverty in 2011/12 than in 2008/09….yet more good news…no?

That rather important fact isn’t relayed to us by the BBC…which totally alters the way things can be perceived.

Way, way down in a BBC article on a Joseph Rowntree Foundation report on poverty comes this:

The overall poverty rate in the UK expressed as a proportion of the population was 21% – the second lowest since reliable official statistics began to be collected in the mid-1990s

What?  The poverty rate is the 2nd lowest on record? Why would the BBC try to bury that good news?

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the New Policy Institute which produced this report are both progressive, campaigning organisations…something that the BBC should mention and then reflect in the way it reports the ‘facts’….but it doesn’t…instead jumping on board that progressive bandwagon and producing a highly misleading interpretation of that report.

The BBC eventually also reports this…‘child poverty was at its lowest level for 25 years.’…but again half way down the page and only a passing mention.

If child poverty had been up you can guarantee it would have been the headline.

or this:  ‘the number of pensioners living in poverty had fallen to its lowest level in decades.’

Again not a headline.

and there’s this from the JRF...

Incomes for the poorest 10% have been falling for much longer, since 2004/05.

So that confirms what Rafael Behr said in the New Statesman…that the ‘Living standards crisis’ began under Labour a decade ago.

or as the report itself admits:

What is noticeable about in-work poverty is how it began to rise around 2003/04,after being fairly static for the previous five or so years.

and…

The Sunday Times reports that (In a massive headline):

Child Poverty is at lowest for 25 years

From the JRF itself:

Between 2007/08 and 2011/12, the number of children in poverty on the relative measure fell by around 500,000.

And yet the BBC highlight something else completely…a Labour narrative once again…

Most people classed as being in poverty ‘have job’

More working households were living in poverty in the UK last year than non-working ones – for the first time, a charity has reported.

Just over half of the 13 million people in poverty – surviving on less than 60% of the national median (middle) income – were from working families, it said.

But why has that happened?  What has made the difference in proportions?

One reason is that pensioners, obviously ‘out of work’, are statistically rising out of poverty, therefore ‘increasing’ the proportion of those who are  in work but who are in poverty relative to those out of work:

From the JRF:

The fall in poverty among those in workless and retired families is obviously related to the fall in pensioner poverty.

Kind of alters the perception of things….the BBC vaguely notes the connection in a side panel…‘The proportions of poor people have also been affected by the rapidly reducing rates of pensioner poverty.’…..but it is a crucial fact that undermines the whole thrust of the article and should be highlighted.

And just how many working adults are in low pay?

The BBC tells us….the number of working poor has steadily been rising for years.

But hang on….the report tells us that there are 3,060,000 working adults in poverty in 20011/12…..but in 2008/09 there were 3,500,000 working adults in poverty.

So there were more working adults in poverty in 2008/09 than 20011/12…and yet we’re told there are more in poverty now.

Hardly fits with Labour’s narrative of the poverty stricken poor under the Coalition.

More were in poverty under Labour.

And…

It’s a curious concept being marketed here…the government, and the Public, expect people to work for a living if possible…Labour and the JRF  seem to think otherwise….life on the dole pays better……….because having a job doesn’t lift you out of poverty, relative poverty that is, then perhaps you shouldn’t bother working….from Peter Kenway, the author of the report:

‘It suits politicians of all parties to claim that work is the route out of poverty. Such a message wraps a snarling toughness directed at workless adults inside a saccharine justification: you must work for the sake of your kids.’

And Julia Unwin from the JRF tells us that:

‘Hardwork is not working’

The BBC joins in too:

Get a job has long been the mantra of ministers….And while work is the best way out poverty, it’s no longer a guarantee, it seems.

Actually the message is you must work to earn a living, and not just take from those who do work.

Paul Mason, gone but not forgotten….just why did the BBC employ this man as a senior political editor?

What was it about his juvenile politics that so enriched our lives, that enlightened and educated us about the world?

Paul Mason, lover of anarchists, Occupy and Communism….and the Internet.

Perfect for the BBC with its studied neutrality on all subjects. Just a shame Mason let his personal views contaminate every film and  report he produced.

Here is a reminder of just why the old Trots at the BBC loved him so much:

Warning…contains graphic photographs

At an International Council meeting in Canterbury, UK, Amnesty International debates and rejects the proposal to recognize as prisoners of conscience people who use or advocate the use of force in opposing oppressive regimes.

This means people like Nelson Mandela are not recognized as prisoners of  conscience.

Amused to hear Nelson Mandela put into the same category as Nick Griffin this morning (08:58) by one of Mandela’s oldest friends, who knew him for 63 years, and who told us that Mandela was angry with the Whites, for obvious reasons, but also angry and suspicious of the Indian immigrants in South Africa in the context of the new African nationalism that was being propagated….Justin Webb said that’s interesting…that’s a side of him we don’t hear much about..and oh we ran out of time.

Yes…there’s a lot we don’t hear about Mandela these days.

The BBC rarely misses a chance to mention that Mrs Thatcher thought that the ANC was a terrorist organisation and a bunch of Communists….the intention explicit…to demonstrate just how bad a woman Thatcher was…because Mandela was a saint….today on Any Questions we had some good lady, Jeanette Winterson, mention it (1 min 30 sec)…adding  ‘Lest we forget‘….amusing really because as she condemns Thatcher she is telling us how we should adopt Mandela’s virtuous values of inclusiveness, standing against prejudice, and his ability to meet his enemies around the table….no such inclusiveness when it comes to Margaret Thatcher then?  Mandela, who used extreme violence to serve his purposes, is a latter day saint, Thatcher who disliked his methods, and opposed Apartheid, is evil…funny old world.

I can’t think why Thatcher thought that about Mandela and the ANC:

It must be because Thatcher is Thatcher…because it is hard to argue with her point……indeed even Amnesty International thought along the same lines….something all those pious worthies grandstanding and basking in the reflected glory of Nelson Mandela seem to forget or are ignorant of:
At an International Council meeting in Canterbury, UK, Amnesty International debates and rejects the proposal to recognize as prisoners of conscience people who use or advocate the use of force in opposing oppressive regimes. This means people like Nelson Mandela are not recognized as prisoners of conscience, although campaigns continue against the inhumane conditions of his imprisonment.

Mandela never renounced violence nor apologised for it…in fact he still supported killing long after his release:

The BBC has repeatedly told us in the last two days that South Africa is a nation at peace…the legacy of Nelson Mandela…..ignoring the government sponsored murder campaign against whites…and indeed Black opponents of the government.

Around 3000 white farmers have been killed, and many more other whites, and the number of farmers reduced from 60,000 to half that number as they flee the country.

And of course this method of dealing with political opponents was invented by Mandela’s ANC:

It is remarkable how a man who, though admittedly having a good cause, adopted terrorist methods is being whitewashed, sanitised, scourged of his past sins.

How might that have happened and who rewrote history?

This might be one angle on that:

“This is how we turned Mandela from a black terrorist into a black leader.”

The anti-apartheid hero was on a US terror watch list until 2008 and while still on Robben Island, Britain’s late “Iron Lady” Margaret Thatcher described his African National Congress as a “typical terrorist organisation.”

That Mandela’s image has been transformed so thoroughly is a testament to the man’s achievements, but also, in part, to a concert that took place in London 25 years ago this week.

For organiser Tony Hollingsworth the June 11, 1988 gig at London’s Wembley Stadium had very little to do with Mandela’s 70th birthday, as billed.

It had everything to do with ridding Mandela of his terrorist tag and ensuring his release.

“You can’t get out of jail as a terrorist, but you can get out of prison as a black leader,” he told AFP during a visit to Johannesburg.

Many insisted the focus remain on sanctions against the apartheid regime.

“A lot of people were criticising me for sanitising it,” Hollingsworth remembered.

Eventually Terry convinced the ANC and Hollingsworth convinced Simple Minds, Dire Straits, Sting, George Michael, The Eurythmics, Eric Clapton, Whitney Houston and Stevie Wonder into the 83-artist line up.

With that musical firepower came contracts for a more than 11 hour broadcast.

“We signed with the entertainment department of television (stations). And when the head of the department got home and watched on his channel that they were calling Mandela a terrorist, they called straight to the news section to say, don’t call this man a terrorist, we just signed 11 hours of broadcasting for a tribute about him.”

“This is how we turned Mandela from a black terrorist into a black leader.”

Aah yes….TV executives.

And where have we heard that attitude before….‘we can’t say that about him…because we have a tribute show to go out?’

Oh yes, from the BBC, Newsnight, and Jimmy Savile.

Pounce has spotted this:

Simon Amstell apologises for Mandela comment on Radio 1

What did he have to apologise for?

The comedian suggested there was racial segregation between Radio 1 and sister station BBC Radio 1Xtra.

He said: “Mandela would not approve of the situation at the BBC.”

His comments came during a link on the show.

Amstell said: “What is going on? We’re next to 1Xtra, it’s so white in here. Mandela would not approve of the situation at the BBC.”

When Nick Grimshaw asked why, the guest replied: “Look at all these people in here.” Grimshaw answered: “There’s a lot of people.”

The comedian then said: “Yeah, but look at the segregation that’s happened.”

He then laughed when the producer of the Breakfast Show, Matt Fincham, said: “I don’t think that’s the right thing to be saying right now.”

Amstell added: “Well, someone had to say it. Mandela would say it if he was here.”

At the end of the link Nick Grimshaw said: “Apologies if you were offended by anything that was said earlier.” Amstell replied: “Nothing I said was offensive though.”

So who exactly was he apologising to…and for what?   Not to Mandela……It seems that it is the BBC which doesn’t like being accused of ‘apartheid’ policies…despite the fact they are operating them …. the same BBC is all too ready to accuse others, such as Israel, of operating some sort of apartheid, whilst itself running campaigns to silence, smear and malign right wingers and climate sceptics.

What Amstell hadn’t realised of course was that a Black music station is ‘positive discrimination’…the ‘apartheid’ is a good thing…just like having an Asian Network apparently……a policy which suggests that the BBC thinks all those Asians aren’t really British despite being born here…a brown skin means they can’t possibly watch the same telly as the whites, or listen to the same music or eat the same food.

Amstell is right isn’t he?

A Black music station is an oddity…classical music, rock music or a hip hop/rap music station you can understand…but the defining characteristic of a station is that you only need to be ‘Black’ to be played?  Clearly the type of music isn’t important.

Just how black is black?  When do you lose that certain je ne sais quoi that opens doors at the BBC?

Nelson Mandela has died…but don’t worry…he has apparently been reincarnated as Gordon Brown.

That was certainly the impression I got when Brown turned up on Victoria Derbyshire’s show (10:20) telling us how grateful he was to Nelson Mandela for helping him to save the world.

Incredible how the BBC can unearth the shy and retiring Gordon Brown when it wants to….it seems remarkably reluctant to seek him out and ask him about those 13 years of cooking the books.

The BBC has of course taken to carpet bombing us with reminiscences about Mandela…even Sheila Fogarty cracked and got caught up in the euphoria…saying our best hope is that some of Mandela’s character and values will rub off on us.

Most embarrassing was Evan Davis who gushed, giggled and fawned his way through Today.

I did laugh when he told us that politics was very tribal and that Mandela’s forgiveness and reconciliation should be a lesson for us all (08:36) …..Davis said he wondered why people find it so difficult to learn that lesson or follow the example of Nelson Mandela…it’s not difficult he informed us.

This from an organisation that takes every chance it can to spread hatred for Margaret Thatcher…even today the opportunity is not missed.

Vicotria Derbyshire asked Brown ‘Did Britain get it right in the 80’s?‘…meaning of course was Thatcher’s policy towards South Africa the right one.  No guesses what Brown said.  But why just the 80’s?  Apartheid didn’t just blossom in 1979 with the election of Thatcher….though I’m certain BBC history will say it did….Apartheid was operating for as long as whites were in South Africa in different forms….and it was probably operated by the Zulus before them…if you weren’t a Zulu perhaps you got a spear through you…they didn’t build an empire by being cuddly and forgiving…and the Zulus of course co-operated with the S.A regime in suppressing the ANC.

In the early hours we heard from a priest in Glasgow (05:20)….which Mandela visited in 1991….he asked Mandela what he thought of Mrs Thatcher…I was hoping, the priest said, to be told she was a terrible woman…but Mandela didn’t say that at all.

A curious paradox…….the BBC always supports negotiations rather than force or sanctions against a nation…see Iran for the latest example……and the BBC has spent the day praising Mandela’s ‘forgiving nature’ and his ability to build reconciliation……but was Thatcher not applying those very principles to South Africa…engaging positively with the regime and working to end Apartheid through diplomacy and negotiation?   The BBC does not see it that way at all for some reason.

Norman Tebbit who lived through those times in close up says:

The policy of the Thatcher government was a success.

‘The result was an overwhelmingly peaceful transition of power in which the final initiative for the handover came not from foreigners but from native South Africans – and Afrikaner South Africans, at that.’

Even the Guardian had to accept Thatcher played an important role in ending Apartheid:

Thatcher played a pivotal role in southern Africa. As Britain’s new prime minister in 1979 she was persuaded by Commonwealth leaders at their meeting in Lusaka, where she famously danced with President Kenneth Kaunda, to try to end the war in Rhodesia – now Zimbabwe. That led to the Lancaster House conference and an election in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe which was won overwhelmingly by someone she despised – Robert Mugabe.From that she was persuaded to try to deal with apartheid in South Africa.

I  [Journalist Richard Dowden] was briefed off-the-record by her foreign affairs adviser on several occasions, but when he told me that she had called on the then president, PW Botha, to release Nelson Mandela, I found it difficult to believe. I did not report it as I could not source it. But it was true. In a letter to Botha in October 1985 she wrote: “I continue to believe, as I have said to you before, that the release of Nelson Mandela would have more impact than almost any single action you could undertake.”

When Botha stepped down after a stroke in 1989, he was replaced by FW de Klerk, who met Thatcher at Downing Street in June. I was among a group of journalists waiting outside No 10 with the promise that he would give a press conference straight after. We watched him leave then ran up Whitehall to the South African embassy where he had promised to speak. He did not turn up. We were told later that he had been too shocked by Thatcher’s vehemence.

Mandela was released on 11 February 1990.

When he came to London, the ANC central committee insisted – against his wishes – that he did not meet Thatcher. After he did finally meet her later that year he thanked her for helping to end apartheid and announced this at a press conference soon after. Senior ANC officials spluttered with rage.

And in the Telegraph:

Margaret Thatcher’s vital role in ending apartheid

Desmond Tutu said Mandela was a gift from God.

And for the BBC it does seem that Mandela is now a religion…..as even Boris Johnson said today…it was a kind of ‘Magic’.

The spell is as powerful as ever.

Here you go, amongst the wailing and gnashing of teeth at the BBC concerning St Mandela, a new thread to complete.

Interesting listening to the aftermath of Osborne’s budget speech on the BBC…you’d hardly know that Ball’s got a pasting or that Labour had been soundly trounced.

You’d have no inkling that Osborne’s budget was based on a solid recovery and gave help to all levels of society….no inkling that under Labour 7.2% of the economy was destroyed.

Some key phrases from the OBR report upon which the budget is based:

In 2018-19, we expect the underlying balance to move into surplus for the first time in 18 years.

There is a roughly 5 per cent chance that the economy will shrink in 2014 and a similar chance it will grow by more than 5 per cent.

We  expect quarterly GDP growth to slow into 2014, gradually strengthening thereafter as productivity picks up and real earnings growth provides the foundation for a stronger and more sustained upswing. This recovery in productivity growth is perhaps the most important judgement in our economy forecast.

Note that ‘This recovery in productivity growth is perhaps the most important judgement in our economy forecast.‘…because the BBC doesn’t look at that….it just tells us that the recovery is a ‘false recovery based on consumer spending and borrowing’...but the OBR says that whilst there will be a slow down in 2014 after that the economy will grow based on productivity gains.

That is not something the BBC seems to want to advertise.

Here Nick Robinson and Robert Peston are carping, negative and critical of Osborne’s measures…for example the decision not to raise the car fuel duty…Imagine what they could do with £22bn – that, the chancellor revealed, is the cumulative cost of the ever-popular cancellation of planned rises at petrol pumps.

Ironic coming from Robinson…the same person who, when at ITV, took Labour to task for suggesting that the Tories would ‘cut‘ the NHS by £35 bn when the truth was they just wouldn’t match Labour’s proposed spending rise but would keep the budget at the then same level….but now Robinson plays the same game….categorising a future non-rise in income as a spending cut.

Here are some of the BBC’s key pointers for critiques of the Coalition that seem to be the editorial backbone to most BBC analyses:

First...Use the Labour narrative (contrast with how they talk of terrorism or the security wall in Israel)…Plan B is credible….and when proven not…go with the new one…the ‘Cost of living crisis‘ is real…and caused by the government’s policies….no one has ever been ‘poor’ before May 2010.

Second….Actually let’s not look back to Labour times...let’s talk about now…in other words let’s not blame Labour for the mess we’re in now.

Third…’Austerity’ is the real cause of our problems….and it isn’t necessary….‘Austerity’ is a purely ideological imposition….the Coalition is on a ‘mission to shrink the government beyond responsible economic stewardship’  That was the BBC’s Dominic Laurie…who seems to have stepped into Paul Mason’s loafers and taken on the mantle of advocate for big government, nationalisation and State intervention.

Fourth….Every government policy that is seen to benefit anybody is ‘electioneering‘ or ‘crowd pleasing populism’…whilst Miliband’s ‘price freeze’ was socially responsible policy making.

Fifth…..the recovery is a ‘false recovery’…based on consumer debt, the spending of savings and borrowing….‘BBC Political Editor Nick Robinson said the government was worried economic growth might not continue as it was mainly based on consumer spending’, (but don’t suggest going back to look at Labour’s record……after all wasn’t that the exact recipe for the leveraging up of the financial crash? Rule 1 applies…let’s not talk about Labour.)  It is remarkable how the BBC manages to ignore all those businesses who say they are doing a roaring trade and go on to paint a picture of doom and gloom.

The OBR does say consumer spending has boosted the growth, but here it explains a major factor in that spending….’Some forms of credit growth have picked up, in particular car finance, which has supported strong growth in car purchases and contributed to the unexpected strength of private consumption.’

Now it was only a few weeks ago that the BBC themselves looked at car buying and concluded that the rise in buying was due to more innovative and cheaper finance packages that gave customers more flexibility at a cheaper price…..I have to assume most people will have looked at their budgets and decided they can manage such deals….unlike the BBC who has decided that they are being reckless and spendthrift…based on what evidence they don’t say.

The OBR says that growth is coming from  increasing productivity, though still too low, but a productivity that will take over as the real driver of growth towards the end of next year….its most important judgement….and one the BBC ignores.

Remarkably you can hear all those points in one little interview on 5Live  (13:20) with the government’s Financial Secretary to the Treasury, Sajid Javid.…who held his own against three hostile BBC inquisitors.

Here is the Telegraph’s initial reaction…entirely different tone to that of the negative BBC:

The boot is on the other foot. Labour MPs now know what it was like for the Tories to have to sit through year after year of Gordon Brown economic triumphalism. For most of Labour’s time in power Budgets and Autumn Statements – or Pre-Budget Reports as Mr Brown rebranded the latter – were an ordeal for the Conservatives. He would rattle off great economic good news and a succession of giveaways, while they just sat there powerless to object. To this day watching Labour fritter away the golden economic recovery they inherited from John Major still rankles. Today, for the first time, George Osborne had a script he wanted to deliver, about economic success and measures that help voters and businesses. Perhaps the most telling moment, the one that caused a collective gasp, was when he revealed the updated figures for what he called the ‘Great Recession’ and a ‘calamity’: at the height of the crisis and on Labour’s watch GDP contracted by a jaw-dropping 7.2pc.

Here was a catalogue of smart, well-judged measures that MPs can deploy on the doorstep as evidence of what the Government is doing to – as Mr Osborne said – get the country moving again. These delighted his own side and left Labour looking as if they now realise how wrong the Ed Balls economic strategy is turning out to be.

His statement also completes a remarkable political recovery for the Chancellor. The economy is the only thing that matters. But it should be noted that a year ago he was in deep trouble. The economy was going against him, his reputation was damaged by the omnishambles budget and he was in danger of becoming more unpopular with the public than is normally bearable for even the most thick-skinned politician. The moment when the crowd booed him as he presented medals at the paralympics was a personal low-point. To his credit, he never faltered, or tried to win easy popularity by trying to doctor his image. Now, he can bask in the plaudits he deserves for placing a bet and seeing it pay of. As he pointed out, there is still much work to be done. But for the moment at least he has an inkling of being a Chancellor who is master of all he surveys.

95 year old man dies after long illness. BBC goes into full on Saint Mandela mode with Mark Mardell calling him “a secular saint”. It’s been amazing watching the sanitisation of Mandela’s life with the very notion that he supported terrorism verboten. As I watch Newsnight he is being compared to Lincoln.

This is going to make Diana’s death look like The Man Who Never Was. There’ll be at least a month of enforced national mourning, including the public stoning of anybody wearing a tie that isn’t black. A one-off tax to pay for the erection of gilded statues of the great man in every London Borough.

The BBC will disappear up their own backside. Mandela is lucky he’s going to miss it.