Poor BBC. The Falkirk debacle presents them with a problem. On the one hand, we all know that Miliband is in situ thanks to the votes of the Unions, but on the other hand, BBCt have to pretend that big brave Ed will stand up to Red Len and, as the BBC analyst puts it … ” is trying to turn the row into something defining and positive.” Really? In what way? I also note that Angela Eagle was allowed to pontificate in front of the BBC cameras. No tricky questions about how much UNITE have handed over to her constituency association, for example.

The BBC spends £175,000 producing a report that essentially says nothing at all about anything very much….and spends £300,000 to prevent the publication of another report that probably says an awful lot about the BBC’s DNA and the monsters it breeds.

Time for an independent BBC regulator with legal powers to force the BBC to act upon its recommendations.

The BBC Trust is clearly not up to the job being compromised by conflicting duties…one to protect the BBC and guide its editorial policy and second to deal with complaints about that editorial policy et al.

Anyway, here’s Nigel Farage’s thoughts on the recent impartiality report:

Nigel Farage: The bloated BBC bullies those who disagree with its liberal bias

The BBC’s response to a report that identifies its liberal bias is utterly shameful, writes Nigel Farage.

Thoughtful in the comments links to this story in the Manchester Evening News:

Twenty people a day are being hauled before the courts for TV licence dodging in Greater Manchester.

Figures from the Ministry of Justice show nearly 7,000 people were prosecuted last year for failing to pay the charge.

What was really interesting was this:

The vast majority of non-paying viewers were hit with fines, but none were asked to cough up the maximum £1,000 penalty.

But leading magistrates say impoverished families were often disproportionately punished.

The BBC so often berates politicians for ‘attacking the most vulnerable in society’….and yet are clearly quite prepared to indulge in a little bit of thuggery themselves.

Tory Cuts must be to blame.

Kipling talked of the “the truthful well-weighed answer that tells the blacker lie”.

The BBC are the masters of deploying the truth to hide the truth.

Whenever the BBC reports something verbatim without further explanation or background colour and context you know they are trying to sweep something nasty under the carpet.

Labour’s little spot of trouble with their Union sponsors, Unite, hasn’t really kept any BBC journo awake at night thinking how he can tie all these loose but fascinating ends together.

The BBC has stuck strictly to a limited set of facts without indulging in the usual speculation, analysis or voices off that reveal far more than we get from the main players.

They have also been extraordinarily slow in picking this story up….’slow’?  Again do I mean ‘wilfully blind’?

It has been a major, major talking point on the Left’s own political blogs….all condemning Unite…and yet the BBC ignored it for  a long time…..or ignored the significance of the story.

As CCE in the comments says:

Where is the massive BBC ‘political analysis’ machine – that costs 3.5bn PA to maintain when we need it?

This is a HUGE and damaging story about the unscrupulous nature of the Labour Party internal politics and will consequently get no “analysis” and fall off the BBC news agenda in 3 1/2 hours (max)

Here the BBC reports the resignation of Labour’s Tom Watson:

Tom Watson quits as Labour election campaign chief

But the BBC fails to mention two very relevant points which the Scotsman (H/T CCE) brings to light:

Labour sources claimed that Mr Watson was told to resign by Mr Miliband who is under pressure to exert his authority on the party after it emerged that the Unite union is targeting 41 safe seats including the Falkirk selection.

You will be hard pushed to find mention of those other seats that Labour has taken control of which Unite has been targeting…and no mention of Miliband actually sacking Watson because of Unite’s actions and his association with that…….a significant move by Miliband if true…..his relationship with Unite being all important as his major backer as leader of the Labour Party.

The BBC seem to be downplaying this at the moment when the reality is that it is a story of great importance with a whole series of possibly devastating consequences for Labour…apart from damage to their reputation.

There looks like being a massive fall out with Unite, and maybe other Unions, and they of course bankroll Labour…..yet more encouragement to reform and curb Party funding by big donors….though that seems to be on the back burner for now.…and Watson was a Brownite so probably intellectually and politically aligned with Miliband’s own Old Labour politics….as Nick Robinson said:

Ed Miliband knew what he was getting when he hired him as Labour’s election coordinator. The Labour leader wanted Watson’s ruthlessness, organisational skill and campaigning zeal to help him reach Number 10.

So a loss of an important ally for Miliband.

Robinson finished that piece with this:

At the Downing Street barbeque tonight Tory MPs will be congratulating David Cameron for making the issue of Watson, Unite and Miliband’s leadership one which the public will now hear about.

Note that …‘the public will now hear about.’

Question might be why haven’t the ‘Public’ heard about this days ago, from the BBC,  when it was already big news on the internet long before PMQs?

And of course beyond the little spot of trouble with the selection hijacking there is also the question of Unite’s control of the violent protest group Unite Against Fascism…chaired by Unite officer Steve Hart who has close ties to Miliband….not forgetting that one UAF officer is Labour MP Peter Hain….all connected to extremist Islamists via the UAF.

Something else for the future for BBC reporters to get their teeth into…once they’ve woken up.

On American Independence Day, here’s a new and independent open thread for y’all! Enjoy.

I can’t resist sharing my glee at the BBC’s obvious horror that Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood puppeteers are on the run in Egypt.  I know it is very unclear where things may go but the BBC meme that the “Arab Spring” is an irreversible force for good has been shattered and all we get is BBC talking heads bemoaning the loss of “democracy”.  Watching Jeremy Bowen has been a particular delight as he squirms with the uprising that the BBC cannot rationalise! I mean how on earth could any people resist a descent into an Islamic caliphate. Still, there’s always Tower Hamlets….

Remember this?

“I always think that impartiality is in our DNA – it’s part of the BBC’s genetic make-up.”

That was Helen Boaden, the then director of BBC News. It was 2011

And then today….

Helen Boaden, the BBC’s former news director, has admitted the corporation held a “deep liberal bias” in its coverage of immigation when she took up the role in 2004.

Oh my.

The BBC’s latest review on impartiality says:

Today’s BBC gives due weight to all significant strands of opinion on the subject of immigration. 

Well Sir Andrew Green from Migration Watch was certainly given a fair interview recently on the Today programme, and David Goodhart from Demos has had a few interviews on his ‘controversial’ book about the effects of immigration…but he is a ‘safe’ lefty.

How much longer the BBC will maintain this approach to reporting or discussing immigration might be open to question….the possibility is that this new approach is merely a response to the knowledge that they were under observation for the purposes of this review.

Certainly when you listen to everyday programmes on the BBC the same old attitudes prevail….talk of school overcrowding, and immigration usually doesn’t get mentioned, the same with housing or the NHS….occasionally the presenter will refer to immigration but only because he/she has been deluged with emails or texts pointing out immigration is the main driver of overcrowding and other problems and he/she realises they can’t get away with not mentioning it. 

By coincidence the government has today published its own report into the effects of imigration:

Immigrants create overcrowding and fuel tensions, report finds

Asylum seekers, refugees and low-skilled immigrants are creating overcrowding, fueling community tensions and putting pressure on the NHS, a government report has found.

Never mind schools, housing and jobs, more cars on the roads and increased crime.

The BBC’s own report states:

“The BBC was slow to reflect the weight of concern in the wider community about issues arising from immigration.”

No..it wasn’t ‘slow‘…it deliberately refused to cover the damaging effects of mass immigration and repeatedly pushed  a positive narrative of ‘immigration is beneficial’ to the UK both economically and socially.

The effect of this is that politicians have been allowed to put into practice immigration policies that are politically and ideologically motivated and against the interests of the existing population with highly damaging effects. 

The BBC has been complicit in this and has ‘aided and abetted’ what amounts to corrupt political practice by the Labour Party.

What is needed, rather than evermore internally generated reviews,  is an independent ‘Leveson Inquiry’ for the BBC that looks into how its own political leanings effect its output and how that output then effects the politics and society as a whole.

The inquiry should be legally based and have the power to force changes upon the BBC…should they be needed…..perhaps we might also have running alongside a trial of the polticians who implemented such corrupt policies.

The power of BBC news is once again confirmed by this report from Reuters…though one of the co-authors is ex BBC man Richard Sambrook….which tells us of ‘the importance of mainstream TV bulletins for communicating significant international news. BBC TV news programmes still play an important role in setting the wider news agenda.’

The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism has looked at the BBC’s coverage online and on its main TV bulletins – and has looked at the audiences’ behaviour. There are some surprises.

Firstly, TV bulletins still rule. In spite of all the discussion of the merits of online, of social media, of interactivity, choice and convenience it was clear that more people got their news of these big international events from the main bulletins at 6 and 10 on BBC1 than from the BBC website.

So editors of the main TV bulletins still set the agenda for other outlets and platforms and provide the mass viewing experience. We found no evidence of online coverage driving TV viewing.

Thanks to A.D who posted this in the comments:

Toxteth mosque ‘suspect’ suitcase: Danish man cautioned.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-23142432

Police confirm man cautioned after bomb alert at Liverpool mosque is Somalian NOT Danish .

http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/man-cautioned-following-bomb-security-4803983

Reading the Liverpool Echo version it looks possibly like a Muslim was posing as a non-Muslim with the intent of implicating the ‘right’ in a hate crime:

Officers had taken away CCTV footage which showed the moment a man turned up at the mosque saying he wanted to become a Muslim.

Suspicions were aroused when, after spending about 15 minutes inside the building, he abruptly ran off, leaving a metal suitcase on the premises.

One quick-thinking worshipper dragged the suitcase out while the police were called.

Just how many other ‘anti-Muslim’ attacks on Mosques can really be attributed to Muslims looking to stir up anti-EDL feeling?  The Media are all too ready to jump in and claim any graffiti is ‘racist’ or a ‘hate crime’ before the people who did it have been caught.

It doesn’t take long for things to start to unravel.

The BBC’s impartiality review, conducted by Cardiff University, has some major flaws.

Even without reading it you can already pick holes in it.

Its terms of reference were obviously far too narrow..ironic for a review that was concerned with ‘breadth of opinion’.

Two major topics of concern are missing…climate change and Israel.

Strangely Israel was also missing in any meaningful way from the Seesaw to Wagon Wheel report as well.

But another question might be asked….why Cardiff University?  Or indeed any university.

Academics are notoriously left wing…and ‘extreme’…. ‘Academics have deeper knowledge but some also hold extreme views’….hardly a good starting point.

If this was conducted by students you have to ask do they have the experience and depth of knowledge needed to judge ‘bias’ in the BBC’s output….they would need a wide ranging and deep knowledge of world affairs to be able to do the job properly….did they?

And look at Cardiff….and the BBC’s relationship with it….the BBC has close ties to Cardiff which seems to be the ‘go to’ place when the BBC wants some research done.

Cardiff research recognised for reshaping the BBC’s post-devolution news agenda

22 May 2013

A Cardiff University research project that helped change the way the BBC reports on political issues has been recognised for its impact at the University’s prestigious Innovation and Impact Awards.

and how about this:

Professor Richard Sambrook – BA (Reading), MSc (Birkbeck, London)

Position: Director – Centre for Journalism Email: SambrookRJ@cardiff.ac.uk
Blog: JOMEC @ Cardiff University
Twitter: @Sambrook

Richard Sambrook is Professor of Journalism and Director of the Centre for Journalism which undertakes postgraduate vocational training. He is a former Director of Global News at the BBC where he worked as a journalist for 30 years as a producer, editor and manager.

Oh…and look..who was a previous director of journalism at Cardiff:

Professor Richard Tait CBE, was Director of the Centre for Journalism Studies at Cardiff University^[1] and a member of the BBC Trust, the governing body of the British Broadcasting Corporation.

and it looks like he is still there as a ‘professor of journalism’

Professor Richard Tait – M.A., D.Phil. (Oxon)

 

Position: Professor of Journalism

All of which probably means nothing at all…but it hardly inspires confidence in the independence of Cardiff.