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, I hadn’t realised, until reading the comments, that Newsnight had run the ‘cripple’ email non-story on Friday night, and worse, as their lead item, over and above the Ruth Turner Cash for Peerages arrest story.

I honestly expected that BBC Views Online’s placement of the ‘cripple’ email non-story as the fourth most important story in the world was the action of some leftie cub-journo left to their own devices on the night-shift in Shepherd’s Bush.

But Newsnight? Leading with it? A supposedly serious flagship BBC programme with its own editor, what on earth were they thinking?

Let’s get this straight, Ruth Turner, Tony Blair’s ‘gatekeeper’, is arrested, arrested, in connection with alleged breaches of the 1925 Honours Act and on suspicion of perverting the course of justice (a crime that carries a possible life sentence), so Newsnight spends eight full minutes leading with a different non-story about a private citizen (not even a mere councillor) who sent a private email to a councillor four months ago in which he insulted a leftie activist with a limp by referring to him as, shock, a cripple. Big deal – what an exclusive!

The real question about the ‘cripple’ email, completely ignored by the BBC of course, is just how the hell did a private email between just two people get leaked? My bet would be on leftie employees within the local authority illegally reading (and leaking) councillors email – now that would be a story worth investigating.

After covering this non-story, Newsnight then spent a mere three minutes, mostly on a pretty lame two-way between Emily Maitlis and Michael Crick, on this huge development in the Cash for Peerages story, before moving on to a story about the Chinese shooting down a satellite.

Newsnight were spun, and spun quite willingly it seems, by Tony’s NuLab spinners. Pathetic.

Even when the BBC have deigned to cover this story, much has been made of the police being heavy-handed and dramatic in arresting this ‘poor 36 year old woman, who lives alone, don’t you know, at her home at 6.30am’. Another big deal. I doubt the police kicked her door in, slapped on the cuffs and threw her in the back of a Black Maria, or does the BBC know different?

Even our own much-valued pet BBC defender, ‘John Reith’, writing from inside the Corporation, comments:

I think it’s wrong to publish private e-mails in the absence of any compelling public interest requirement. In this case the writer of the e-mail was simply a private citizen. It might be different if he were the shadow spokesman on disability. But he isn’t.

Frankly, I thought the addressee’s reaction was a bit PC-priggish too – but media-savvy as it turned out.

As for the complainant – the so-called ‘cripple’. I’d be more sympathetic if there was anything seriously wrong with him – e.g. if he were a wheelchair user or equivalent. It seems he just walks with a bit of a limp. As we all do from time to time.

I notice he doesn’t mind being called a reptile. Safest to stick to that then.

As you say – a non-story. And one stored up since last September by NuLab spinmeisters for a Cameron visit.

Journalists should be careful not to be so easily manipulated. A number seem to be off their guard since the era of spin was declared over. Time to wise up again – ‘cos it’s back.

Thank you for your honesty John (oh, and now that you’re back, would you mind giving us your views on my posts about Molly/Misbah and the stealth-editing of the manufactured golly row story please? Thank you).

Writing from the cellars beneath the Palace of Westminster, Guido Fawkes Esq. graces us with his presence to say:

Peter Barron – Newsnight editor – has yet to respond to my query re. the Newsnight story order and emphasis on Friday. I know the Beebie babies read this blog, just like Downing Street reads my blog, so I reproduce it below.

Peter,

Could you give me an on the record quote concerning the relative priority given to these stories on Friday.

The lead story focused on an embarrassing email sent between two non-entity local Tory councillors. In other news, after nine minutes on this story, the next story was that PM’s aide was arrested on suspicion of perverting the course of justice in the loans for lordships investigation. This story was given three minutes.

Why were the stories prioritised in that order?

Do you think the un-pc email story was more important?

Guido Fawkes Esq.

Well Peter, you can reply to Guido at guido.fawkes@order-order.com, and if you don’t mind cc’ing it to me at biasedbbc@gmail.com I’ll be happy to share your explanation about why the ‘cripple’ non-story was so important with our readers (both inside and outside the BBC) too! Thanks.

P.S. It’s not just Newsnight – apparently the BBC’s Ten O’Clock news led (again) on the story of the weather from the day before. Perhaps the editor of the Ten would care to get in touch with a comment too.

, according to today’s Daily Telegraph:

The BBC faced accusations of “ageism” from its own employees yesterday as a Daily Telegraph inquiry revealed mounting anger from local radio staff who claim they have been told to keep old people off the air.

At the heart of their resentment is an imaginary couple created by Corporation bosses called Dave and Sue, to whom all presenters are told to aim programming…

They emerged from a BBC study called Operation Bullseye, which concluded that older people are getting younger in their attitudes and interests. Literature distributed to local radio stations said: “Dave and Sue live in a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural England”. Dave is a self-employed plumber, Sue a school secretary, and both have children from previous marriages. They shop at Asda, wear T-shirts and fleeces, and grew up in the Beatles generation. They have lived through a period of change. One of their children has entered a mixed-race marriage, although the BBC calls this “mixed heritage”.

The article, by Stewart Payne, follows up on his article from November, also highlighted by Biased BBC, BBC radio phone-in silences the elderly.

So much for public-service broadcasting when the BBC spends its time competing with commercial stations for already well-served audiences and with commercial stations for staff. The BBC, it’s what we do.

Hat tip to commenter SiN.

, writing about the Molly/Misbah case on the Grauniad’s commentisfree, links to my piece below about the BBC’s blinkered coverage of this story, saying:

For some, the whole affair has been just the latest excuse to damn Islam wholesale and with it all Pakistanis and even to vilify the child. (Whatever you think of the point made by the original post here, the lowlife on the comment thread will sicken you. And I thought Big Brother contestants weren’t allowed internet access).

Whilst it is our clear policy to permit freedom of speech as far as reasonably possible, this does serve as a reminder to some of our more wayward commenters that what you say here is on public view over the long term and could be used to discredit the work of the Biased BBC team and of other more considered commenters.

Meanwhile, having read through the comments responding to Mr. Hill’s article, it seems to me that we’re not the only ones with the thorny issue of free speech to contend with.

I’ve always thought one of the most effective ways to show the BBC is biased is the collective laugh of disbelief or roar of disapproval.

Three bloggers for you: Dale, Fawkes and some Prague fellow.

All aghast at the extent to which the BBC is keeping quiet on the flames of political scandal licking ever closer to the PM himself.

Iain Dale sums up:

“Britain’s premier current affairs interview programme managed to get through a whole hour with barely a mention of the Cash for Peerages Inquiry which dominates the news and the Sunday papers. No mention of it in the BBC news bulletins, no mention of it in the newspaper review with Trevor Phillips and Jane Moore, one patsy question for Lord Falconer who said he wasn’t playing and that was, er, it.”

And that should, er, be it for any diehard defenders of the BBC’s impartiality. Remember brown envelopes? You should, if you were watching the BBC.

. The story is that last September a Conservative activist sent an email to the Conservative leader of Bradford City Council referring to the leader of Bradford Labour Party as a ‘cripple’ and a ‘reptile’. A mischief-maker then posted a copy of the email to the leader of Bradford Labour Party who is, needless to say, less than pleased with it.

So, Person A sends an email to person B insulting person C who gets to hear about it and isn’t very pleased. Wow. Happens all the time, even at the BBC I’m sure.

But here’s the thing, this relative non-story is currently, according to BBC Views Online, the fourth most important story in the whole world on the UK version of BBC Views Online’s top page!

Is this really the fourth most important story in the world?

Who the hell are they kidding? It’s a pretty ridiculous story, and if the political parties were reversed, it probably wouldn’t even make it on to BBC Views Online, let alone be a top story on the front page.

Please use this thread for off-topic, but preferably BBC related, comments. Please keep comments on other threads to the topic at hand. N.B. this is not an invitation for general off-topic comments – our aim is to maintain order and clarity on the topic-specific threads. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog. Please scroll down to find new topic-specific posts.

I’m a little pressed for time at the moment, but I prefer blogging to working can just spare a moment to post some links. Some are things I have seen around the internet, some are emails from readers.

Call for faith-based NHS services

The NHS should provide more faith-based care for Muslims, an expert says.

Muslims are about twice as likely to report poor health and disability than the general population, says Edinburgh University’s Professor Aziz Sheikh.

Ostensibly based on an article in the British Medical Journal, Should Muslims have faith based health services?, BBC Views Online quote Professor Aziz Sheikh at length. Near the end of BBC Views Online’s report they throw in a few quotes to the contrary from Professor Aneez Esmail.

What the Beeboids don’t make clear is that the BMJ article is actually a two part head-to-head article, with Professor Aziz Sheikh in the first part arguing for the proposition and Professor Aneez Esmail in the second part arguing against, both at some length.

Worse than that, what BBC Views Online fail to point out is that Professor Aziz Sheikh is a former chair of the Muslim Council of Britain’s Research & Documentation Committee and led the launch of the MCBDirect project – so is clearly interested in the promulgation and promotion of political Islam.

Not surprisingly, the BMJ, a professional publication, quite properly notes:

Competing interests: Aziz Sheikh chaired the research and documentation committee of the Muslim Council of Britain from 2002-6. He is currently principal investigator on a Scottish Executive supported grant investigating the end-of-life care needs of South Asian Sikhs and Muslims in Scotland.

Funny that the BBC should omit that.

Hat tip to commenters Chuffer & Pounce

where they claimed that “a row has erupted” about a museum display, complete with some pseudo-official sounding quotes from a university professor to back up their claims.

It turned out that the academic in question is a well known Marxist and SWP activist, though the BBC omitted to mention this, even though they knew full well about him from their own website!

After this manufactured ‘row’ was exposed here and elsewhere, the ever professional Beeboids stealth-edited their original article, downgrading their manufactured ‘row’ to mere ‘criticism’, as if they’d never hyped it up in the first place.

On Monday BBC Views Online published a story about the redundancies announced last week at NCR in Dundee, including the news that:

Dundee University lecturer Carlo Morelli urged workers to occupy the plant in a bid to make NCR bosses change their minds.

You can guess where this is going, can’t you? Yes, indeed, a quick Google later and it’s plain that Carlo Morelli of Dundee University is another far-left activist, having stood as a candidate for the SSP (Tommy Sheridan’s one-time mob) and written for Socialist Worker, the SWP’s far-left rag.

Did BBC Views Online mention any of this? No. Yet again they’re caught red-handed promoting the views and interests of a far-left activist under BBC provided cover of academic respectability. Whilst NCR’s treatment of their employees does seem shabby, the far left’s involvement in this protest is all about promoting their own cause rather than saving anyone’s job and the BBC ought to be honest in reporting their involvement.

, writes the ever erudite Daniel Finkelstein in today’s Times. Here’s an excerpt:

Which brings me to the BBC. Unlike a lot of columnists, I like the BBC. I think its reporting is generally excellent, its news programmes are of high quality and its foreign correspondents are usually both brave and illuminating. Although the corporation can be high-handed in dealing with complaints (the theory that if both sides complain they must be getting something right is absurd) I think its staff does genuinely wish to be politically unbiased.

If only they always knew how. For on Israel, they (not everyone, of course, but too many reporters and too often) sadly get it wrong over and over again. They mistake reporting equal numbers of deaths from both sides with giving people a complete appreciation of the arguments involved. They tell you how, when, who and how many. All this is balanced. As to why, you are often left with a very one-sided view.

Let me provide an eloquent example. One of the biggest stories in the Middle East is the civil disorder in Gaza. Last week on his website, the journalist Stephen Pollard reproduced an internal memo from the BBC’s Middle East editor, Jeremy Bowen, to his colleagues. It contained a passage in which Bowen explains “the way that Palestinian society, which used to draw strength from resistance to the occupation, is now fragmenting.

“The reason is the death of hope, caused by a cocktail of Israel’s military activities, land expropriation and settlement building — and the financial sanctions imposed on the Hamas-led Government which are destroying Palestinian institutions that were anyway flawed and fragile.”

Now this is certainly one explanation of the reason why members of Fatah and Hamas are killing each other. No one can object that this argument is put before the BBC’s audience. But for the BBC’s Middle East editor to believe that it constitutes the sole explanation and to offer it up alone to his colleagues? Now that’s a different matter.

Do read the rest.