Kevin Marsh is probably not a well-known name outside the rarified corridors of the BBC. But as head of the BBC’s College of Journalism and also a former editor of Radio 4’s Today, he’s one of the corporation’s top news wallahs, shortly due to retire on an obscenely fat pension. So how does he practise his trade? As a scion of public service broadcasting, with its binding principles of fairness … Continue reading
I asked, last week, how long it would be before the intrepid Roger Harrabin came up with a defence of the Met office, after his Yorkshire-based colleague, Paul Hudson, dared to suggest that Accuweather’s Joe Bastardi (among others) was more accurate with his weather-forecasting than the Met and its £170m global warming lying machine (aka a supercomputer). Well, it’s taken him all week. And if you can understand his back-flipping, … Continue reading
Via the comments – Iain Dale on One Show bias and the BBC’s response. Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.
In September, when US-based left-wing Guardian columnist Gary Younge popped up as a bona fide voice of the BBC on From Our Own Correspondent, I pointed out that he had recently described followers of the Tea Party movement as “(a)nnoying, bizarre, incoherent, divisive, intolerant, small-minded, misinformed, ill informed and disinformed…” In other words, just the sort of prejudice against the American right which finds favour at the Beeb. I noted … Continue reading
I never thought I would write this, but three cheers for a Labour peer. Their lordships debated ‘climate change’on Thursday. Predictably, in the most part, it was an alarmfest about the need for more taxes, laced with endless religious warnings that the end of the world is nigh; the idiotic peddling of moonshine. But there was one ray of sunshine. Step forward Bernard Donoghue, the former policy adviser to Harold … Continue reading
Writing here, Mary Ellen Synon documents another BBC smear.. “The EU’s new foreign secretary, Baroness Ashton, was at the European Parliament today, being questioned by MEPs. Since she will also be a new vice-president of the Commission as well as ‘High Representative for Foreign Affairs,’ (no, I still can’t believe it either) she had to submit to questioning like all the other members of the new Commission. The BBC on-line … Continue reading
In the Daily Telegraph’s interview with Michael Parkinson, towards the end of the item we pick up this gem; A senior BBC source said: “We’re desperate for anyone that isn’t white and male. It’s difficult in entertainment because the options are so limited. Diversity is a big issue and they’ve over-relied on men for a long time.” Claudia Winkleman and Shappi Khorsandi, the comedian, have been tipped as potential rising … Continue reading
A concerned B_BBC reader writes…. “In next week’s Radio Times (16-22 Jan 2010) there is an interview with Dermot O’Leary. A quote from the interview is printed over his photo. The quote says: “I’ve probably got more in common with a liberal Muslim than a conservative Catholic” In the interview he actually says: “I don’t like evangelism and I’ve probably got more in common with a liberal Jew or a … Continue reading
The BBC’s creepy Obama obsession continues on Radio 4 with Obama’s Babies: In Swahili Obama means ‘blessed one’ and mothers across Africa were quick to bestow the name on their offspring. ‘Obama babies’ followed in America and across Europe as parents grasped at the hope that the President Elect’s magic could rub off on their children. But one year on and with the President’s dreams being tested by reality, how … Continue reading
When I worked at the BBC, many moons ago admittedly, the main justification for the licence fee was that people actually watched BBC shows. Peak time audience share for BBC1 regularly nudged the 40% mark, and over a week, most people actually tuned in to the channel for a significant amount of time. Latest official figures, however, show that BBC1’s overall audience share during December was down to 21.5%, and … Continue reading
