, 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 … Continue reading →

Last week, BBC Views Online, reporting on the case of Molly Campbell/Misbah Rana, told us Misbah’s mother in custody offer, including the following quotes from Misbah at a press conference in Pakistan: However, Misbah said she wishes to have nothing to do with her mother. The girl said: “They say I have been abducted. “This is not true. I am living with my father and I don’t want to go … Continue reading →

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. Click through to read and … Continue reading →

Tony Blair enjoyed free airline upgrades worth thousands of pounds during his controversial holiday to the Miami mansion owned by Robin Gibb, the former Bee Gee… MPs said Mr Blair had become a national embarrassment for repeatedly failing to pay his own way. Mr Blair has taken “free” holidays worth more than £775,000 with wealthy hosts since taking office. They include four holidays at a Barbados villa owned by Sir … Continue reading →

we find in the Sunday Times that the BBC says it’s running out of money – apparently: Despite job cuts at the BBC, ministers have felt the corporation has not tightened its belt enough. They were particularly angered by revelations last year about the salaries paid to presenters such as Jonathan Ross, who signed an £18m three-year contract. Meanwhile, according to the Sunday Express, ‘Hard up’ BBC blows £33m on … Continue reading →

Yesterday Laban pointed out how the Marxists and fellow-travellers in BBC Southern region manufactured a row, nay, the eruption of a row, in their story, the third most important story in England in their opinion: Row erupts over Golly exhibition A row has broken out over a golly exhibition at a Hampshire museum. Turning to the same shocking story today, after Laban’s article (and articles by Iain Dale and Tim … Continue reading →

The BBC: Pair killed by Underground train Two suspected graffiti artists have been killed by a London Underground (LU) train in Barking, east London. The Sunday Times: Vandals mowed down by train TWO young men were killed after being caught spraying graffiti on a London Underground train and then running into the path of another Tube train as they tried to escape. Artists indeed! It’s almost a pity that the … Continue reading →

(Thanks to reader Septimus Lupo for this classic.) “Row erupts over golly exhibition” – the BBC England page finds room for this major story. A row has broken out over a golly exhibition at a Hampshire museum. A row. Gosh. Gollygosh. Tell more. A collection of golly badges on display in Westbury Manor Museum in Fareham has been criticised for its perceived racist connotations. Dr John Molyneux, from the University … Continue reading →

At last. The BBC give us the detailed story on the school hammer attack. She told the BBC the men attacked the boy and then another got out a hammer and starting hitting him. “He fell to the floor and asked them to stop, but they kept kicking him.” She added: “The boy tried to get up but they kept hitting him, then suddenly they all ran away.” Police have … Continue reading →

in November, an allegation that was reported with much fanfare across all the BBC’s various media at the time, complete with the inference that it was somehow fall-out from Jack Straw’s comments about veiled Muslim women. Even Lothian & Borders Police were inspired to previosuly unknown efforts investigating this ‘crime’. Fortunately, the lads and lasses in blue eventually winkled out the truth, Sikh teen lied about hair attack, though strangely … Continue reading →