Bishop incident “was not mugging” says the BBC. OK. What was it, then? The Beeb, not normally so solicitous of Christian men of the cloth, ain’t telling. The Guardian is. The Rt Rev Tom Butler, 66, one of the Church of England’s most senior bishops and a pillar of Thought for the Day on the BBC Today programme, says he has no idea. Others say he was seen sitting in … 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.
A report says. Areportsays. Arep. Portsays. Areportsaysareportsaysawhatever. Gaagh, I am sick of those words. Tim Almond doesn’t think much of a BBC story saying that a report says that Tesco, Asda and Primark are exploiting Bangladeshi workers.
This article by the BBC’s education correspondent, Mike Baker, was published in November: “A way all children can be readers.” The article is one long exhalation of praise for a reading scheme called Reading Recovery aimed at children who are failing to learn to read. Mr Baker writes: Is this the biggest missed opportunity in education? Imagine if virtually no child left primary school unable to read. Or if no … Continue reading
Kudos to the BBC for making several programmes in the last few weeks that covered areas that had previously been neglected or avoided. This story, based on an issue of Radio 4’s Crossing Continents, is about how a young Malaysian woman who has converted from Islam to Christianity is threatened with violence by Muslim fanatics. This BBC investigation looked into sexual abuse of children by UN peacekeepers. Almost from the … 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.
Who-whom? Heard during the course of a segment on Hugo Chavez during The World This Weekend, at about 1.25pm: “The US depends on Venezuela for nearly a fifth of its oil imports.” As Lenin was wont to ask about any political relationship, “Who – whom?” Meaning, who has power over whom? A quick Google is giving me that Venezuela depend son the US to buy between 60 and 80% of … Continue reading
Alex Deane, former aide to David Cameron, at the Social Affairs Unit blog, on a little vignette in a Telegraph Joan Bakewell interview. (For post-diluvian readers, Joan Bakewell was the Kirsty Wark of her late-Sixties to mid-Eighties day, popping up all over the BBC either as presenter or pundit. Famously described by Frank Muir as ‘the thinking man’s crumpet’).
So brave … so incredibly brave. “We can’t ignore Iraq and the war, it’s as simple as that. I think the writers have been incredibly brave to have taken it on and included it in the script.” – Keith Allen, who plays the Sheriff of Nottingham in the latest BBC version of Robin Hood, is awed by the courage of the Scriptwriters who Took On Bush. Those guys – they … Continue reading
… the coverage of two court cases where teachers are alleged to have had sex with pupils. A Grammar school music teacher embarked on an affair with a sixth-form pupil, a court heard on Tuesday. The headline originally referred to the school’s grammar status – it’s since been amended. Contrast with : An art teacher has appeared in court charged with sexual offences against girls over a period of 30 … Continue reading
