The other thing to be said about Monday night's Newsnight is that James Clayton's report on the failed asylum seeker from the Gambia focused on a woman who Newsnight had made a central figure in one of its news reports a couple of years ago. (I remember seeing that).
And now she's here in the UK. And Newsnight went for a catch-up.
And now she's here in the UK. And Newsnight went for a catch-up.
The woman in question had been the village 'cutter' - i.e. a practitioner of Female Genital Mutilation - in Gambia. Her family claims she was forced to carry it out. She claims she fled here to escape doing so. The British authorities have rejected her appeal to stay.
James Clayton's report emphasised the less-than-entirely-uncomfortable conditions she is now staying in while appealing her rejection decision, and tied her hardship to new government legislation. Her complaints about her treatment (as a result of that legislation) appeared in the programme's opening headlines too and were elaborated later too.
Susceptible types on Twitter were duly moved and took to bemoaning the inhumanity of modern Britian as a result, lauding the lady as someone who fled and fought against FGM (many of them seemingly misunderstanding the story). Her statement that if she's sent back she'll be forced to 'cut' again wasn't challenged - either by Twitter or Newsnight. (She could go back and not cut, or move to somewhere else in Gambia, couldn't she?)
The following studio discussion between Conservative SPAD Shaun Bailey and Labour SPAD Sonia Sodha was balanced enough though, with Shaun playing the part of the calm, compassionate Conservative and Sonia breathlessly emoting from the Left and tying the FGM lady from Gambia's story to the general point that the migrants beating at our borders are fleeing conflicts (even though Gambia isn't in a state of conflict at the moment - which no one pointed out to her).
