Monday 13 August 2018

Covering/Not Covering


It's interesting that Jeremy Corbyn's latest difficulties have made the Top 5 stories for both the Sky and ITV news websites:


...and yet are nowhere to be seen on the BBC news website's home page, or even on the BBC's Politics page.

This mirrors something I observed over the weekend via TV Eyes...

Jeremy Corbyn was in trouble on Friday night for a speech comparing Israel's actions to the Nazi occupation of Europe and then from Saturday morning onwards was in the eye of a storm over his actions in Tunisia  four years ago. 

Sky News devoted considerable attention to both stories over the weekend, beginning on Friday evening with hourly reports, occasional interviews and extensive discussions on the evening's paper reviews. The coverage continued prominently every hour throughout Saturday morning and Saturday afternoon. After a lull on Sunday evening Sunday night's paper review focused on more revelations about Mr Corbyn's actions in Tunisia and the story has again been a main story hourly throughout the day today. TV Eyes listed 84 separate mentions of Mr Corbyn's travails on Sky News from Friday evening to now (late Monday afternoon). 

In contrast, TV Eyes lists a mere 12 separate mentions on the BBC News Channel. The BBC was silent on Friday night on the breaking news about the speech comparing Israel's actions to the Nazi occupation of Europe and the Daily Mail's headline story about the wreath ceremony in Tunisia was only mentioned and not discussed on The Papers that night. A handful of passing mentions on other papers reviews on Saturday and Sunday and Monday morning sufficed for the rest of 'the coverage', with Sunday night's The Papers again just mentioning the Mail's latest headline (and saying "the Mail continues its attack on Jeremy Corbyn"). Only at 2:21 pm this afternoon did the BBC News Channel finally turn in earnest to events in Tunisia when a BBC reporter (Jonathan Blake) gave a story summary of the story and played clips of Jeremy Corbyn's self-defence. This has been repeated hourly since.  

The contrast between the two rolling news channels here is very striking indeed. One has given both stories extensive coverage, the other next to no coverage. 

It makes you wonder: Have the constant attacks from the Corbynistas got to the BBC? Are they now running scared? Dare they report bad news about Jeremy Corbyn anymore (except, perhaps, for criticism of his position on Brexit)?

P.S. Others have noticed:



Update: And here it (finally) is, appearing just underneath a report headlined 'Streamer Ninja won't play with female gamers':



Update: Mind if I butt in? (Sue)

Comments on this SKY Twitter thread aren't going well for Corbyn. (Look at the eyes)




3 comments:

  1. If they had published the Corbyn story it would have detracted from the Boris burqa story which they continued to run over the weekend using new angles to keep it prominent.

    The BBC is becoming more brazen with its political agenda. Across a whole range of topics they continue to push at the boundaries to see how far they can go. It's a classic tactic.

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  2. Now No. 1 with a bullet as they used to say about the US Billboard charts.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-45170622

    With some of these stories I think the BBC has to have editorial conferences on how to play them.

    Possibly, they panicked when they realised they might be accused of anti-semitism for this story suppression. Perhaps they decided somewhat reluctantly that Corbyn has to be thrown to the wolves...I say reluctantly not because they are Corbynistas but because they realise that could spell the end for the PC Euromaniac soggy left in the Labour Party. Any successor to Corbyn will be from the hard left. It will confirm that the Labour Party has entered on a new era...maybe we will see the BBC really get behind plans for a new centre party...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No surprise, but the bbc ‘reporting’ on this continues to take extraordinary slants.

      Netanyahu ‘attacks’. Jez ‘hits back’. Anything bar the facts.

      Next they will be saying cars are again running wild in Westminster.

      Delete

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