Friday 25 January 2019

Things can only get worse (allegedly)


Catching up (and panting heavily), I see that the BBC received a walloping for another of their 'No Deal' tales:


Former Tory MP Stewart Jackson tweeted:
More BBC bias. This time deliberately untrue scaremongering.
Labour MP Kate Hoey tweeted:
I am beginning to wonder why I pay my licence fee when @BBCNews constantly gets it so wrong - surely not biased against us Leaving the EU!!!
As the fairest blog about BBC bias in the known universe and beyond (h/t Professor Brian Cox), I read, took on board and then gave the Stateroom to a reply to Kate saying that the BBC News website had reported the story fairly.

And I think that half-forgotten Twitter babbler had it pretty much right. Even a check on News Sniffer, confirms that the BBC News website reported it with some conscientious attention to fairness.

So what were Brittany Ferries, Stewart Jackson and Kate Hoey objecting to?

Well, unlike the BBC defender there, I've gone beyond the BBC website, and I'm pretty sure I know what they were specifically objecting to.

I think they all listened to Tuesday's The World at One.

It began (cue Bernard Herrmann soundtrack?):
Sarah Montague: Hello, and welcome to The World at One with me Sarah Montague. Preparations for a No Deal Brexit are beginning to bite as passengers ferries are re-scheduled to make way for medicine. We'll hear from a woman whose return journey from France was cancelled: 
Vox Pop: I can't think of any other situation, as I say, with an advanced economy in the 21st Century where we would face this other than if we were on a war footing.
And the programme continued in that mongering-of-scares vein for several minutes later, without relenting.

A mixed picture maybe then, but Tuesday's The World at One was very Project Fear, and very BBC. And I'm sure it's this that Brittany Ferries recoiled from. 

2 comments:

  1. I heard that and thought "that's BLLX" - they've probably just reorganised their schedules to accommodate more freight. The BBC made it sound like there would be boats full of medicines (see the intro). That sounded absurd to me. I mean - how much medicine actually comes into the country every day? One of these ferry ships has a gross tonnage of 29,500 tons! And it's not as though there aren't thousands of planes carrying freight coming into the country every day as well, in addition to all the other shipping. Add to that we have been building up our storage capacity for medicines.

    Project Fear Fake News Built-in BBC Bias - The BBC... Campaigning for Remain since 1975.


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  2. Innumerable return journeys from France have been cancelled because of lightning strikes or blockades by contented French workers. They certainly don't need Brexit as an excuse.

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