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Showing posts with label BBC. Show all posts
Showing posts with label BBC. Show all posts
Wednesday, 18 March 2020
Friday, 28 October 2016
Imam loses libel action against the BBC
I read about this in the papers, then on Harry’s Place, now here, and here.
'Jekyll and Hyde'
In November 2013, BBC presenter Andrew Neil alleged on the Sunday Politics that the imam had said that jihad was the greatest of deeds.
Jihad typically refers to a personal struggle to do good - but violent extremists use it to refer to fighting holy war.
Despite the imam's protestations during the libel trial, Mr Justice Haddon-Cave said four of his speeches showed he had promoted such violence and two that he had espoused extremist positions.
"Shakeel Begg, is something of a Jekyll and Hyde character," he said.
"He appears to present one face to the general, local and inter-faith community and another to particular Muslim and other receptive audiences. The former face is benign, tolerant and ecumenical.
"The latter face is ideologically extreme and intolerant."
It’s one up for the BBC, good for Andrew Neil, and three cheers for Mr Justice Haddon-Cave.
Saturday, 2 April 2016
Identity
Another 'BBC season' is upon us. Last Autumn we had a major season on 'race and gender'. This Spring we're getting a season on' identity'.
As we become more connected and mobile than ever, BBC World News and BBC World Service examine how our individual identities are changing. A month-long series of content looks at how the movement of people and the increasing exchange of ideas and information are changing who we are and how we live.
Looking at what they' have in store for us, don't hold your breath for anything focusing on, say, English national identity, or being part of a traditional family, or being white, male, middle-aged and Northern, or being an Anglican or an Orthodox Jew.
Highlights from the season include:
Very BBC.
- World On The Move
- Default World
- Identity Season At The FT Weekend Oxford Literary Festival
- The Salon
- Trading Hair
- Forgotten Girls of Dhaka
- Transgender: Back To Jamaica
- Intelligence Squared Debate: Society Must Recognise Trans People’s Gender Identities
- Beyond Binary ("In communities around the globe, intersex, genderqueer and bi-gender people are rejecting the categories of ‘male’ and ‘female’, and attempting to re-define gender identity.")
- Artsnight: Black Culture With George The Poet
Friday, 22 May 2015
First the UK, then the world!
According to the UK Press Gazette, the BBC now claims a weekly global audience of 308 million people, "after adding in Facebook, Youtube and 'entertainment'" to the way it calculates its figures.
The corporation aims to reach 500 million people by 2022.
The BBC said in a press release that, for the first time, television (148m a week) overtook radio (133m a week). Online attracted 55m a week.
It said the World Service’s audience has increased by 10 per cent to 210m, with BBC World Service English recording a weekly reach of 52m, up 25 per cent.
Fran Unsworth, director of the BBC World Service, said: “These amazing figures demonstrate the importance and impact of the BBC around the world.
“In times of crisis and in countries lacking media freedom, people around the world turn to the BBC for trusted and accurate information."
That's why the BBC needs closely watching.
Sunday, 1 March 2015
And a brand new entry at No.24...
Except (possibly) for the young these days, it's certainly true that the BBC has permeated most of our lives to a remarkable degree.
So much so that I doubt I'm alone in feeling a strange pang of regret that a BBC programme I've not listened to for 25 years is being moved. Yes, Radio One's Sunday chart show is moving to Friday night and, even though it doesn't really matter to me in the slightest, it seems oddly like sacrilege.
In my teens 5 o'clock on Sunday, after Sunday dinner, was the time to get my C60 and C90 cassettes ready to record all the new entries. "Number 36", sang the jingle-singers. 'Click', I went.
Oh, the thrill of the chase! When would the DJ would start rabbiting over the end of the record? Would it be too soon? Oh the dread of that!
Tommy Vance wasn't too bad, but Simon 'flipping' Bates? Grrrrr!...Oh how I laughed when he was caught out by Falco's 'Rock Me Amadeus' and all the fading 'euses' at the end faded into complete silence. Result!
It's funny the things you remember, isn't it?
I remember the pleasure of hearing Tommy Vance elide the ending of Tears for Fears' Mad World into The Stranglers' Golden Brown in the end of year countdown (1982) - a coupling I would re-play on my tape recorder endlessly (or at least until the tape broke, which happened quite often).
Another very clear memory was hearing Tommy Vance apologise for saying that Annie Lennox had "beautiful eyes". Some listeners had written in describing him as "sexist". So that sort of thing was going on even back then - I'm guessing around 1982-83.
As David said in the comments the other day, he BBC has a legacy and connection to the public psyche spanning generations. Those hoping to rein in the BBC will have that to contend with for many more years to come.
Tuesday, 20 August 2013
The Salford Guardian
Roy Greenslade of the Guardian has been complaining for two days now about the failure of the rest of the press to report the David Miranda-Glenn Greenwald-Alan Rusbridger story as if it were the biggest story of the moment.
He's certainly right that the rest of the media - with one notable exception- hasn't shown anywhere near the same interest in the story as the Guardian itself.
For example, not a single newspaper (excepting the Guardian) featured the story on their front page this morning and I looked at the Sky News and ITV News websites first thing today and didn't find the story among the former's list of main stories and found it only a good way down the news agenda of the latter.
Roy Greenslade has had no cause for complaint about the BBC though (and, as a result, hasn't complained about the BBC). They've been leading their online news coverage plus all the main BBC One news bulletins with the story for two days now, and programmes from PM to Newsnight have covered the story in detail. The Guardian couldn't have hoped for any more from the BBC.
Compare that to the way the BBC is reporting the dramatic news story which is now leading the Telegraph website - a story with potentially major repercussions for Europe: Greece needs third bail-out, admits German finance minister: Wolfgang Schaeuble makes unexpected admission that Greece will need a third bail-out as other politicians play down the deeply unpopular prospect before German national elections.
Yes, it's on the BBC's home page but it's only appeared at No.9 in their running order - behind a story about a new Sony Play Station (see bottom of post for a screen print of the BBC home page). They clearly think it's a less important story than the Miranda story.
They may or may not be right.
Sky doesn't reckon much to either story, while ITV this evening has begun to tilt strongly towards the BBC's position, having bagged an 'exclusive' interview with Glenn Greenwald. (It even led their evening news bulletin, having been treated as a minor story yesterday.)
Still, the BBC's closeness to The Guardian is something that often gets commented upon and this is surely another prime example of that.
OK, here's that snapshot of the home page of the BBC News website (from about half an hour ago):
No 10 'knew of Miranda detention'
No 10 was "kept abreast" of the decision to detain David Miranda, the partner of Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, a spokesman says.
UK drugs women arrive at Peru court
Elmore Leonard, crime novelist, diesSaturday, 15 June 2013
An article by Charles Moore
Here's a little Saturday morning reading related to the theme of this blog - an extract from a thought-provoking piece by Charles Moore in the Daily Telegraph, which deserves reading in full:
It is less than a month since Drummer Lee Rigby was murdered in Woolwich, yet already the incident feels half-forgotten. In terms of the legal process, all is well. Two men have been charged. There will be a trial. No doubt justice will be done. But I have a sense that the horror felt at the crime is slipping away.
The media, notably the BBC, quickly changed the subject. After a day or two focusing on the crime itself, the reports switched to anxiety about the “Islamophobic backlash”. According to Tell Mamma, an organisation paid large sums by the Government to monitor anti-Muslim acts, “the horrendous events in Woolwich brought it [Islamophobia] to the fore”. Tell Mamma spoke of a “cycle of violence” against Muslims.
Yet the only serious violence was against a British soldier, who was dead.******
A trap is set here, inviting those of us who reject such statements, to defend the EDL. I do not. While not, in its stated ideology, a racist organisation like the BNP, the EDL has an air of menace. It must feel particularly unpleasant for Muslims when its supporters hit the streets. But the EDL is merely reactive. It does not – officially at least – support violence. It is the instinctive reaction of elements of an indigenous working class which rightly perceives itself marginalised by authority, whereas Muslim groups are subsidised and excused by it. Four days ago, six Muslim men were sentenced at the Old Bailey for a plot to blow up an EDL rally. The news was received quietly, though it was a horrifying enterprise. No one spoke of “white-phobia”. Imagine the hugely greater coverage if the story had been the other way round.
Charles Moore's characterisation of the reporting of the BBC here is spot on, as earlier posts on this blog have hopefully shown.
Sunday, 28 October 2012
'Today' III: "Well, quite!"
Another of the main stories on the 24/10/2012 edition of Today - the subject of this, the third of an ongoing sequence of posts - was the Jimmy Savile/BBC paedophile crisis.
The Today website headlined the story like this:
"The chairman of the BBC Trust, Lord Patten, has said the Jimmy Savile
scandal should not be used to question the corporation's independence."
That, indeed, was the angle the programme pursued - not an angle I guess they'd be unhappy to pursue, given that it allows them to change the subject somewhat!
As far as guest selection goes, the programme chose a balanced pair of interviewees and cannot be faulted for their choices. Sir Christopher Bland, former BBC chairman, acted as the BBC's defender and David Elstein, who has held top jobs at Channel 5 and BSkyB, acted as its (not wholly unfriendly) critic. Quite right and proper. (You can hear this double interview in full here).
Let's see how James Naughtie conducted himself. Does he display neutrality here? (My transcriptions follow the usual format):
"The Culture Secretary Maria Miller has written to the chairman of the
BBC Trust, Lord Patten, raising "very real concerns" about public trust
in the BBC. He responded by saying, "I know that you will not want to give any impression that you're questioning the independence of the BBC." That cool exchange focuses on the long-term problem, beyond all the sordid details of the Savile scandal itself - how best can the BBC demonstrate that it remains robust and independent and retain public confidence. No senior BBC executives are available for interview this morning and the Culture Secretary also declined our request. Sir Christopher Bland joins us from Westminster, former BBC chairman of course, and also we can speak to David Elstein, former chief executive of Channel 5 and former head of programming at BSkyB.
"Sir Christopher, what do you think the BBC needs to do to safeguard its independence and to retain public trust as it goes through this horrendous period?"
[Sir CB: It needs to wait for the two inquiries. "At the moment the noise of people jumping to conclusions is almost overwhelming". A lot of it happened "long ago." BBC needs to keep calm and pursue to truth forensically.]
"David Elstein, how do you see it?"
[DE: "The BBC is a very trusted organisation". Despite ineptitude at the top, it's hard to see the issue as being about the BBC not being trusted. The problem is it's very slow and backwards in dealing with crises (like many large organisations) - a problem compounded by Lord Patten and the BBC Trust choosing "an insider" to be Director General just when a crisis was about to break...]
{interrupting} "Well, they couldn't know that and...
[DE: ..and the investigation being channelled through the BBC board and trust, the chairman of whom has already "compromised his own position". Problem of process not of trust.]
"Yes, I mean, you make a fair point about George Entwistle's position being an awkward one because of his previous job. That's just the way the cards fell. I mean nobody could have predicted that. It's not a piece of bureaucratic incompetence...."
[DE: "Oh, I don't agree with you at all. Jim. I don't agree with you at all." If Patten had had his wits about him he'd have read the news articles in Jan and Feb of this year reporting the Savile/Newsnight problem. He didn't read them, or come across the story until Sep, Oct. If he had, he's have asked the right questions at the DG interviews...]
[Sir CB, interrupting: "I don't think that's right and fair.."]
"Sir Christopher, come in on that one because it is..."
[Sir CB: if you followed up every rumour about the BBC as DG you'd have no time for your proper job. YOU didn't say at the time, this is a major scandal.]
[DE: "It's not a case of what I thought about the story at the time...]
[Sir CB, interrupting: "Well, what did you think about the story at the time?]
[DE: It looks to me as if it were a story that would be investigated at some time. The issue is 'When do you read your press cutting?' Your were excellent chairman, but I can't believe chairman had no red light flashing.]
"Do you think that Maria Miller, David Elstein - and then Sir Christopher on this as well - do you think Maria Miller was right to write what was a pretty sharp letter - which has been responded to sharply by Chris Patten?"
[DE: "I think it was unfortunate and opportunistic of her and pretty unwelcome at a time when the BBC's got many a problem in dealing with this...]
{interrupting} "She's been in post, you know, for three weeks. Probably a lack of experience."
[DE: "Yeah, given that her first contribution to all of this was to misread her parliamentary brief...]
{interrupting} "Well, quite!"
[DE: "..and misdescribe the Newsnight item in the first place, she's not exactly covered herself in glory as we go along."]
"And I take it Christopher that..."
[DE: "I do have a problem..."]
"Sorry, yes?"
[DE: "I do have a problem with what Chris Bland is recommending, that the BBC sit tight and wait...]
"Well, hang on!..."
[DE: One inquiry could take a year...]
{interrupting} "But the Nick Pollard inquiry into the central..."
[DE, interrupting: "Even that is..."]
"But hang on!...into the central question of, you know, how it happened, vis a vis Newsnight and the investigation and what the sequence of events was and who was involved is going to report before December. Now, I mean, you CANNOT do a report of that kind more quickly. I mean that is..that is, you know, a piece of expedition."
[Sir CB: "I think that's right]
[DE: I think the BBC should do something "direct and dramatic", "take control of the process of compensating victims of child abuse perpetrated on BBC premises during the production of BBC programmes by people employed by the BBC..."
{interrupting} "Yes, but I mean finding them and knowing when it happened and going back 35 years, I mean that's not as easy as it sounds. You accept that?
[Crosstalk between Sir CB & DE]
"OK, Sir Christopher Bland?"
[Sir CB, the Smith inquiry has to go back over many years, examine what happened and until then we wont' know if the allegations are absolutely justified.]
"Do you think the inquiries, the two inquiries, are being done in the proper way and on a time-scale that is adequate for their purpose?"
[Sir CB: "Yes." But it's not a time-scale to suit the politicians, press or "to some extent" the BBC. Until they are complete we won't know what really happened "and we need to recognise that]
"Christopher Bland, David Elstein, thank you both."
So, did James Naughtie act as a neutral umpire there? Hardly! It sounded more like a three-way debate with David Elstein on one side and Sir Christopher and Jim on the other. It sounded like that because it was like that. If Sir Christopher wasn't interrupting and disagreeing with David Elstein then Jim was. That's undeniable, surely? Add to that the easier questions to Sir Christopher from James Naughtie and you have an interviewer very clearly taking sides in a debate.
Hang on!...
That's one aspect of the bias. The other is, I think, far more serious and I am quite amazed that nobody seems to have picked up on it - especially given James Naughtie's famous gaffe over the surname of the previous hulture [sic] secretary.
I'd like to 'replay' one part of the interview for you:
"Do you think that Maria Miller, David Elstein - and then Sir Christopher on this as well - do you think Maria Miller was right to write what was a pretty sharp letter - which has been responded to sharply by Chris Patten?"
[DE: "I think it was unfortunate and opportunistic of her and pretty unwelcome at a time when the BBC's got many a problem in dealing with this...]
{interrupting} "She's been in post, you know, for three weeks. Probably a lack of experience."
[DE: "Yeah, given that her first contribution to all of this was to misread her parliamentary brief...]
{interrupting} "Well, quite!"
[DE: "..and misdescribe the Newsnight item in the first place, she's not exactly covered herself in glory as we go along."]
"And I take it Christopher that..." (which question, I suspect, was likely to end with "...that you go along with that?", thus prolonging the two-pronged attack on the minister while turning it into a three-pronged attack! Impossible to be sure about that, of course!)
Maria Miller refused to go onto Today. No one defended her. She was only attacked. Who's to blame for that?
That said, can anyone please explain to me how this is anything other than a supposedly impartial BBC interviewer publicly joining in an attack on the Culture Secretary? For my money (unless I'm missing something) that "Well, quite!" surely merits joining his other famous 'slips of the tongue' ("First up after the news, we're going to be talking to Jeremy Cunt," and "If we win the election, does Gordon Brown remain chancellor?") on the James Naughtie Wall of Fame - except that there was no question of a 'slip of the tongue' here. This was an open dig followed by an open endorsement of a criticism of a leading Conservative politician. Surely, he shouldn't have said what he said, should he?
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