Always on Twitter

Twitter-happy Lewis

The Sunday Times quotes a number of former BBC figures today on the subject of the Maitlis affair, of which the most damning comes from an old-school BBC legend:

Sir John Tusa, founding Newsnight presenter: "No editor of Newsnight that I worked with would have allowed that to go through. No presenter would have written anything like that. It is self-indulgence and it does no service to viewers. You can either choose to be a celebrity or you can choose to be a journalist. You can’t be both." 

The paper summarises that into a striking headline:

Emily Maitlis was chasing fame, not the story, says BBC veteran

Other blasts-from-the-past focus on a particular problem with Newsnight, though one that was  ultimately first set in train by BBC management:

Roger Mosey, former editorial director of the BBC: “The BBC’s traditional restraint has been swept away in the age of social media. On-air staff have been actively encouraged to engage with their audiences and to show their personality.”

Peter Barron, former Newsnight editor: “People at the BBC are concerned that journalists are more interested in breaking stories on Twitter than their own platforms. The nature of Twitter is driving broadcasters to be more eye-catching and that is leading into problematic territory.” 

The Sunday Times also includes a column by Matthew Syed. This is the paragraph that particularly stood out for me from it:

Matthew Syed, The Sunday Times: “This is why the corrosion of the BBC’s reputation for impartiality is of unusually grave importance. I happen often to agree with the editorial stance of Newsnight, but even I can see how its bias is wrecking the credibility of the entire institution. This isn’t about the coverage of Dominic Cummings per se, but a slow-motion car crash that has been unfolding for months, its journalists making the tragic (but common) mistake of conflating the virality of its social media posts with the credibility of its analysis. This could yet destroy the BBC itself, turning a great organisation into a facet of polarisation rather than a bulwark against it.” 

That "slow-motion car crash" looks set to continue unless senior management at the BBC get a grip on it. Some Newsnight journalists are still posting on Twitter, heavily, seven days a week - which, it must be said I passing, surely can't be good for their mental well-being. The programme's policy editor Lewis Goodall even put in a Saturday night appearance this week to have his say on Dominic Cummings again - and only on Dominic Cummings. (I don't think he's had a day off for weeks).

Developments

The Guardian's Jim Waterson reports that Emily Maitlis won't be presenting tonight's Newsnight as planned and that Katie Razzall will be presenting the programme instead. Will Ms Razzall be asked to deliver an apology? 

Jim Waterson also confirms, from BBC sources, that the programme's editor, Esme Wren, did indeed work on Tuesday night’s episode - so it was her who signed off on the Maitlis monologue. The question then is: Does she deserve to survive in post after this?

Update 22:00: A little while back Katie Razzall tweeted, "Just for the record, Emily  Maitlis has not been asked by the BBC to take tonight off - and if I thought she had been, I certainly wouldn’t have agreed to present the show".

Esme Wren herself has also recently tweeted in response to The Observer's Carole Cadwalladr (Carole was doing her usual getting-the-wrong-end-of-the-stick thing on Twitter, writing "And this makes no sense.  Emily Maitlis has an editor. The editor takes responsibility for the editorial content. What is this? A punishment beating?"), to which Ms Wren replied: 

I am the Editor of Newsnight Carole Cadwalladr & I am responsible for the output of the programme. Emily Maitlis hasn’t been replaced tonight in response to the BBC statement. Katie Razzall is part of the team and we work as a team throughout. 

Given that Emily Maitlis ended last night's programme by saying she'd see the audience tonight and she's listed in the various TV listings as being scheduled to present tonight (as usual on a Wednesday), people are putting two and two together and smelling a rat. 

I'd say, however, looking at the very careful wording of Katie Razzall's and Esme Wren's tweets that it's almost certainly the case that Emily Maitlis isn't presenting tonight because she didn't want to present tonight's programme (Too embarrassed? Too upset? Too angry?) and so Katie Razzall agreed to present it instead.

P.S. And The Telegraph tonight reports: 

Although the BBC did not go as far as an apology, Maitlis was said to be furious that she and her colleagues had been publicly reprimanded and she did not appear as planned on Wednesday’s programme. The presenter Katie Razzall took her place.’ 

The BBC rules that Emily Maitlis and Newsnight did not meet their standards of due impartiality

The BBC has just released a statement about last night's Newsnight, criticising Emily Maitlis's opening monologue and ruling that "it did not meet our standards of due impartiality".

Is "our staff have been reminded of the guidelines" going to be the fully extent of the repercussions for the programme and its presenter from this?

Emily Maitlis may have written the monologue but her producer Esme Wren must have read it and given it the green light - a terrible misjudgement.

As per Sue's post, shouldn't we have at least one scalp?

Other views

Stephen Pollard: I'm very uncomfortable with this. Read these words on a page and they are an op-ed column, not a report. I think there can be a place for editorialising on TV, but not in the intro to a flagship BBC analysis programme. (FWIW I think Cummings broke the rules and should go).

Ed Davey MP: Brilliant journalism from Emily Maitlis.

Dan Hodges: Can we just clear something up re Emily Maitlis and her Newsnight opening on Cummings. And it’s not about her it’s a general point. Is that what we all want now. Editorialisation replacing news. Again I don’t mind either way. But again, I just want to know the rules.

Oz Katerji: Maitlis spoke the truth on Newsnight, Dominic Cummings broke the rules, & nobody instructing a public broadcaster to accommodate lies and spin into their analysis should be listened to. The BBC’s job is not to make a mockery of the truth by taking lies about eye-tests seriously.

Darren Grimes: Look, you all know my view, but whether you liked Maitlis' explanation or not, this is editorialising. Deliberately including certain analysis and excluding others. It reveals her views and in doing so undermines the impartiality of the BBC. She was not clear it was her own take.

Mark Pougatch: Outstanding Newsnight, Emily Maitlis and Lewis Goodall. Fearless broadcasting at its best.

Dr Paul Stott: The Newsnight monologue, which we first saw in April, returns. The idea that Emily Maitlis speaks for the country, or that it is her job to try to do so, is highly questionable.

Robin Ince: I am often quite cross with BBC News, but Emily Maitlis is often its very best asset.

Kate Hoey: Understand that the BBC is being inundated with complaints about Emily Maitlis and Newsnight from last night. I have also put in a complaint and am sure many many more will.

Piers Morgan: Where is the bias? Emily stated irrefutable facts. That’s her job as a journalist. The Govt is supporting hypocrisy & endorsing rule-breaking. This will cost lives. It doesn’t matter if you’re left, right or sideways: facts don’t care about your feelings. Emily didn’t editorialise, everything she said was true.

Madeline Grant: It’s not Emily Maitlis’s job to tell viewers what to think...This is the Fox News modus operandi, just spouting left-wing views,

Sian Berry: Truly excellent from Emily Maitlis exercising the freedom to say two plus two make four.
Charlotte Gill: A moral lecture from Emily Maitlis? No thanks. We’re talking about the woman who Tweeted how “sad” she was that a journalist got fired for accessing private calls.

Jon Jones: The Emily Maitlis Miracle MK2. These words were brilliant and most definitely needed. This needs to be the new norm.

Ben Bradley MP: Come on BBC Newsnight,BBC Politics!? You used to at least TRY to be impartial! This editorial from Emily Maitlis is so far over the line, the line is now just a dot in the far distance!

AC Grayling: Look around the world in this terrible time & you see that it's women who are the leaders: Jacinda Ardern, Angela Merkel - in journalism here it's Emily Maitlis, Marina Hyde. The very worst of male hubris, ineptitude & arrogance is summed up in Johnson & Cummings.

Nick Timothy: It's incredible that Emily Maitlis and Newsnight don't see the damage they are doing to the BBC every time they do this.

Stefan Simanowitz: A great journalist puts into words the things people feel. Thanks 4 this Emily Maitlis.

Ian Leslie: This is weird and wrong and I am amazed the BBC think it's OK (and I say that as someone who essentially agrees with what she says).

Fury, contempt and anguish

I see that Julia Hartley-Brewer, who thinks Dominic Cummings should go, is nonetheless as outraged as I am at Newsnight's blatant breach of the BBC's charter responsibilities: 

I’m sorry but this is TOTALLY unacceptable from Emily Maitlis, Newsnight and the BBC. The BBC is REQUIRED to be impartial. This is a clear breach of their own rules. Commentators (including me) can give their own opinions, BBC presenters cannot.

I hope a real head of steam builds up over this and that Emily Maitlis and Esme Wren are properly held to account over this because it's simply intolerable. 

Emily Maitlis broke the rules. The country can see that. And it would be shocking if the BBC could not.

Update (20:00): More from Julia Hartley-Brewer:

To all the people who are defending the BBC insisting  Emily Maitlis & Newsnight did nothing wrong: YOU ARE THE PEOPLE WHO WILL DESTROY THE BBC YOU CLAIM TO LOVE! You can’t have a broadcaster which is both taxpayer-funded *and* has a political stance. Pick one. You can’t have both.

That brought an interesting reply from Patrick O'Flynn:

I wouldn't mind watching a "Viewsnight" provided Emily Maitlis alternated her lib-Left slant with another presenter who highlighted pro-nation state, socially conservative outlooks. It might work quite well. But the political slant can't all be one way.

Watch this space

Louis Philippe de Pear

ws...breaking news...breaking news...breaking news...brea

Via the eternally-alert DB, here's some heart-warming mutual grooming between the editor of Channel 4 News (Ben de Pear) and the editor of BBC Two's Newsnight (Esmé Wren):

"From now on we will be cooperating on stories and presenters. Watch this space", says Channel 4 Ben.

In response DB tweeted, "According to the editor of Channel 4 News he'll be collaborating with BBC Newsnight on future stories. Two broadcast outlets, one metro-left narrative."

Hmm. What's going on here? 

All Gas and Gaiters

Elsewhere, of course, #VicarGate is still raging. 

For newcomers to this latest Newsnight 'scandal', here's a summary of what happened:

Earlier this week Newsnight staged a discussion about Mrs May's Brexit deal involving "members of the public", one of whom, 'Reverend Lynn', urged us to “have faith in the government”.

Some viewers, however, smelled a unholy rat and claimed that 'Reverend Lynn' is actually a professional actress called Marina Hayter, who has been an extra in Eastenders and a Star Wars film, as well as playing "Bar Worker, Chemo Patient, Wedding Guest and Fun Fair Attendee" in various other things.

Many started accusing the BBC of deliberately hiring an actress to pretend to be a Brexit-Deal-backing pro-Government pastor on Newsnight.

The BBC, of course, denies this:

Some familiar faces appeared among the conspiracy theorists. Hear the word of the Lord, for example!:

Enter Emily, stage left:

And a little bird tells me that Newsnight editor Esme Wren started twittering too:

Cue Paul Mason, ex-Newsnight master of impartiality, entering stage far-left:

And on it goes...

Mixed review

Ah well, there's always Newsnight. 

Last night there was (1) John Sweeney's latest nudge, nudge, wink, winking piece about Arron Banks, followed by an interview with an anti-Banks Labour MP; (2) an interview about JimAccossedHergate with an American journalist who really, really, really disapproves of what the White House did; (3) a piece on whether Amazon is a good or bad thing from a town oop north, (4) a discussion about whether the female orgasm should be included in school sex education classes (I kid thou not!), and (5) a Mirror journalist going Inside the Papers. 

For stats fans, all five interviewees were female (if I'm allowed to say that, given what happened to Dame Jenni of Woman's Hour) - as, of course, was the interviewer (and the editor). 

I'll pay credit to Kirsty Wark for not giving the pro-Acosta journalist anything like a free ride. (I'm guessing she'd read her colleague Emily Maitlis's piece beforehand). And David Grossman's Amazon report was both fair and interesting. But Kirsty's socially liberal feminism did seep out during the female orgasm discussion where she sided somewhat (though not too much) with the socially liberal young BAME woman against the socially conservative less young non-BAME woman.

That's perhaps inevitable on a BBC current affairs programme. The BBC isn't exactly full of socially conservative people.

Of 'Newsnight', wrens, the 'Evan' treatment and Barack Obama as Homer Simpson

As you may already know, Newsnight is getting a new editor. 

Three months after Ian Katz leaped, loudly purring, onto the lap of Channel 4, the BBC has appointed Esmé Wren from Sky News as the tattered BBC flagship's new editor.

According to Guido Fawkes, Esmé is "the right choice out of the final two" (a somewhat ambiguous wording, either giving her the thumbs up or damning her with faint praise - though I think it's meant in the 'thumbs up' sense):

The internal candidate was Louisa Compton of Victoria Derbyshire and Newsbeat – it would have been nurses pay and preferred pronouns every night had she got the gig. Congratulations… 

Ms. Compton herself is now leaving for Channel 4.

That said, External Esmé, before going to Sky, was a Newsnight producer, so she isn't entirely new to the BBC - or to this particular BBC programme.

It has to be said though, however.....(Ed - Does it? Really?),.....that Newsnight presently isn't that far from being "nurses pay and preferred pronouns every night" already.

This past week alone saw Monday's edition lead with a major item on police stop and search and its effects on young black men; a feature on Tuesday about social mobility and education; a section on Wednesday about gender and science; a piece on a worthy-sounding dance event (xenophobia, multiculturalism, how Brexit is building walls) on Thursday; and the issue of a universal basic income (as backed by Ed Miliband) on Friday. 

You can take the ex-Guardian deputy editor out of the programme but you can't take the Guardian-like spirit out of it, it seems. 

Or can you? And, more importantly, can Esmé? 

And, regardless of any of that, can she get the programme's very many missing viewers back, or is Newsnight a lost cause only watched by a few hundred thousand political obsessives and a handful of hardcore BBC bias-obsessed bloggers (like me)? 

It's not that Newsnight can't pull of some very good things from time to time, and plenty of OK things too, and Jess Brammar and Dan Clarke have done a decent job of keeping things ticking over and I rather enjoyed skimming through their programme this week...

...but you just know, even before you've watched it, that a joint interview with Daniel Hannan and Sir Vince Cable will, if conducted by Evan Davis, see pro-Brexit Mr. Hannan get the full 'Evan' treatment - challenges and interruptions - while the anti-Brexit Sir Vince gets a much chummier kind of 'Evan treatment' (though Evan didn't go so far as to actually stroke him)...

...and you'd never be surprised when Newsnight treats the portraits of Barack and Michelle Obama (widely mocked this week) as beyond-criticism works of wonder. The Barack one, if you need reminding, was the one where Homer Simpson faded into a hedge (or so people keep telling me)...

...or when Trump-related matters come up, and the guests invited on to discuss the Trump-Russia thing are Anne Applebaum (critic of both Trump and Putin) and Niall Stanage of The Hill (a self-declared 'liberal'), both sing from much the same hymn sheet.

To hope or not to hope, that is the question. Possibly. If anyone still cares.