Gordon Brown!

This is getting ridiculous now.

Last September I posted about how Radio 4's Sunday programme “likes giving Gordon Brown a platform to promote his causes”. 

I wrote:

Despite it being a weekly programme featuring very few politicians, the son of the manse has been granted the Sunday bully pulpit no less than three times over the past year, pushing his agenda with the BBC's help.

Last October he was on demanding that the government 'must act to prevent the loss of a million young people to the job market'.

This May he was on advocating for G7 leaders to 'prioritise vaccines for developing countries ahead of the G7 summit'.

And today he was back saying that world leaders need to act now to end the 'moral outrage' that 'rich countries are amassing huge stockpiles of Covid vaccines they don't need'.

It's all very Sunday. In the years that I've covered them, they've always had their favourites and put them centre-stage. 

In January I posted again about the promotion of “their living saint among UK politicians”:

I repeat all this because Gordon Brown was back on Sunday once again this morning pushing a campaign (and an online petition) to compel the UK government to give more aid to the Afghans. 

[He's forever wanting to give our money away.]

Ed Stourton's questioning - or more accurately 'questioning' - was very helpful to the former prime minister.

And so it continues!

And if you recall last month, Edward Stourton went so far as to describe Mr Brown - off his own bat, as an opinion - as  “quite a just steward”.

Well, take a guess how today's edition of Sunday began...

Without a 'good morning' or anything, an excited Ed launched straight in:

And we have an exclusive interview this Sunday. As we heard in the paper review just now, the former prime minister Gordon Brown is in the news this weekend. He says the crisis facing vulnerable people is a moral issue that goes far beyond politics. He's assembled a coalition of charities and faith groups and he'll tell us live why he wants an emergency budget.

What on earth is going on here? 

Gordon Brown, the Just Steward

There was a revealing moment on this morning's Radio 4 Sunday programme. They were giggling at Boris Johnson's reading at the Jubilee service at St. Paul's and discussing past prime ministers, and one of the guests mentioned Gordon Brown and imagined him being given the Parable of the Unjust Steward to read as a joke. The guest said that it would have been unfair, and Edward Stourton chipped in to agree, saying “Because he was quite a just steward”. 

That's a point of view I don't entirely share.

Time then, I think, to head off down Memory Lane again:

As Sunday also continued to celebrate Pride Month today, maybe Ed and Gordon could 'get a room'?

Gordon's still alive!!!

I wrote a piece last September about how Radio 4's Sunday “likes giving Gordon Brown a platform to promote his causes”, noting that he'd been “granted the Sunday bully pulpit no less than three times over the past year, pushing his agenda with the BBC's help”.

“It's all very Sunday”, I wrote. “In the years that I've covered them, they've always had their favourites and put them centre-stage.”

I then called Gordon Brown “their living saint among UK politicians.”

I repeat all this because Gordon Brown was back on Sunday once again this morning pushing a campaign (and an online petition) to compel the UK government to give more aid to the Afghans. 

[He's forever wanting to give our money away.]

Ed Stourton's questioning - or more accurately 'questioning' - was very helpful to the former prime minister.

And so it continues!

Gordon's alive!!!

 

This blog started with a series a posts detailing patterns of bias on BBC Radio 4's weekly 'politically left-of-centre and socially liberal' religion-focused Sunday programme.

And here's a new one: They like giving Gordon Brown a platform to promote his causes.

Despite it being a weekly programme featuring very few politicians, the son of the manse has been granted the Sunday bully pulpit no less than three times over the past year, pushing his agenda with the BBC's help.

Last October he was on demanding that the government 'must act to prevent the loss of a million young people to the job market'.

This May he was on advocating for G7 leaders to 'prioritise vaccines for developing countries ahead of the G7 summit'.

And today he was back saying that world leaders need to act now to end the 'moral outrage' that 'rich countries are amassing huge stockpiles of Covid vaccines they don't need'.

It's all very Sunday. In the years that I've covered them, they've always had their favourites and put them centre-stage. 

And that Crash Gordon is now their living saint among UK politicians brings me full circle as a blogger, as I began writing about and counting, counting, counting BBC bias during the Gordon Brown era. 

How lovely.

Guess who's back?

Has a former prime minister ever been invited to write for the BBC News website before? Well, one has now:

Gordon Brown's school plan for Syria's refugees

By Gordon Brown

UN special envoy for education

Now, what would you rather do: Read that Gordon Brown article or listen to a Rachel Reeves interview?