James Purnell and the BBC plans to take over children's education

 

James Purnell (he/him?)

I've never bought Peter Hitchens's counter-intuitive contention that the Blairites were the true Marxists in the Labour Party, but the behaviour of former Blairite minister James Purnell in his role as the BBC's head of radio and education occasionally gives me pause for thought. 

I think he's the main BBC figure behind all the pandering to the 'woke' brigade. 

Therefore, I felt a certain degree of disquiet on reading Anita Singh's piece in today's Telegraph, which reports James Purnell expressing his wish for the BBC to increase its "reach" by taking "a greater role in children's education". 

Mr Purnell wants the BBC's online resources to "replace some of the 'traditional' elements of teaching" and "free teachers to concentrate on pastoral care".

This is clearly a serious bid from the BBC to gain and an even vaster degree of influence over the nation.

Should we be alarmed? 

Blogs hereabouts, including ours, have picked up on some shocking stuff being put out by the BBC's online resources. 

But are those just rare lapses picked up on and massively amplified by bloggers and the anti-BBC papers? 

Well, I don't know the answer to that.

At the risk of creating work for myself and others, the BBC's online education resources - and children's output -  are a massive field that blogs and websites such as this barely even touch, but surely, urgently need to tackle.

What is the BBC teaching our children already? What will it be teaching them? 

I'd really like to know.

"The plot to stop James Purnell becoming director-general of the BBC"

It looks as if Dominic Cummings is out to stop James Purnell from becoming the BBC's next DG. A "well placed Downing Street source" has told Robert Peston that if the BBC’s board and Sir David Clementi “try to put someone like Purnell in we will put in a chairman whose first job is to fire him…The likes of Purnell [would be] 'dead on arrival'”.

Getting out

As you know, Lord Hall is leaving the BBC.

He's off to run the National Gallery - which is very nice for him.

Hopefully he'll carry on his fine work at the BBC and pursue its sacred mission - the diversity agenda - with just as much vigour there. The National Gallery is full of paintings by dead, white European males, which surely can't be allowed to continue. 

(Wonder if Ash Sarkar can paint? Tony Hall could still make her the Gallery's artist-in-residence, even if she can't). 

*******

The BBC's online report on the story is open for comments. As Bernard would have said in Yes, Minister, that's very brave. I think it's safe to say that, so far, they could be going a good deal better for the BBC. 

Here are the Top 10 comments:

1. Great, can we please have the BBC back? You know, the one that wasn't obsessed with gender politics, racism or anything snowflake, and could it return to being a dependable and unbiased organisation that produced great programming? Could we, please?
2. He has turned the BBC into a biased woke left wing organisation that does not reflect the majority view of the population. A population that is forced to pay for this and it is high time to get rid of the TV tax.
3. Hall has totally destroyed the BBC and turned it into a third rate tabloid! Should have been sacked years ago!
4. Box ticking BBC has lost its way with social engineering and biased views.
5. But he said he felt it was important the BBC had the same leader for the BBC's mid-term review in 2022 and the renewal of its charter in 2027. Who says the BBC's charter will be renewed in 2027 anyway?
6. He's getting out before the poo hits the fan.
7. I'd give it 18 months and there will be no licence fee.
8. I'm glad. Somehow over the last few years I've felt like BBC news was there to make me feel unhappy with everything, rather than informing me of national and world events.
9. Hope the new DG can crackdown a bit. BBC News (website in particular) is a biased joke, and they seem to think that the nation should do/think exactly what they want, or go swivel. It needs some serious reform. Look to how Reuters handle news: it can't ever be perfect but they try to be fair in layout and language and avoid trying to "spin" the news. 
10. I can only echo the comments of the highest rated. We don't recognise the BBC anymore. I would say under Hall's watch the company HAS proved to be divisive and bad for our country. It's all cookery shows, endless trailers, endless having minority groups rammed in your face.

*******

Although rumour has long had it that Lord Hall was grooming former Labour minister James Purnell to succeed him, pretty much everyone is predicting that his successor will actually be a woman. 

(I suppose James could always self-identify as a woman, if that helps.)

I doubt it will be Samira Ahmed. 

Should we predict who it will be? From the Guardian's list of runners and riders, I'll pick former Ofcom boss Sharon White. She'd certainly keep the diversity flag flying at the BBC.

Saturday Morning Light Breakfast

I

Fresh from having its ruling against Naga Munchetty squashed by the elegant shoe of Lord Hall, the BBC's Executive Complaints Unit has contented itself with upholding two complaints on the grounds of swearing. Mrs Whitehouse would have been delighted. 

Over the past week, two rulings have been released. The first concerned the use of the f-word during BBC One's D-Day 75: A Tribute to Heroes  in June, while the second concerned Nicky Campbell's mis-speaking of Jeremy Hunt's surname as 'C***' on Radio 5 Live in June. 

They have been fully upheld on the grounds that neither programme gave a prompt apology for the use of blue language. 

Tellingly, it's taken about three months for both complaints to crawl their way through the maze of the BBC's complaints process.

*******

II

Further to Sue's post about Lord Singh's aggrieved departure from Thought For The Day after (he claims) the BBC censored him on the grounds that some of his talks "might offend Muslims", The Right Rev Dr Gavin Ashenden, former chaplain to the Queen, has written a letter to The Times arguing that it's more than a storm in an eggcup:

It is more that the BBC has surrendered to a politically correct or progressive culture that pretends to want simply to avoid causing offence. But the actual effect is a wholesale redistribution of power and influence. This culture has no problem causing offence to Christians through an erosion of Christian culture and ethics; nor, it seems to Sikhs, if we take Lord Singh at his word. Instead it prefers the victim causes of identity politics and Islam. Lord Singh’s vital and principled intervention signals the increasing restriction of freedom of speech and thought that the privileges of our culture are predicated on.

Very true.

I see. incidentally, from the Times report that both James Purnell and Lord Hall got personally involved in batting away Lord Singh's concerns.

*******

III

Talking of the Times, the paper also reports that Newsnight's Kirsty Wark recently told a literary festival audience that she got where she is today thanks to positive discrimination by the BBC:

I joined the BBC as a graduate entry when they needed more women. I became a producer young because they needed more women in senior positions. Now I’m still on television because I’m older. I’m not quite sure it would have been the same if it were ten years earlier, but I’ve been quite privileged to have the longevity of this career.

The top-rated comment below the article rather rudely says, "Positive discrimination. That explains a lot, Kirstie [sic]."

Of 'EastEnders' and James Purnell

The Rise and Fall of the BBC Empire

Talking of Toytown, I see that some MPs have taken time out from mismanaging Brexit in order to condemn the BBC for mismanaging the building of a new Eastenders set.

The £87 million project is running £27 million over budget and five years behind schedule. (I'm tempted to say 'very BBC').

This is costing BBC licence fee payers money. (I'm again tempted to say 'very BBC'). 

The Public Accounts Committee accused the BBC of "complacency". According to the Telegraph:

A BBC spokesman said: "We welcome the committee's recognition of the importance of the E20 project. However, we strongly reject the notion that there has been any complacency.".

So said a blatantly complacent BBC spokesman. 

Richard Morrison, writing in The Times, calls it a "fiasco":

To put this fantastical figure in some sort of real-life context, with £87 million you could build 250 affordable homes for actual East Enders. And to put it in another sort of context, this jaw-dropping overspend comes as the BBC is trying to make £800 million of savings. True, that’s partly because it will soon have to pick up the bill for free TV licences for the over-75s, but it also lavishes millions each week on astronomical fees for “talent” and inflated salaries for its executives, 100 of whom earn more than £150,000 a year.

He continues:

Then there’s the £10 million spent on promoting the new BBC Sounds app. That’s the BBC’s belated and (so far) blundering attempt to woo more young listeners by breaking into the streaming market dominated by Spotify. BBC Sounds is the pet scheme of James Purnell, a failed politician whose 15 minutes of fame as culture secretary was chiefly notable for the mind-boggling revelation that he had claimed £247 in expenses for 3,000 fridge magnets. Now he’s on a tolerable £315,000 a year as the BBC’s director of radio and education.

Harsh but true about the ex-Blairite minister now in charge of BBC radio? 

Well, whatever. But wild BBC profligacy where wild profligacy isn't remotely needed and brutal cost-cutting where brutal cost-cutting probably isn't needed seems to be becoming a hallmark (LordHallmark?) of the present-day BBC. 

Of 'Pitching In' and RS Thomas

R.S. Thomas, popping out to welcome English tourists in for a cup of tea and a chat (not)

If only the late, great, English-hating Welsh-nationalist poet, priest and bigot R.S. Thomas were still alive he'd doubtless be penning many an ode of violent hate against the 'English' BBC, despite himself refusing to own anything so modern as a TV. 

The reason? PitchingIngate. 

As he's not alive, it's been left to non-poets like the Labour leader of Cardiff council and Plaid Cymru’s shadow minister for international affairs and culture (an interesting combination of ministries) to voice the incandescent fury of (a tiny, noisy part of?) the Welsh nation against the BBC's "cultural colonialism".

What's got their goat (or sheep)?

Well, it seems to be partly down to the casting of an English actor - Larry Lamb (who famously played Archie Mitchell in Toytown) - as the lead character in Pitching In, a new, doubtless-as-hilarious-as-ever-these-days BBC comedy drama set in North Wales. 

Even worse, the makers of the programme and its actors are either English or speak with South Wales accents. 

It's to be hoped that Lord Hall, James Purnell and Co. don't have second homes in Wales or the ferocious ghost of R.S. will be haunting them with a fiery vengeance.

P.S. Those who think of R.S. Thomas might well think of him as an unsociable, unsmiling hater of pretty much everything, whether it be tractors, TVs, air conditioning, tourists, English people or anyone Welsh who isn't a long-suffering Welsh-speaking hill farmer, but he could - once every 500 poems (not counting his love poems to birds or the sea) - surprise the world with a human-love-filled poem, such as this one to Mildred, his late wife of 51 years:

We met
under a shower
of bird-notes.
Fifty years passed,
love’s moment
in a world in servitude to time.
She was young;
I kissed with my eyes
closed and opened
them on her wrinkles.
“Come,” said death,
choosing her as his
partner for
the last dance, And she,
who in life
had done everything
with a bird’s grace,
opened her bill now
for the shedding
of one sigh no
heavier than a feather.

BBC Thinking

Co-host Tina Daheley

The Sunday Times reports that BBC Radio 4 is launching a "bite-size Today podcast" to attract a young audience. Naturally, in the usual way of BBC thinking, the key to doing so appears to be to make the team involved as 'diverse' as possible:

And guess whose brainchild it is? Yes, James Purnell, the BBC's middle-aged, white, male director of radio and education.

P.S. Former Labour minister James Purnell had this to say about the thinking behind the new podcast:

Fake news spreads like a virus across social media and the trust audiences have in radio is a potent weapons against it. 

That would be a heteronormative matter

James Purnell (not as young as he used to be, but then are any of us?)

The dividing line between those who think that identity politics is a good thing and those who think it's a bad thing is very sharp and, often, highly political (though it doesn't always sit neatly on the traditional left-right axis). 

And the BBC places itself very firmly in the camp that favours and promotes identity politics, thus taking sides on a matter of controversy.

We learn today, for example, that the BBC is "to address ‘heteronormative culture’ with LGBT reforms". 

There will be network of "straight allies" (to be identified with badges!), and "non-binary language" will be encouraged. There were even be "unconscious bias training" (re-education classes) to ensure that staff do not cause accidental offence. 

That "heteronormative" phrase, if you were wondering, comes from James Purnell, director of radio and education at the BBC  - and a former Blairite minister. 

Here are a couple of startled reactions to it from (the left-wing end of) my Twitter feed:

Claire Fox, Institute of Ideas: Assumed this was BBC WIA-style satire; sadly not. Expect full gamut of womxn-style bollxxx, linguistic policing, unconscious bias training for those who refuse to wear demeaning "straight ally" badge!  

Ben Cobley, author of 'The Tribe': This is remarkable. Exactly along the lines I describe in The Tribe, but still remarkable in the extent to which the BBC as an organisation is outsourcing authority to favoured group representatives, who will minister to identity group members. I don't think I've ever seen such a complete example as this. And to top it off it's being overseen by a former Labour MP as director of BBC radio and 'education' (we might say 'political education' in the same sense that Labour has political education officers).

Further reading

Other BBC-related news this week concerns James Purnell's call for the BBC to be given top billing over rivals like Sky, Netflix and Amazon in TV guides, and for this to be enforced by law. This is something that News-watch's David Keighley describes elsewhere [see below] as "patronising, droit de seigneur" behaviour and an attempt to "steamroller Parliament". 

Also, as well as that letter from over 70 MPs calling for the BBC to get a grip over its Brexit coverage, former culture secretary John Whittingdale has warned that MPs might "escalate" their concerns about the BBC to Ofcom if the corporation fails to stop its negative bias over Brexit - though, to quote David again, Ofcom might not be the tiger Mr Whittingdale hopes it will be:

The focus of Ofcom boss Sharon White seems, however, to be elsewhere. At an Oxford media conference earlier this month her main concern was ‘diversity’ and the lack of older women on BBC screens.  Another major problem is that the Ofcom Content Board, which will be the final court of appeal in complaints about BBC output, is chock-full of ex-BBC figures.

Both of those stories came from the Daily Telegraph.  

Over at The Conservative Woman David Keighley himself reports the outcome of his complaint to the BBC about their coverage of the death of Arkadiusz Jozwik shortly after the Brexit vote - a death the BBC's initial reporting linked closely to claims that the Leave vote on June 23rd had resulted in a rise in hate crimes, presenting viewers with the idea of a frenzied hate-filled gang of youths targeting a Polish man. The police, however, later dismissed the 'hate crime' claim and one boy has now been convicted of manslaughter. David pursued the BBC doggedly through all the stages of the BBC's complaints process (Complaints Unit, Editorial Standards), eventually reaching the stage so many have reached before - receiving notification that his complaint is "not upheld" and won't be taken any further. "Surprise, surprise!", as David says. 

The Daily Mail, meanwhile, has a story of BBC 'fakery'. According to the paper, the producers of Reggie Yates's series Hidden Australia wanted to show Aborigines drinking to back up their 'ravaged by alcohol addiction't theme and then "panicked when they realised they didn't have enough footage of drinking", So they roped in some footage of a wake as a 'party scene'. The BBC has apologised for misleading viewers and removed the programme from the iPlayer. The BBC's apology does, however, make it sound as if the independent production company behind it was to blame. It has "banned" them as a result, according to the Mail.

The Mail has a piece today about how unfunny viewers found last night's Comic Relief. I didn't watch it myself so I wouldn't know. We did the usual Comic Relief collection at work but, oddly, no one (and certainly not me) took up the suggestion that we all come to work in our pyjamas. I have seen one clip of it though that made me laugh - though it wasn't an intentional joke. Click here and view the top video. (It involves Russell Brand, though there's no swearing). 

Oddly the sharpest criticism of Comic Relief comes from an article in The Guardian by David Lammy MP. He criticises Comic Relief for perpetuating patronising stereotypes about Africans: 

He points out that many African countries have been doing well recently - and not just as a result of Western charity - with life expectancy and GDP rising significantly in the majority of them. As I didn't watch this year's Comic Relief I can't say whether his characterisation remains true, though it certainly fits with my memories of watching it in years gone by.

Now, all the 'right-wing papers', of course, covered the MPs' open letter about BBC bias, not very favourably for the BBC. The 'left-wing' papers, equally 'of course perhaps', rallied to the BBC. Brian Reade in the Daily Mirror accuses the MPs of trying to "gag" the BBC and calls its "a dumb move" and the Guardian's media editor Jame Martinson accuses the MPs of "blaming the messenger". Though the far-left isn't keen on the BBC, the centre-left still seems fully on board. 

Talking of far-left critics of the BBC, the New Statesman has an interview with the famous Laura Kuenssberg. 'She treads very carefully' is all I'll say about that. 

And at the right-wing equivalent of the New Statesman, the Spectator, there's that Rod Liddle piece which Sue wrote about yesterday. As Sue said, it seems to echo much of what we've been saying to a striking degree. (And I agree with pretty much everything he writes there, even down to his praise for Carrie Gracie).

Plus he tells (or re-tells) anecdotes from his days as a BBC editor (on Today): of the then BBC’s controller of editorial policy who told him that people like us who complain about pro-EU BBC bias are "mad"; of the BBC Brussels office knocking down stories of EU "bureaucratic profligacy and incompetence" because they were so pro-EU; of the BBC chief correspondent who wrote a book about European populists called "Preachers of Hate"; and of his being told that only one person at Newsnight had voted Leave (which is one more than expected!).  

That's enough 'further reading' for today.

Civilisation

In his Mail on Sunday column Peter Hitchens returns to a subject we looked at on Thursday: that blog post by "one-time Blairite commissar James Purnell" where the "now senior BBC mandarin" declares exultantly that the BBC will "question the very concept of civilisation" in its new three-presenter version of Lord Clark's Civilisation (to be entitled Civilisations). 

Mr Purnell's declaration that the BBC will not be focusing on Western civilisation runs counter, Peter Hitchens writes, to the Latin inscription on the original Broadcasting House:

This temple of the arts and muses is dedicated to Almighty God by the first Governors in the year of our Lord 1931… And they pray that good seed sown may bring forth good harvest, and that all things foul or hostile to peace may be banished thence, and that the people inclining their ear to whatsoever things are lovely and honest, whatsoever things are of good report, may tread the path of virtue and wisdom.

 Mr Hitchens continues:

It leaves no doubt that the stated purpose of the building and the organisation were explicitly Christian. Much of it is actually taken from the Bible. And it pretty fiercely warns that those things which are 'foul' or 'hostile to peace' are to be banished. But anyone who has many dealings with the BBC, and I have had lots, will know that its idea of what is virtuous, and its idea of what is foul (which sometimes includes me personally), have changed beyond recognition since that inscription was carved 86 years ago. 

That is why it now rejects the original idea of civilisation, fundamentally European and eventually Christian, which it still just about tolerated in the 1960s when Kenneth Clark's famous series on the subject was made.

P.S. Peter Hitchens isn't keen on the 'three presenters' model for Civilisations. "By offering us three differing ideas, and inviting us to choose which we prefer", he writes, "it is not, in my view, being open-minded. It is saying above all that it no longer endorses Lord Clark's idea, or its own founding charter."

The three presenters - Mary Beard, David Olusoga, Simon Schama - are, of course, well-known (and often brilliant) historians, but they are also all openly left-leaning politically and all of them opposed Brexit. So the range of views isn't perhaps going to be as wide as it ought to be. (Surely at least one right-leaning historian should have been included?)

"Expertise, without the elitism"

Writing on the BBC blog, James Purnell, the BBC's Director of Radio & Education, says there's no need to be "despondent" about fake news. 

Today's media is "the greatest educational resource the world has ever seen" and he wants the BBC to become a "trusted guide" through this abundance of "information and misinformation". 

He doesn't, however, want it to be top-down or elitist. 

So there will be no canon of great works, no single-author celebrations of Western civilisation (indeed the very idea of 'civilisation' will be questioned).

Instead, there'll be "empathy" and "expertise" and an ongoing conversation with an involved audience. 

It won’t be the Auntie that dispensed culture from on high. It will be much more of a thoughtful friend. Prodding us to keep our resolutions, helping us ask and find answers.

Sadly for me, I've always rather liked the idea of a canon of great works and would love to watch a modern celebration of Western civilisation, but it seems I'm out of touch with the prevailing spirit at the BBC. 

The language of the piece as a whole strikes me as being quite redolent of the Blair era.

Still, at least there's going to be a lot of science on the BBC over the summer and a Neil McGregor series on 'faith and society' in the autumn. 

Bye, bye Aaqil. Hello James.

Here's something I missed the other day.

Aaqil Ahmed, who became the BBC's (first Muslim) Head of Religion and Ethics in 2009, is leaving the BBC. He sent out a tweet a couple of weeks ago, saying:

He's not going to be directly replaced either. Instead, responsibility for BBC religious broadcasting will pass into the hands of...

...guess who?...

Yes, James Purnell, the former New Labour cabinet minister recently promoted to BBC Head of Radio and Education - an appointment which brought accusations of empire-building even before this latest expansion of his role.

The Guardian reports that Roger Bolton, "a broadcaster and trustee of Sandford St Martin, which aims to promote religious programming", isn't a happy (Easter) bunny:

"If they think that’s the end of the process there will be a great deal of anger,” said Bolton of the decision to make one of Hall’s most senior lieutenants responsible. 

Bolton, who also presents the Feedback programme for BBC Radio 4, said the danger was that “the BBC talks the talk but doesn’t appear to do anything else”.

Maybe he should write to Feedback then.

Disquiet

Radio critics are still not warming to the appointment of James Purnell as Head of Radio and Education (and arts, music, learning and children). 

Kate Chisholm of The Spectator writes that his appointment "makes no sense": 

It’s not just that Purnell was formerly a politician, although that makes the appointment not just odd but alarming, given the BBC’s essential requirement always to be seen as independent of all political influence. It’s much more that Purnell has no editorial experience, no technical know-how, no track record in creating audio programmes. 

And Gillian Reynolds of the Daily Telegraph told Feedback that the government has concerns about the former Labour minister too:

Gillian Reynolds: I understand that there is disquiet at the Department of Culture, Media and Sport that he is coming within range of editorial output. 

Roger Bolton: Now when you say 'I understood' you mean you've been told off the record?

Gillian Reynolds: I have been told off the record that there is concern. Now, people brush this off and say 'Oh, it's all a long time ago. Don't worry! Don't worry! There'll be all these people between' but until we are clear what his job encompasses and what the new Director of Radio will be responsible for we don't know. 

"It apparently takes two men to do one woman's job"

James Purnell

Yesterday's The World at One discussed the promotion of former (Blairite) Labour cabinet minister James Purnell  to the role of BBC Director of Radio and Education (following Helen Boaden's departure for Harvard).

Mark Mardell discussed the appointment with Gillian Reynolds of the Telegraph, then with two Conservative MPs, Andrew Bridgen (a BBC critic) and Ed Vaizey (a BBC fan). 

Gillian Reynolds's disapproval of the appointment was very plain to hear:

It's puzzling. We've know for a while that Helen was heading for the exit. The only question was how soon she would go. Meanwhile, in the waiting area, she negotiated the re-entry of Radio 5 Live into the whole radio portfolio, away from News. So it's a big portfolio. It's very worrying. James Purnell, leaving his politics aside...I can, but can the Conservative Party?...James Purnell has never made a programme in his life, shows little interest in radio. I walked out of a lecture very cross with him last year when he was talking about BBC strategy. Mentioned radio twice. Once was 'Chris Evans'. Now if that counts for radio education...I love 500 words but, you know, there are limits to my patience.

Another interesting moment came at 28:42 when Mark Mardell asked Mr Bridgen about the curious fact that James Purnell will have a deputy - and that, yes, there'll now be two large-salaried BBC jobs where they used to be just one:

And, Andrew Bridgen, it apparently takes two men to do one woman's job? 

Both MPs cracked up with laughter at that. As well they might. The BBC's reputation for profligacy with our money remains something of a (bad) joke.

Onwards and sideways?

That famous bit of New Labour spin. Now you see him, now you don't. (He wasn't there). 

As you'll all doubtless already know, former Labour Culture Secretary James Purnell might be about to move from being the BBC's Head of Strategy to being its Director of Radio (replacing the famously genetically-impartial Helen Boaden). 

The story confuses me somewhat as I can't work out why such a move would bring a greater risk of bias on the (former?) arch-Blairite's part. 

Being 'Head of Strategy' for the BBC sounds to me like an even riskier position for a (former?) political partisan to hold than 'Director of Radio' - and he's (apparently) moving on from that risky post.

Unless I'm missing something. 

Still, the speculation is that Mr Purnell is now being readied for the top job - to replace Lord Hall. 

*******

David Keighley, at The Conservative Woman, writes interestingly about the background to all of this. 

His potted profiles of the people responsible for deciding Mr Purnell's future - the BBC's little-known executive board - are very intriguing, and highly suggestive of the kind of person you need to be to help run the BBC from behind the scenes. 

I don't think I'm in with much of a chance.

"Comments are disabled for this video"

James Purnell, on the right - or not

Samira Ahmed's Newswatch also covered the Newnsight debate with the BBC's head of strategy James Purnell and the Daily Mail's Stephen Glover. A viewer complained:

Never was the gravitas of Jeremy Paxman more missed than on last night's debate. The behaviour of James Purnell, in never allowing Stephen Glover to get a single point in, without shouting him down, was an utter disgrace, and Evan Davis did nothing to control the discussion whatsoever.

This was definitely the much-discussed "aggressive" new face of the BBC on display. James Purnell was clearly intent on interrupting and rubbishing every point Mr Glover made, come what may, Stephen Glover took it in good humour, though he must have found it frustrating.

Newsnight has posted the whole thing on YouTube. What tickled me about them doing so is this -which you'll see if you watch it on YouTube (rather than here at ITBB):

Yes, the BBC that wants to hear from us, the public, doesn't want to hear from us on this YouTube video. 

(A candidate for "You couldn't make it up!" status?)

Friends in high places

It looks as if he wagons are being drawn around the BBC, following the Public Affairs Committee debacle last Monday. 

Among those firing their pistols at the approaching native Americans is the BBC's Head of Strategy, former New Labour minister James Purnell. He's trying to fend off (Conservative) Culture Secretary Maria Miller's attempts to give the National Audit Office full access to the BBC's accounts, and he's receiving the backing of senior Labour Party figures like Harriet Harman.  

Now calls for Ofcom to either regulate the BBC in place of the BBC Trust or to become the custodian of the licence fee are being resisted by, of all people, Ed Richards, head of Ofcom (a former advisor to both Tony Blair and Gordon Brown). He says Ofcom shouldn't get involved with the governance of the BBC.

By one of those remarkable coincidences which seem to arise a lot these days...and I read nothing into it, of course...Mr Richards is a friend of James Purnell's (according to the Mail and the Guardian) and collaborated with him on Labour 1992 election manifesto. They spent years playing football together too. 

In one of those other fascinating coincidences, Ofcom was actually the brainchild of James Purnell and, just to make your head spin a little more, Mr Richards used to be Controller of Corporate Strategy at the BBC. 

Which all goes to show that it's a very small world. 

[Does Ed Richards, by any chance, have a secretary called Miss Purnell, and James Purnell have a secretary called Miss Richards?]

Birds of a Feather

Ah, so BBC Head of Strategy James Purnell's warning against the government's plan to allow the National Audit Office unfettered access to the BBC's accounts (in the wake of the latest scandal over excessive pay-offs) has now received the strong support of his former cabinet colleague, Harriet Harman, deputy leader of the Labour Party:

"[Culture Secretary Maria Miller] is suggesting a lessening of the BBC's ability to set the terms of reference for what the NAO does … and let the NAO set the agenda.

"It is important to think through the principles of this. I'm on the sceptical side but it depends how it was done and whether there are proper safeguards. I don't think we should do a Dangerous Dogs Act on the BBC, rush to do something everyone agrees is good but doesn't really work.

"This is a difficult time for the BBC, and change does need to happen. When it comes to governance we mustn't reach for a quick-fix answer on this issue, accountability at the BBC is a thorny and complex issue."

Again, as with Mr Purnell, Harriet Harman doesn't exactly seem to have a clear argument as to why Mrs Miller is wrong. It all seems to amount to: The BBC's independence is important, things are just too "thorny and complex", we mustn't rush into things, the Dangerous Dogs Act, blah, blah. 

Why is letting the National Audit Office access the BBC's accounts at a time of its rather than the BBC's choosing a risk to the corporation's editorial independence? 

And what is it with BBC types and politicians being so resistant to having outside watchdogs interfering in their already-proven-to-be-dodgy financial affairs? 

James Purnell wants to keep the NOA at bay

The Culture Secretary, Maria Miller, has said that the National Audit Office must have full access to the BBC’s accounts, linking her decision to the controversy over excessive pay-offs for senior BBC executives.

The present situation is that the NAO can only access the BBC's accounts once a quarter, and only with the BBC Trust's permission. 

The corporation's Head of Strategy, former Labour Party cabinet minister James Purnell, has responded, saying that such a move could endanger the BBC's independence. He says that BBC journalists "should be able to be incredibly tough on politicians and people in power without having to look over their shoulder".

To me that reads like a classic (former) politician's appeal to the public to back them against the "people in power" - as if the BBC has no power of its own.

Quite why allowing the NAO access to the BBC's accounts is a potential threat to the corporation's editorial policy is something I really can't quite get my head around. 

Maria Miller's move sounds a reasonable one to me, while James Purnell's counter-parry sounds like a weak defensive gambit to try to cover an errant BBC's back (perhaps reflecting the thought processes of a former MP. Remember the parliamentary expenses scandal?)

More evidence of Auntie’s leanings?

Now you see him. Now you don't.

Following on from Sue's post...

The BBC's decision to appoint former Labour cabinet minister James Purnell  to the newly-created senior management position of Director of Strategy and Digital has, unsurprisingly, been extensively reported. It's been headline news everywhere from the Guardian to the Daily Mail,  though the BBC itself rather slipped the news into an article headlined Helen Boaden becomes director of BBC Radio. 

The appointment has proved highly controversial in some quarters, prompting accusations of left-wing bias at the BBC from Conservative MPs, right-of-centre columnists, a former BBC news anchor and at least one anonymous current senior BBC boss. Many of these criticisms of the BBC's decision can be read in right-leaning newspapers. The left-leaning newspapers, in contrast, seem intensely relaxed about the appointment. Wonder why?

Damian Thompson in the Telegraph crisply articulates the concerns, and neatly disposes of a familiar riposte from defenders of the BBC along the way:

More evidence of Auntie’s leanings 

The BBC has appointed the former Labour Cabinet minister James Purnell to become its “strategy chief ”. That’s nice for him: nearly £300,000 a year of our money to direct the corporation’s “public affairs”. As far as I can work out the job was created for him; there was no recruitment process. The BBC’s centre-Left bias is one of the wonders of the modern world. Nothing on earth can shift it. Any Tories in its management are always of the bogus Chris Patten variety, while editorial power rests firmly with liberal programme makers. I pay my licence fee to the Beeb by direct debit. Would it be simpler if I just paid it to the Labour Party instead?

Also in the Telegraph, however, comes a gossipy piece by Tim Walker that raises a couple of other potential counter-examples (over than that desperate riposte of last resort: "Jeremy Clarkson!"):

Thea Rogers, who was Purnell’s lover, left her job as the BBC’s lead political producer last November to become George Osborne’s special adviser. She had impressed Craig Oliver, the corporation’s former news executive, who is now David Cameron’s director of communications.

Of course, the difference between Thea Rogers and Craig Oliver exiting the BBC to work for the Conservative Party and the BBC inviting a well-known Labour Party figure into the higher reaches of BBC management is obvious. The former doesn't provide any evidence of bias, only proving that there were senior Conservative-supporting BBC managers after all. The latter, however, could indeed provide evidence of bias in that it is the BBC's choice to create a strategic role for the until-recently-high-up-in-the-Labour-government Mr Purnell. 

As for James Purnell himself, well, as Norman Lebrecht puts it:

As a former Labour MP, a part of his BBC strategic role will be dealing with a Government of the opposite stripe who will regard him as the enemy. Tricky.

Indeed.