Patrick O'Flynn: Great old-fashioned scoop by Paul Brand, no doubt about it. BBC News just had to lead with footage "courtesy of ITV News". That's how good a story it is.
The BBC hasn't even bothered trying its usual ''the BBC has learned...'' game.
On the 8.30am Today Prog news the BBC reported that Meghan had said a member of the royal family asked *her* what colour the baby would be. By the 9am bulletin the word *her* had been dropped but there was no apology for the earlier instance of misreporting. Why not BBC News?
Listen at 2hr33min35secs in as BBC News misreports Harry and Meghan's claims of racism against the royal family. Bulletin says "Meghan claimed a member of the royal family asked her how dark her and Harry's first child would be." Simply not true.
By giving this false account BBC News has reported Meghan's claim as first-hand testimony, skewing any attempt at objective assessment about what may have happened. I cannot believe it has not already acknowledged a serious mistake and apologised for it.
Looks like BBC News is just going to sail on without apologising for its untruth about the Royal Family on the Today Prog, hence further fuelling the idea of "Is it true or did you hear it on the BBC?" One day they'll come to regret such arrogance.
He described what happened correctly and sounded genuinely shocked, even though it's becoming pretty standard BBC behaviour these days.
(A case of 'Hope springs eternal' perhaps'?).
I'm sure we'll see something on the BBC's Corrections and Clarifications page - which hardly anyone but us knows about, or reads - sometime before the end of 2022, if Patrick's lucky.
