The BBC Savages Itself Again (Geoffrey Howe-style)

Newswatch with Samira Ahmed (BBC News Channel yesterday evening, BBC One this morning) offered a fine example of the BBC fearlessly holding itself to account.

It led with the hottest BBC News row of the moment - one that has raged across the blogosphere for days now, with the intensity of an Australian bush fire: Why was former cabinet minister Chris Huhne's guilty plea over perverting the course of justice and the announcement of his resignation as an MP (resulting in a by-election) treated by the BBC as if it was a more important story than the surely infinitely more significant breaking news of Richard III's bones being discovered in a car park? A couple of Richard III fans had understandably got the hump over this and were bravely invited into the studio to air their wintry discontent at the BBC's scandalous behaviour. They dismissed the Huhne story as completely unimportant. I'm sure we can all agree about that. The BBC's age-old animus against Richard III truly knows no depths. 

Then it was onto how the BBC covered the gay marriage vote. Some viewers were outraged that the main evening news bulletin had got the spelling of 'marriage' wrong. The caption read 'Gay mariage'. "It's completely inexcusable. Hang your heads in shame!", one viewer wrote. Two other similarly offended Newswatch viewers agreed and got their complaints read out too. Rightly so. It's a very important point. It does make you wonder how on earth some blogger types (you know who you are!) can keeping banging on about biased BBC coverage of the issue when the real issue, the one that genuinely matters, is the question of whether typos are changing the whole fabric of British society for the worse and whether the BBC is actively proselytizing in favour of those typos? 

Someone else complained about the use of 'gay' in the term 'gay marriage', saying it discriminated against bisexuals and transsexuals. The phrase 'same sex' should have been used instead, she/he/it said. I imagine that most of you are just as angry that the feelings of vulnerable, socially-excluded transsexuals have been hurt in such a shameful way by the BBC. You should write to your MP about it.

On the BBC's coverage of the Stafford Hospital scandal, a viewer was appalled. Why, oh why, was the reporter standing outside the hospital needlessly? It's a disgrace! Who cares about what he was reporting, the real issue surely is, was and always will be the question of whether reporters should be standing outside the places they're reporting from. The BBC should extend the Savile Inquiry to cover  that very subject.

Another viewer demanded High Definition local BBC News, so that they could watch all the news about local accidents, cuts, murders, court cases, cuts, weather and football results in the highest possible quality. I'm with them on that. When I'm watching North West Tonight I find my appreciation of their reporting of the cuts is severely curtailed by the lowness of their definition. Samira and the Newswatch gang put the challenging question of High Definition local news to the BBC. I can't remember the answer they got as I nodded off for a few seconds at that point.

Then it was back to sloppy grammar. It's the thin end of the wedge, innit? A BBC reporter was being overly-colloquial, dontcha know, and a Newswatch viewer felt it worth complaining about. A Newswatch producer thought it worth airing too. Quite right!

I must admit I really wouldn't want to have been a BBC bigwig watching Newswatch this morning. It would have ruined their enjoyment of their coffee, croissant and Saturday Guardian. The new DG's days are, I suspect, numbered after this edition of the programme. Lord Patten is rumoured to be already packing his bags. (It's trending on Twitter, so it must be true). Moreover, parliament, led by the cross-party Friends of Richard III group, will be debating the removal of the license fee on the strength of this.

Who needs blogs to take on the BBC when there's Newswatch to give the corporation such a ferocious drubbing, week in and week out? 

Questions, Questions

OK. I didn't want to but I suppose I had to watch last night's Question Time. I endured it purely in the interests of using it as a test case (and, my, what fun it was!)

The programme came from the fairly safe Labour seat of Stirling, and featured Lib Dem Michael Moore MP; the SNP's Humza Yousaf MSP; Labour's Lord Falconer; Conservative MP Mary Macleod; and SNP donor Sir Brian Souter, Chief Executive of Stagecoach Group.

Let's concentrate on the questions though.

The first question selected by the Question Time team concerned the appalling standards of care found at an NHS hospital by a newly-published report. This was investigating the high mortality levels found at the Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust between 2005 and 2009 - the report into which can be read in full here. The report chronicles staff failings and substandard levels of care on an extraordinary scale. As well as revealing a lack of basic professionalism and compassion shown by doctors and nurse at the hospitals, its managers have also been blamed for cutting corners and covering up mistakes in an attempt to meet Labour's targets and win "foundation status" for the trust. So there's a lot of blame to spread around it seems. Commentators (not all on the right) have been making an obvious point, juxtaposing the shocking examples of neglect, incompetence and cover-up at Stafford Hospital (which caused some 1,200 people patients to die needlessly) with the sanitised and sanctified view of the NHS presented by Danny Boyle during the Olympic opening ceremony. "We ♥ the NHS."  

This scandal, as the politically-informed among you will realise, took place during the "boom years" of the last Labour government, when public money was pouring into the NHS. Cost-cutting may have been in the mind of managers at the hospital, but money from central government was still coming at them at record levels. What sort of questions might you have expected then on last night's programme, given that surely not even the most left-wing Question Time audience could try to blame the present Conservative/Lib Dem coalition government (and/or its austerity measures) for a scandal within the NHS from 2005-2009? 

How about these questions?: "Should the scandal at Stafford Hospital shake us out of our complacency about standards in the NHS?" or "Who's to blame for the appalling standards found in the Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust -  NHS managers, the last Labour government or NHS doctors and nurses?" Or how about something more neutral?: "What does the scandal at the Stafford Hospital tell us about standards of in the the NHS as a whole?" or "Who does the panel think is to blame for the appalling standards found at Stafford Hospital?" 

This, however (believe it or not), was the actual question chosen by the Question Time team to be asked:

"Are the appalling standards found at Stafford Hospital a sign of things to come from our NHS due to austerity?" 

Yes, the question and questioner selected did try to make it about the present government (elected in 2010) and did try to tie the scandal to "the cuts"! The point here is that it was the Question Time team's decision to pick that particularly-worded question to put to the panel (as they do with all questions). They made a choice. What on earth entered their heads when they chose it above all others (and presumably there were many questions to choose from on this subject)? It's certainly an odd question to choose in the circumstances, isn't it? Is it also a shocking instance of BBC bias? 

The question was so wide-of-the-mark that the panellists either almost entirely ignored or dismissed it - despite another audience member also giving it a try and despite David Dimbleby trying to get Michael Moore to discuss it. Yes, even the Labour and SNP representatives refused to go down the path the questioner clearly wanted them to go down. Was that the path which the Question Time team also wanted them to go down? If it was, why?

Regular readers of right-wing anti-BBC blogs will know that Chris Huhne - the pro-Green, climate change campaigner,Tory-bashing Lib Dem from the left-wing of his party - has always been a firm BBC favourite. I've read that accusation against the BBC so many times over recent years. What would such a reader expect from the unavoidable question about Chris Huhne which came up on Question Time last night in the wake of his guilty plea over the charge of perverting the course of justice and his subsequent resignation as an MP? That reader would surely expect the BBC to bias the question in Chris Huhne's favour. How? Maybe by picking a question from someone asking a facetious question which implies that Chris Huhne isn't a bad chap and it's all become a bit overblown - something along the lines, perhaps, of "Is Chris Huhne such a public menace that he deserves to be sent to prison?". The idea of Chris Huhne as "a public menace" or "a danger to society" is so hyperbolic as to sound ridiculous and phrasing a question like that would be quite helpful to him in the circumstances.  So that's the sort of thing someone expecting bias from the BBC might expect. And what question was chosen by the Question Time team?:

"Is Chris Huhne such a danger to society that he deserves to go to jail?"

Unsurprisingly, the panel said he most certainly isn't "a danger to society" and were full of sympathy for him and his family and the view seemed to be (except for the Conservative MP) that his wasn't a major offence (not compared to the actions of the bankers, of course. Clap, clap, clap, clap). Was this a biased choice of question? Given some of the audience comments there must have been some far less sympathetic ones to pick from.

Next came the obligatory Scottish independence question. Here bias-watchers need to be aware of two rival claims: One is that the BBC is pro-SNP and pro-independence; the other is that the BBC is anti-SNP and pro-unionist (in the Scottish sense of 'unionist'). Many at Biased BBC contend that it's pro-SNP. My one attempt to systematically follow a major Scottish current affairs programme (The Politics Show: Scotland) from late 2009 to mid 2010 found that its presenter seemed to be anti-SNP. SNP supporters, pretty much en masse, agree that the BBC is biased against them. Bearing all that in mind, what question was chosen by Question Time last night?:

"What do you make of recent polling that suggests that support for Scottish independence is at its lowest level since the creation of  the Holyrood parliament in 1999?"

Well, that's a question which most assuredly isn't biased in favour of the SNP! Does it also confirm bias on the part of the Question Time team though?

The most common complaint here, of course, is that the BBC is anti-Tory. The first question could easily be construed as being anti-Tory, and the final one was most definitely anti-Tory: 

"How can the Conservative Party claim to want a fair, more equal society when almost have their MPs opposed the Same Sex Couples Marriage Bill?"

So, despite the fact that it was a Conservative Party prime minister who brought the bill in, the Question Time team chooses an explicitly anti-Tory question about the passage of this potentially landmark piece of legislation. There were doubtless many others for them to choose from, but they chose that particular one. Is that also evidence of bias? 

Of course, if you expect the programme to push the anti-cuts agenda even in the unlikeliest of questions whilst covering Labour's tracks, or if you expect the programme to cover Chris Huhne's tracks for him, or if you expect the programme to be anti-SNP, or if you expect the programme to push an anti-Tory slant on a major piece of social legislation, then you will be highly likely to judge the programme makers' choice of questions last night to be "biased". My old self of three years ago, when I last seriously watched the programme, would certainly have expected all these things to happen in advance. That they did all happen last night when I was not really expecting them to happen is intriguing. Does it trouble you too?

We're running out of time, but...

Well, as kind-of promised, here's a post about the questions selected by the Question Time team to be put to the panel by members of the Question Time audience. The number of questions put varies from programme to programme but averages around five questions per edition.

The contention, as I've often seen it put (on right-leaning blogs), is that "the questions are invariably framed from the left".

It's easy to see if this is true. All someone needs to do is to spend a couple of evenings skimming through the Question Time website and tracking down all the questions asked on every available edition of the programme on the BBC's i-Player. As the BBC makes the programme available to 'listen again' for a year after the initial broadcast this would give us a whole year's worth of questions. Obviously, any trends of bias would be immediately discernible from such a list. Equally, if there were no trends of bias that too would be revealed by such a list. 

Here is such a complete list (ignoring last night's edition). A couple of evenings is indeed all that it took to compile it. Please see what you make of it. We'll have our say later. Does it provide evidence of BBC bias? 

9/2/12 London
1. In light of the latest setbacks in the attempt to deport Abu Qatada should the UK simply put him on the first available flight back to Jordan?
2. Do you think in the wake of the phone hacking scandal heavier regulation of the press is the way forward or would that compromise the principles of a free press?
3. Syria is massacring its own people. How bad does it have to get before the British government takes decisive action?
4. If we believe in 'innocent until proven guilty' was it right for the FA to strip John Terry of the captaincy of England?
5. Should Andrew Lansley and his NHS bill be taken out and shot?

16/2/12 Nottingham
1. How would you solve the unemployment crisis?
2. Does the election of police commissioners risk politicising the police force?
3. Will the current NHS changes produce quantifiable benefits to the public before the next election or will it be looked back as electoral suicide?
4. Baroness Warsi suggests religion is being sidelined, marginalised and downgraded in the public sphere. Isn't this a good thing?
5. What difference would an independent Scotland make to my life in Nottingham?

23/2/12 Tunbridge Wells
1. If David Cameron wants bankers' bonuses to be linked to success why did he allow RBS, a failing bank, to be paid bonuses of £785 million?
2. Is it time for the UK to lead the international community in providing military assistance to the Syrian freedom fighters?
3. Do unpaid work placements for unemployed 16-24 year olds help them into the work place or are they just a modern form of slavery?
4. Isn't bailing out Greece just a measure to delay the inevitable?
5. In light of the recent arrest of journalists at 'The Sun' is it a good idea to launch the 'Sun on Sunday'?

1/3/12 Dewsbury
1. Should the Chancellor resist calls from business leaders and his own backbenchers to remove the 50% tax on high earners?
2. A motioned released by some Lib Dem members today describes the Health and Social Care Bill as so deeply flawed it's not possible to make it fit for purpose. Are they right?
3. Isn't it time that we accepted that in a number of cities in the UK racial segregation is a fact of life?
4. Has the situation in Syria reached a point where Britain and her allies ought to intervene by force regardless of approval by the security council?

8/3/12 Guildford
1. I'm a politics student at the University of Surrey and my question is: Considering the tragic deaths of six more soldiers why is our withdrawal from Afghanistan still planned for 2014 and not sooner?
2. Would a mansion tax be fairer than a 50% tax band for the highest earners?
3. Does the proposal to allow gay marriages undermine the institution of marriage as a whole?
4. How can the railway network justify fare increases, especially as we are already the most expensive in Europe?
5. Gender equality is constantly on the agenda, so why are women still under-represented?

15/3/12 St. Andrews
1. What should George Osborne announce in the Budget that will significantly decrease long-term unemployment?
2. Would Scotland be financially better off as an independent nation?
3. In a recent poll nearly three quarters of people said the conflict in Afghanistan is unwinnable. Is the accelerated exit policy and admission of defeat?
4. Was Donald Trump right in warning the First Minister not to be 'Mad Alex' over the wind power?
5. In light of the proposed minimum price for alcohol why the responsible majority have to suffer for the irresponsible minority?

22/3/12 Grimsby
1. With more than 1 in 6 people now aged over 60 isn't the government right to ask pensioners to pay their fair share?
2. Does cutting the 50% tax rate to 45p signal the end of us all being in it together?
3. Why did the British woman kidnapped in Somalia have to finance her own freedom? Why did the government not do more?
4. Should teachers in Grimsby be paid less for doing the same job as their counterparts in the south of England?
5. Is this year a good time for the UK to consider becoming a republic?
6. Is David Cameron's idea to privatise a vast swathe of our road network not just another excuse to fleece the already-put-upon motorist?

29/3/12 Portsmouth
1. Who's responsible for the unjustified panic buying at petrol stations today? Is it the government or the unions?
2. Does a £250,000 dinner with the Prime Minister influence government policy?
3. Was the 56-day sentence for Liam Stacey, following his racially-abusive tweets about the footballer Fabrice Muamba, excessive?
4. In the light of taxing pasties but not caviare are we still all in this together?
5. should the government allow new grammar schools?
6. As we approach the 30th anniversary, could the UK fight a campaign based on the Falklands as we did in 1982 if required to do so?

19/4/12 Leeds
1. Should we now take control of our justice system in the light of the farcical deportation of Abu Qatada?
2. Was the Bradford Spring just a spot of unseasonable political weather or a sign of wider climate change?
3. Is it fair that the parents of truant children should have fines taken directly from their child benefit?
4. Is the Budget proving to be omnishambolic?
5. Is it right for British drivers to participate in the Bahrain Grand Prix when a pro-democracy movement is raging?

26/4/12 Romford
1. How can we have confidence in the government's economic policy when we are in recession again?
2. In light of recent evidence heard at the Leveson Inquiry should Jeremy Hunt resign as Culture Secretary?
3. Do you feel that moving low income families from Newham to Stoke-on-Trent is a form of social cleansing?
4. Should the contraceptive pill be available to girls as young as 13 without prescription, as suggested by an NHS report?

3/5/12 London
1. With the Olympics only three months away are the recent severe delays at Heathrow proof that our public transport system simply cannot cope?
2. Is Rupert Murdoch fit to run News Corp?
3. What impact will a Socialist victory in the French presidential election have on the Euro Crisis?
4. Mervyn King claimed their was a failure of imagination to understand that the economic bubble would burst. Is he right that no one is to blame?
5. Has the London mayoral election campaign become an embarrassing mudslinging affair which has lost sight of the real issues affecting the people of London?

10/5/12 Oldham
1. Why can't public sector workers accept that if they're going to live longer they're going to have to renegotiate their pensions?
2. Was race an issue in the recent Rochdale grooming case?
3. M. Hollande plans to tax and spend for growth as an alternative to austerity. Would it work for the UK?
4. Cameron and Clegg renewed their vows this week. Will this marriage reach its fifth anniversary?

17/5/12 Cardiff
1. Do you agree with the Home Secretary when she says that police officers should stop complaining about being picked on?
2. David Cameron yesterday told Europe to make up its mind. What choice has he given UK voters? Do we stay or not?
3. In light of Mervyn King's comments this week about its negative effect on GDP, should the Jubilee Bank Holiday be cancelled?
4. Drug and alcohol deaths in Wales have increased by 31% in ten years. Isn't about time we follow Scotland's minimum price for alcohol?
5. Are relations between the media and politicians becoming inappropriate?
6. With the Olympic torch coming to Cardiff next week why should Wales get excited about London's games?

24/5/12 King's Lynn
1. Who's bonkers? Vince Cable, or the 76% of the Institute of Directors who said they would take on more workers if stringent labour laws are eased?
2. When David Cameron called Ed Balls a "muttering idiot" was this improper language or a statement of the blindingly obvious?
3. Is it right that Olympic torch bearers are offering their torches for sale on internet auction sites?
4. Wind power is perceived to have failed our energy needs. Will more nuclear power stations provide a better solution?
5. Should David Cameron defy the European Court of Human Rights and not allow prisoners to vote?

31/5/12 Rugby
1. After pasty, caravan and charity u-turns, is the Chancellor competent?
2. Is it right for doctors to strike over a pension that most of us can only dream of?
3. Would the UK be justified in banning Syrian delegation members with connections to the Assad regime from the London 2012 Games?
4. Do the continual revelations from the Leveson Inquiry put into doubt the personal judgement of David Cameron?
5. Are we about to be invaded by hordes of homeless, hungry Greeks and, if we are, where are they going to go and what are we going to do with them?


7/6/12 Inverness
1. Have this weekend's Jubilee celebrations made us feel more British and damaged the campaign for independence?
2. Is it fair that well-off pensioners should get free bus passes and the winter fuel allowance?
3. Is it the job of the Germans to save Euroland?
4. How can a 3p increase in fuel duty be justified when rural businesses and families are already struggling to keep moving?
 
14/6/12 Stockon-on-Tees
1. Is it appropriate for Rebecca Brooks and David Cameron to be professionally, definitely in this together?
2. Do you agree with Communities Secretary Eric Pickles that problem families have had it easy for too long?
3. Can the panel please recite a poem that they learned by rote at school and explain how this has been useful in their subsequent careers?
4. Is it right that only rich foreigners will have the right to live with their partners in this country?
5. Is it right that all our e-mail and Facebook messages can be viewed by the police?

21/6/12 West Bromich
1. Are wealthy celebrities who avoid paying tax the moral equivalent of benefit cheats?
2. Should Britain scrap GCSEs and return to O-Level style exams?
3. Do I have more chance of attending a state banquet than see banks increase lending to small businesses?
4. Were doctors right to strike or should they be more willing to play their part in reducing government spending?

28/6/12 Luton
1. Is there any integrity left in British banking?
2. Is scrapping the petrol duty rise a sensible thing given how much the government is in debt?
3. Why should me and my partner continue working, paying taxes, struggling on a tight budget when those on benefits do nothing and get paid a lot more?
4. Is the sudden urgency about House of Lords reform simply a way of keeping the Liberal Democrats quiet in the coalition?

5/7/12 Derby
1. Given that this week George Osborne has already begun blaming Ed Balls for his part in the Libor Scandal I would like to know what's to stop a parliament-led inquiry turning into a political squabble?
2. Will cutting the British Army from 102,000 to 82,000 [increase] the threat to the UK?"
3. The Home Secretary is planning changes to the citizenship test. What question would you like to see included?
4. Is it time to stop fighting the war on drugs and instead regulate, control and tax it?
5. Does the panel think that Ian Brady should be allowed to die as he wishes or should be kept alive at great public expense?

27/9/12 Brighton
1. Will we see the same level of anger as in Athens and Madrid once the full impact of the UK government's austerity measures are felt?
2. would we be better off with more plebs and fewer public schoolboys patrolling the corridors of power?
3. What does the panel believe motivated the decision of Rochdale Police and Social services to ignore the grooming of under-aged girls by Asian males?
4. Can the next generation afford a home without help from the Bank of Mum and Dad?
5. After two years in coalition government is anyone really listening to Nick Clegg?

4/10/12 Manchester
1. Is the government right to scapegoat civil servants for the West Coast Rail fiasco?
2. In the light of the recent deaths of two Great Manchester police officers should British police now be armed, like their American counterparts?
3. Has Ed Miliband found his voice?
4. Is it right to investigate Jimmy Savile's past now he's dead?
5. Are we risking economic catastrophe by delaying airport expansion in the South East of England?
 

11/10/12 Birmingham
1. Is the BBC's reputation about to be blown away by the Jimmy Savile debacle?
2. Is George Osborne discrimination against the under-25s with his proposal to remove their housing benefits?
3. Should Boris Johnson challenge David Cameron for the leadership of the Tory Party?
4. Shouldn't the adoption limit be a matter for the morality of individual women and not Jeremy Hunt?


18/10/12 Glasgow
1. Why isn't the government doing more about rising gas and electricity prices when these companies are still making millions in profits?
2. Do you believe Scotland would be better off as an independent nation?
3. The UK Drugs Policy Commission wants to relax penalties for drug possession. How would this affect society and drug use?
4. Considering 16 and 17 year olds are not responsible enough to buy fireworks why are we letting them have a lot on independence?

25/10/12 Slough
1. With today's announcement on the GDP figures are we seeing the first signs of green shoots?
2. Is the proposal to limit child benefit to the first two children fair and reasonable?
3. Has the BBC been fatally damaged in the public's mind as a result of the Jimmy Savile scandal?
4. Should David Cameron give the European Court the two-fingered salute by not granting prisoners the right to vote?
5. In recent polls the Liberal Democrats come out as fourth behind UKIP. Should they leave the coalition before they lose whatever support they still have?

1/11/12 London
1. As a U.S. citizen I voted for Barack Obama in 2008, optimistic about his mandate for hope and change. The reality has been very different. Does he deserve another four years?
2. Is Nick Clegg right to claim that bringing powers back from Brussels is a false promise wrapped in a Union Jack.
3. Is the Energy Minister right in saying there are enough onshore turbines or is he tilting at windmills?
4. Was Dame Helen Ghosh right to accuse David Cameron of freezing women out of senior government position in favour of an Old Etonian clique?

8/11/12 Bexhill
1. Is David Cameron's mention of a "gay witch-hunt" in relation to the child abuse allegations a self-fulfilling prophecy?
2. Now that the Bank of England appears to have run out of options, what should government be doing to support the recovery?
3. Did the Conservative Party overreact when withdrawing the party whip from Nadine Dorries?
4. Would money be better spent on policing rather than the cost of the police commissioners' elections or the appointed commissioners' salaries?
5. What can British politicians learn from the recent victory of Barack Obama?

15/11/12 Corby
1. The winning party in Corby has come out on top in every general election in the past 30 years. Will today's result continue the trend?
2. Should we simply put Abu Qatada on a plane to Jordan?
3. Shouldn't we be spending more time discussing how we can better protect children than worry about who's running the BBC?
4. Should we be boycotting tax-dodging companies?
5. Who's wrong - Hamas or Israel?

22/11/12 London
1. Should parliament now consider amending sex discrimination legislation to cover the Church of England?
2. Should Britain forge a new, looser relationship with Brussels?
3. Do you think Israel was justified in bombing Gaza after months of rocket attacks on Israeli civilians?
4. Why should prisoners who've shown they cannot abide my the laws be given a say into society is run?
5. Under the benefit cap should large unemployed families priced out of London move into cheaper areas or should councils subsidise them to stay?

29/11/12 Swansea
1. Are the Leveson proposals an "attack" on the free press?
2. Should the political views of foster parents be taken into account before children are placed with them?
3. Do you think the minimum price put on alcohol is fair?
4. In view of Nick Boles's comments, are we all morally entitled to our own house with a garden?

6/12/12 Liverpool
1. Do the panel agree with George Osborne? Are we all in this together?
2. How does the government intend to ensure that care and compassion is restored back into the NHS?
3. Do the panel trust the press to regulate themselves?
4. When will the new 'pay what you want' tax bill be rolled out to the rest of the business world?

13/12/12 Bristol
1. Is the large number of Tory MPs opposing gay marriage symptomatic of a party out of touch with contemporary society?
2. With almost 3 million more foreign residents since 2001, is Britain no longer British?
3. Is it fair to vilify the two Australian DJs for the unintended tragic consequences of their hoax phone call?
4. Should the use of illegal drugs be decriminalised?
5. Do you believe that the Housing Minister was right to advise against giving food or money to homeless people?


10/1/13 Lewisham
1. Is the 1% benefits cap fair?
2. Do politicians who court celebrity debase the honour of their own profession?
3. David Cameron claimed the NHS was safe in his hands. Given the cuts and closures around the country, is this still the case?
4. Should David Cameron take notice of the United States's warning not to leave the European Union?

17/1/13 Lincoln
1. Lincoln has seen JJB, Blockbuster, Jessops and now HMV fall victim. Some of them will be boarded up. Is the internet killing the high street?
2. Can public services cope with yet another influx of migrants when we open our doors to Bulgaria and Romania this time next year?
3. Countries such as Norway and Switzerland have thrived outside of the European Union but still have strong trading links with EU member countries. Should the UK follow suit?
4. In these times of austerity should we consider introducing horse meat as a cheaper alternative to beef?
5. Is Mali in danger of becoming the next Afghanistan and should the UK get involved at any level?

24/1/13 Weymouth
1. Is the referendum on the EU in the national interest on in the interests of the Conservative Party?
2. Do schools close when it snows for the safety of children and staff or is everyone afraid of being sued or fined by Health and Safety?
3. Is George Osborne's programme of spending cuts credible?
4. Do you agree with cuts to the military as the terrorism threat grows in North Africa?
5. Are poor people fat?

31/1/13 Lancaster
1. Is reducing the travelling time from Manchester to London worth £30 billion?
2. Are we wise to become involved in another Islamist struggle in Mali?
3. With the Cumbria vote against the nuclear waste dump is it time the government turned its back on nuclear and backed renewables instead?
4. Should Prince Charles ask the Queen to go dutch?
5. Should Nick Clegg send his children to private schools?
6. Polish is now the second language in the UK. Will we need to revise this to Bulgarian or Romanian next year?

I'm going to have to stop you there. We're running out of time.

Continuing with the subject of bias and the BBC's Question Time, a post called Is there Bias on BBC Question Time? caused quite a flurry of interest late last year. It was written by Labour activist Phil Burton-Cartledge on his A Very Public Sociologist blog and was subsequently taken up and given a wide readership by the New Statesman. 

It began: 

Is the BBC in thrall to the liberal establishment? Do right-wingers take to the telly in disproportionate numbers? Does it really deserve its Tory epithet, "Buggers Broadcasting Communism"? Or is the BBC getting it about right in striking an impartial balance? Whichever way you look at it, these are not a set of questions likely to be settled by a single blog post.

But one place you might want to look for evidence of  BBC bias is its flagship politics programme, Question Time. More specifically, if there is a leaning to the left or the right, this could be clarified by the political affiliations and loyalties of its guests.

Now, the weighting of the panel on Question Time towards either the right or the left has been a concern of the BBC's critics for a long time. When I was a Biased BBC addict I would always read the comments leading up to its weekly Question Time liveblog (now defunct) where the composition of the panel would usually be brought up and the overwhelming biasing of the panel in favour of the left and against the right would be pointed out/alleged by someone or other. Now, I must admit that as time went on I got more and more sceptical about some of the ratios which commenters were coming up with - usually 5:1 or 4:1 in favour of the left. Just as an example, I remember one comment on an edition featuring Conservative MP Francis Maude and one-time prospective Conservative London mayoral candidate Nick Ferrari, both appearing on the same panel. The comment ran, "Where was the balance on tonights QT. 5 against 1. How does the BBC get away with it. We have a total left wing media." This sort of comment would keep on coming. On occasions some Conservative politician or journalist would be re-defined as a CINO (Conservative In Name Only) for not being sufficiently right-wing and moved straight into the 'leftie' camp, and David Dimbleby himself would frequently be automatically counted into the same ratio as a leftie. Unsurprisingly, overwhelming bias towards the left was regularly 'proved' by this doubtless very sincerely-meant species of gerrymandering week in and week out. No wonder the BBC hasn't taken this sort of thing seriously.

What I didn't realise, not frequenting Twitter, is that left-wingers are also regularly tweeting complaints about Question Time panels being weighted against the left and towards the right (and/or the establishment). It's a little parallel universe I didn't know existed. Just as on the right-wing blogs, where David Dimbleby was seen as being obviously pro-Labour (and a leftie), so these left-wing tweeters would regularly castigate "Mr. Impartiality" (as the Radio Times once called him) for being a not-so-closet Tory (and a rightie) and being blatantly biased against their side of the argument. Amazing! 

Now, complaints from both sides usually allow the BBC to reach for one of its favourite sayings, "On balance, we think we must be getting it about right." However, despite the Twitterati, it remains pretty much unarguable that it's right-wingers who are disproportionately angered by what they see as Question Time's pro-Left bias and that the left-wing complainants are far few in number. (Surely?) Plus there are far more left-wingers out there ready to defend the BBC against charges of bias than there are right-wingers. (Surely?)

Cue Phil. 

He studied every edition since 4 December 2008 using the information provided by....Wikipedia. Yes, it was easy-to-access, publicly-available info! It gave him some four years worth of data and a list of 362 individuals occupying 704 panel slots. What he then did (in the course of an evening, from his descriptions elsewhere - so it barely took any time to work out) was to ascribe a party or right-wing/left-wing tag to them, wherever possible. Simple but clever. (I wish I'd thought of it!)

His first set of findings concerns the party politicians: 

47 Conservative politicians occupying 137 slots 

51 Labour with 148 slots 

31 LibDems with 109 slots

18 Others taking 57 slots 

Phil's "socialist spin" on this (as his blog puts it) runs as follows:

A slight advantage for Labour perhaps, but hardly indicative of a systematic political bias - and even less so if you strip out the Question Time dedicated to the Labour leadership election in 2010.

OK, so he's proved an advantage for Labour but, he says it's a "slight" one that's "hardly indicative of a systematic bias". I agree with that. I'd say though that he is "spinning" with regards to that point about the Labour leadership election special, as that occasion saw five Labour Party politicians being given the opportunity to promote their leadership qualities and to bash the Tories at the same time - without the inconvenience of a single Tory to respond. That shouldn't be discounted, Phil. It should earn Labour double points instead! Well, that's my anti-socialist spin on it!! - and it's doubtless just as feeble as Phil's socialist spin. The figures are exactly right as they are, showing that slight Labour advantage that's hardly indicative of a systematic bias. 

Phil then moves on:

Matters are skewed when you introduce other categories of guests. 

His initial breakdown is:

:

trade unionists (7 occupying 9 slots)

business people (23 and 32 slots)

journalists (61 occupying 127 slots (21 women and 42 slots)

celebrities (31 and 46 slots)

campaigners and wonks (4 taking 11 slots)

'other' (authors, scientists, clergy, retired military, etc. - 23 taking 29 slots)

His left-right breakdown of the journalists is:

Balance-wise the right outweigh the left here, but that could be a freak of the figures, right? No. Of the 61 journalists, 40 could be described as explicitly political writers. 27 are of the right, and 13 are liberal/left. Rightwing journalists took 64 slots, and the liberal/left 31. For whatever reason, not only are hacks overrepresented on the Question Time panel, but Tory-leaning journalists outnumber their liberal and Labour-leaning contributors by over two to one.

I've re-done his survey and, yes, he's right. The right-wing journalists do outnumber the left-wing ones by an almost exact 2:1 ratio. Shall I spin this? Hmm. Question Time has to draw its journalists from across the spectrum of the UK press as well as the political spectrum. There are more right-wing components of the UK press than there are left-wing ones, so - taking the newspapers - you have a 2:1 ratio of right-leaning papers (Times, Telegraph, Mail, Express, Sun and Star) to left-leaning papers (Guardian, Independent and Mirror). Chuck in the small daily circulations of the two left-leaning broadsheets, & you have your reason why Question Time has the balance of journalists it has. QED. Well, probably not. Probably not.

Ah, but Phil's celebs push us back towards the left again:

The balance is not addressed by the other category of guests. Of the 31 celebs, 18 have definite views that align one way or the other. Six are on the right, and 12 of the liberal/left. The former had 13 slots, and the latter 16.

Next we get a little more "socialist spin": 

There are other questions that need to be asked. The predominance of business people over trade union voices came as no surprise at all. But come on, leading trade unionists combined have been on less than Nigel Farage! In case anyone needs reminding, trade unions are the largest voluntary organisations in civil society with a combined membership of some six million. Farage is the leader of a party whose supporters can fit into my living room. And if that wasn't bad enough, his odious minion Paul Nuttall has been on twice too. So why are UKIP way overrepresented on the panel and a mass movement of millions virtually ignored?

The first element of the "spin" is to imply a sigh at "the predominance of business people over trades union voices". As business leaders can be seen to speak for the 22 million people in the UK employed in the private sector, they should be on a lot more than trades union leaders who speak for only 6 million people.  (So Question Times ratio of business leaders to trade unionists would be "about right"!) Also, note how Phil drops his left-right/Labour-Conservative analysis here. As most of the "trades union voices" are key players in the internal affairs of the Labour Party, they can (with rare exceptions) be classed as pro-Labour and (with no exceptions) left-wing. No such direct link can be made from many of the business leaders to the Conservative Party (Simon Wolfson is an obvious exception) and some could be pro-Labour (Max Mosley, a Labour donor - two appearances - for example) Given that all three main parties consider themselves to be pro-business and business leaders tend to keep out of party politics, this is a grey area in Phil's survey. He might presume they are all right-wing, being (by definition) pro-business, but they aren't necessarily so. 

The second element of spin relates to his attacks on UKIP. Presumably Phil's point is that UKIP has no UK parliamentary seats (though they did get 3.1% in the 2010 general election) so UKIP's "over-representation" on the programme (13 appearances) is plain for all to see (he thinks). Well, if you look at it that way perhaps. However, UKIP is, of course, way up in the opinion polls at the moment, has a large contingent at the European parliament and might just, polls say, come first in the next European elections in 2014. So, over-represented? Actually, if you work out the percentages, UKIP only gets 2.9% of the party political spots (13 out of 451) compared to 32.3% for Labour, 30.4% for the Conservatives and (a surprisingly high) 24.2% for the Liberal Democrats. Hardly over-representation I think. Plus given that Question Time is primarily a party political programme, the fact that the number of party politicians from smaller parties (UKIP, Plaid Cymru, the Greens, Respect, etc) seems disproportionate the number of (largely Labour Party-affiliated) trade union leaders isn't particularly surprising. 

So what's the verdict on Phil's study? It pretty much proves that there isn't a problem with bias as regards left-right imbalance on Question Time, guest selection-wise. One area of left-leaning imbalance is pretty much evened out by another area of right-leaning imbalance. However much you (or I) might want to shuffle guests into one camp or the other to suit our tastes and to get the ratio we want, the panels on Question Time are balanced (over time). If you still choose not to believe that then you are ignoring the facts and blundering on with a self-placed blindfold over your eyes. That's what the stats show and the stats are right, even if some of the interpretations put on them (by both Phil and myself) remain open to question - and to vigorous disagreement. Such is politics, and rightly so. Statistics can only take us so far.

I would add that it would have been far better if Phil had posted the full results on his blog - along with his right'/'left' labels. (I used to post the full results of my surveys on my old blog. They were very full and took up acres of blog space, but given how much blog space there is that's hardly an issue). That way others can check the soundness of the stats for themselves. It looks a bit suspicious if you don't. 

****************

After all that number-crunching, let's see how others reacted to Phil's findings. 

Let's start with Phil himself. He admits on his blog why he really did his survey - and it wasn't to prove pro-right bias at Question Time. Here's an exchange:

Loz said...
Anyway, great piece and should be spread far and wide every Thursday the minute a right-winger opens their cake hole to bleat about the Marxists controlling the BBC.

Phil said...
Re: your final comment, I wrote it specifically for those annoying Question Time moments ;) 

Biased BBC (the very sort of people he intended to annoy) responded. The post, Not Many People Know That, didn't dispute his findings, its author simply stating "I always assume QT is in the main ‘balanced’". Many of his readers at Biased BBC most definitely don't share that assumption it has to be said. The whole thread largely consists of a stream of ad hominem arguments, which I feel an urge to summarise for you (for your edification):

What a waste of time!

Get a life mate!

It's in the New Statesman!

Sociologists are a waste of space!

He's a leftie!

There's no right-wing bias on the BBC. Ever. Full stop.

It's always 4:2 or 5:1.

He's a liar!

He's just can't have been being objective!

He can't be right!

He counted all those CINOs as right-wingers!

The Left are fools and traitors.

He spelt a word wrong on Twitter!

Marxists are bad people.

I looked at the last five editions. They prove him wrong. 

"I'm not going to waste any more of my time proving what we all know anyway."

Hmm. 

The left-wing commenters at the New Statesman (despite the odd stray anti-BBC, pro-right comment) did much what you'd expect them to do as well. They seemed to divide between those are keen to defend the BBC as a beacon of impartial broadcasting and those who see if as a right-wing, establishment outfit with Andrew Marr as a reactionary and David Dimbleby as anti-left. Someone added a gratuitous dig at Israel, naturally. 

*************

Two other concerns (at least) remain about Question Time's impartiality - the question of whether David Dimbleby is a biased chairman and the question of whether the questions chosen by the Question Time team demonstrate bias. 

David Dimbleby, as you can see above, gets accused by a minority on the left of being an anti-left, establishment type but for as long as I've read Biased BBC it's been the accusation that he's anti-right that has reached my ears more - particularly as I have in the past been in the thick of providing statistics that back up that contention.

My old Beeb Bias Craig blog looked at Question Time in the months leading up to the May 2010 general election. As was my way, I watched every edition of the programme (to avoid cherry picking) and spent a good four hours each week analysing each edition. I worked out precise figures for how much time each guest got to speak, who was questioned most by David Dimbleby and - above all - who was (proportionally) interrupted the most (my old interruption coefficients). You can read all my results here. Though the rather angry (and insulting) tone of some of my posts back then makes me squirm now, I stand by those figures. They are spot on. 

I'll quote a post I wrote for Biased BBC some time later:

Following last week’s full-frontal assault on Coalition minister Vince Cable, this week’s Question Time saw another Coalition minister, Grant Shapps, fall victim to a rampaging bullock, being questioned and interrupted by David Dimbleby far more than any of the other guests (even David Starkey). The figures for this will appear in the comments field below.

Well, you might say, both Mr Shapps and Dr Cable are government spokesmen, so David Dimbleby is right to challenge them more than guests from the opposition parties – except that DD didn’t challenge government ministers more than opposition party guests when Labour were in power. Quite the reverse.

Here’s a list of the guests who were interrupted most frequently by DD in relation to the length they were allowed to speak (yes, interruption coefficients!) in the months leading up to the general election. (There are a few joint first prizes):

29/4 Liam Fox (C) /Vince Cable (LD)
22/4 William Hague (C)
15/4 Nigel Farage (UKIP)
8/4 Theresa May (C)
1/4 Ken Clarke (C)
25/3 Liam Byrne (L)/Baroness Warsi (C)
18/3 Caroline Lucas (Green)/Andrew Lansley (C)
11/3 Jo Swinson (LD)
4/3 Boris Johnson (C)
25/2 Nigel Farage (UKIP)
18/2 Lynne Featherstone (LD)
11/2 Jim Allister (TUV)
4/2 Theresa May (C)
28/1 Jenny Tonge (LD)/Nigel Lawson (C)
21/1 Caroline Spelman (C)

Full details of the statistics behind this list can be found here.

By political party, that results in these totals for the award for Most Interrupted Panelist:

Conservatives – 10
Liberal Democrats – 4
UKIP – 2
TUV – 1
Greens – 1
…and for the government of the day…
Labour – 1

I wish David Dimbleby a long and happy retirement!

(Charming last comment, that!)

So, as you can see, I was convinced that I had the stats to show anti-right bias by David Dimbleby ("Mr. Impartiality".) I admitted to myself even then though that David Dimbleby doesn't look like a leftie, despite sometimes seeming to behave like one. I toyed with the idea at the time - after it was suggested by esteemed fellow blogger Nota Sheep - that he might be over-compensating for some innate Conservative tendencies.

Talking of the excellent Nota Sheep, he is fond of posting this video, which seems to show DD launching an attack on Iain Duncan Smith at the prompting of Harriet Harman. This one will fascinate you if you've never seen it before. What is going on here (besides some tricksy use of video by the video maker)?:

The response from an anonymous commenter at the time on Nota's blog puts the case for the defence:

What was it that we're supposed to be annoyed about? She said something to him, and he then interrupted IDS, but you can't say that one led to the other. All David Dimbleby does on that show is interrupt and challenge the speakers - that's what he's there for. He does it to everyone - well, to all the politicians anyway, he usually gives journos and business types an easier ride.

By the way, Dimbleby is not employed by the BBC, he's always been a freelancer. 

So, what do I think now? Well, as for that video, I rather agree with the anonymous commenter these days. I no longer believe it to be quite the clinching proof of a Labour-BBC conspiracy I once half-believed it was. It looks bad, when viewed in a certain light; however, polemical heavily-edited videos with short, taken-out-of-context extracts from an hour-long programme have somewhat lost their sway over me. He may have been a bit too much in Harriet Harman's corner in that extract (quoting her "Rubbish" at IDS), but would he not have interrupted Iain Duncan Smith anyhow for going off-topic? David Dimbleby often comes down on guests like a ton of bricks for going off-topic. I suspect he interrupted repeatedly and forcefully because that's what he does. 

However, what about my own figures showing that David Dimbleby interrupted anyone-but-Labour more than than he did the then-Labour government representative on the programme? I well remember how angry I used to get whilst studying some editions of the programme at the time whenever DD used to go for his right-wing guests (not all of them Conservative or UKIP spokesmen, some right-wing journos) much more than he did Labour spokesmen; however, reviewing my figures, he also went after Green and Lib Dem politicians too - plus those headline figures don't show that he did give some of his Labour guests at the time a fairly tough time (just not as often and not across the board). If you review, as I've just done, some of my more detailed takes on particular episodes - such as this or this or this or this or this or this or this or this (and there's more!) -  you might be able to sense my anger and my then very firm belief in the anti-right bias of David Dimbleby and might see why I might have felt it. 

I know it will probably seem to any of you who aren't enmeshed in this debate that the idea of David Dimbleby as a biased leftie (or as an overcompensating Tory) will seem ridiculous. His coverage of such national events such as Remembrance Day, Trooping the Colour, the State Opening of Parliament and so on are models of presentation and have endeared him to many BBC viewers over several decades. He's also presented such charming programmes as A Picture of Britain. I've not monitored the man's performance on Question Time in recent years so I can't say if this was an atypical period or not, but I watched the programme closely for some months at that time and I know what I saw. I saw biased chairmanship from David Dimbleby. What do you make of that? What do I make of that?

As for the other concern - the one about the questions chosen and whether they are selected in a biased way - that's something I've not looked at before. Maybe I will now. Another post beckons.

If I could come to you sir...

James Delingpole, star blogger at the Daily Telegraph, may be best known for his polemical pieces on global warming but he's also posted many a piece excoriating the BBC over its "left-wing bias". These go down very well with his supportive readership (though not with his unsupportive ones!) and you often see links to his anti-BBC posts at Biased BBC. There hasn't been one of those links yet to his latest post, however, entitled BBC Question Time bias: a mystery solved? where James informs us that he has now "stopped loathing Question Time", thanks to the "delightful audience" in "lovely Lancaster". (Yep, that's my neighbouring city and that's what we're like up here - delightful!) He went on to say:

I talked about this afterwards to the lady who vets the audiences. It's an urban myth that before each show the BBC sends a coach to pick their audience up from the Socialist Worker's Party Social Club, Hizb ut Tahrir and the EU Commission. In fact – and I totally believe this – they are rigorously screened and pre-selected to reflect the political spectrum.

I have to say that I've read countless comments over the years from people who firmly believe this "urban myth", that the audience is carefully selected to project the BBC's left-wing agenda and that it most assuredly isn't reflective of the political spectrum. Heck, I've made a few such comments myself over the years!

The audiences do appear to be overwhelmingly left-wing - making left-wing points, applauding left-wing talking points, attacking right-wing points of view, sitting in stony silence at the end of a right-wing guest's contribution and occasionally booing a right-wing guest. They do often seem to contain a surprising number of militant and/or trades union types too (in the old-fashioned, non-BBC sense of the word 'militant').

I monitored this very briefly (far too briefly for it to add up to much). One episode from Conservative/Liberal-dominated Cheltenham in October 2010 saw the following breakdown of all the points made by the audience:

Attacks on Labour/Support for the Coalition - 2  

Attacks on the Coalition/Support for Labour - 11  

Attacks on Lord Browne's (Coalition-backed) tuition fees proposals - 9  

Support for Lord Browne's (Coalition-backed) tuition fees proposals - 0  

Attacks on the BBC - 0  

Support for the BBC - 1  

Attacks on MPs in general - 1  

Support for foreign ownership of British football clubs - 2  

Attacks on foreign ownership of British football clubs - 1  

You wouldn't expect that from an audience drawn from Cheltenham in 2010, so soon after that year's general election, would you? It doesn't ring true somehow as being representative of the political spectrum - especially in Cheltenham. And that's how it usually seems to be with Question Time audiences week in and week out  - at least for many (particularly right-wing) people -, even when Labour is in government. 

I should have repeated that study over many months, but by then my dislike of watching the programme was too intense and I didn't. If I had carried out such a long-term study, what would it have proved? That unrepresentative-seeming audiences are a feature of Question Time, more often than not, I would guess - probably significantly more often than not. That would show that there really is an issue, a problem - and possibly a significant one - that needs tackling by the BBC. If figures of the type shown above were to  be carried out over, say, a year's worth of editions and if the results demonstrate the same heavy imbalance in a large number of Question Time editions - and very few (or none) trending in the opposite direction - then the BBC would be placed in an embarrassing position. It would be on the receiving end of some difficult questions, which it would no longer be able to dismiss as merely "anecdotal evidence", or as an "urban myth". That's the positive value of statistics. In this sort of area, complaints based purely on anecdote, on what someone "reckons" or "knows for a fact" or that "everybody with a braincell already knows" won't get the complainant very far with the BBC Complaints Department.

Would such a survey also prove the BBC's audience selection process to be a biased one though? No, it wouldn't. It might suggest but it wouldn't prove the BBC's culpability for the problem. Couldn't something else be causing the imbalance?

That said, such figures (if they showed a strong enough trend) would show that the complaints of (usually right-wing) bloggers and commenters that the Question Time audience is unrepresentative are true and that the BBC has, at the very least, been dismissing the problem without just cause - refusing to believe it or believing it but deliberately ignoring it. All of which would make it a potentially fruitful exercise to actually carry out such a survey. It would take up hours of the unpaid researcher's precious spare time every week though to do thoroughly and for anyone who dislikes watching Question Time would doubtless be a painful experience. It ain't something I fancy doing. Any takers?

Another reason why many (usually right-wing) people believe there to be a problem here is that they've read other (right-wing) commenters recounting their own problems with getting onto the programme as an audience member, usually failing to get beyond the questionnaire stage (where you write about your political views). They may have also read (as I used to read) blog-posts (on right-wing blogs) pointing out a particular Labour Party activist in the audience asking one of the main questions. Someone had recognised them.

I once read such a post and decided to see if I could use Google to check out an audience member in Cardiff - one who had asked a sharply-political main question sarcastically attacking UKIP. He had the air of a political type to me, yet here he was appearing as an ordinary member of the Cardiff public being rude about Mr. Farage. (The edition featured Nigel Farage). As he had a very unusual name up popped an identical name to his on Google. That identically-named man was a (failed) Labour local election candidate - not in Cardiff but in Coventry. A co-incidence of names? Possibly. Well, Google Images also showed a photo of the very same man from the Cardiff edition of Question Time at a social gathering, in Coventry. Aha! I didn't progress it beyond that after my e-mails to the local Conservative association (enquiring if they knew whether the Coventry Labour activist was on that particular Question Time edition) got absolutely no response. It almost certainly was him. Anyhow, that was enough to convince me of the "urban myth", being only too ready to make the extra leap of faith into believing that his presence in Cardiff - at Labour's  request? - was somehow also with the BBC's connivance. Looking back, that was a leap too far but it was a suggestive 'discovery' nonetheless. I was highly suggestive at the time. 

James Delingpole probably felt much as I did. He perceived a problem with Question Time audiences and deduced that the BBC's selection processes were the cause - and that the cause of that was bias, possibly intentional bias. Now he feels differently:

In fact – and I totally believe this – they are rigorously screened and pre-selected to reflect the political spectrum. 

I would bet he's right to believe them. I believe them now.

So what's the problem? Why do the BBC's Question Time audiences come across so often as being overwhelmingly left-wing and so unrepresentative of the whole political spectrum?

James Delingpole has an explanation:

Rather, the problem lies in the nature of politics. As I've argued countless times before, it's much easier to be left-wing than to be right-wing. To be on the left confers a spray-on niceness that alleviates you of all need to behave with any kind of decency or moral responsibility in your daily life because, hey, you vote Labour or Lib Dem or Green and that means you care about the oppressed, the disabled, the poor, the minorities, the bunny rabbits, the kittens in baskets with eyes in cutely different colours a bit like David Bowie's. Whereas to be on the right, obviously, means you just want the rich to get richer and for everyone else to get sent to death camps.

One unfortunate result of this is your typical Question Time audience. There are as many conservatives in there as there are lefties. Problem is, the lefties are often much keener to articulate their position because they know instinctively that they have the moral high ground whereas the conservatives are reluctant to stick their head above the parapet lest they be seen to be unkind. I'm not suggesting that they're justified in thinking or behaving this way: I'm merely pointing up human nature. We'd all much rather be liked than disliked, which is why there are so very few people out there willing to play the James Delingpole role. If there were I'd give up my job in a trice. I don't do it for the fun, I can tell you.

That does ring true to me. I recognise my own behaviour (as a cowardly conservative) in that description of how people behave in those sort of charged political debates (or, in my case, in most kinds of political debate outside the circle of family and most intimate friends). They might even take me for a left-winger at times. It's a variation on the old thing about Conservatives (in the days of the 1979-1997 government) not wanting to appear bad in front of opinion pollsters by "admitting" they voted Conservative! There probably are lots of right-wing people in those Question Time audiences. They just don't saying anything, or they clap along to points they don't really agree with to look as if they are on the side 'moral' side as the vocal left-wing neighbours sitting next to them. That sort of thing. Does this ring true to you too? (It's very different on the internet, of course).

Of course, this goes well beyond simple left-wing/right-wing issues. On matters of American and British foreign policy, involvement in wars, Israel, climate change, environmental issues, etc, there's usually an equivalent position to that 'spray-on niceness' position of the standard left-wing standpoint - making love not war, feeling sooo sorry for the Palestinians, fearing for the future of Gaia, and so on, and those are precisely the sort of views you keep hear being expressed by audience members on Question Time. Isn't that the real reason why Question Time audiences tend to appear so unbalanced - and so flippin' predictable on so many issues too?  

If that is the reason - and if the BBC can be forced to admit an ongoing, almost weekly, massive imbalance in the political stance from which most of its audience expresses its points - what can the BBC do about it? Could it divide its audience into sections for people who express a preference for each political party, with non-attached audience members being required to sit with those closest to their political opinion? (Rather like the seating plan of the Scottish parliament!) With like-minded people sitting together (and, thus, feeling more comfortable), the chairman could then ensure that a broad range of views is expressed by picking a balanced selection of people from each section of the audience....unless, of course, the problem James Delingpole identifies extends beyond the BBC studio. Those shy righties will probably be well aware that they are going to watched by a couple of million people perhaps on their tellies - including their less intimate friends and work colleagues! (Wouldn't want to say anything 'uncaring' in front of millions of people, would we?) Hmm, so what could the BBC do to ensure that its "rigorously screened" and "politically representative" audiences actually behave like a "politically representative" audience? Any ideas could be e-mailed to the programme perhaps!

Another possibility (and I'm thinking on my feet here) is that the left-wing members of the audience simply want to have their public say more than the right-wing ones, in much the same way that most of the many protest marches and demonstrations we see in the UK are carried out by left-wingers (or environmentalists, anti-war campaigners, pro-Palestinian activists, etc). Right-wingers (with very rare exceptions) don't march and demonstrate anywhere near so often (if at all). This seems to be a curious, long-term feature of British politics and appears to be mirrored in the Question Time audience. (It's a very different story again on the internet of course, where right-wingers can be as vocal and assertive as anyone else.) Could this be another reason for the imbalanced feel of Question Time audiences?

Questions, questions. The man in the red shirt at the back, yes you sir with the glasses, might know the answer. He usually does.

Of course, there are other concerns about the impartiality of Question Time. They will do for another post though. 

A Case in Point (Update)

So, some 24 hours later, the BBC News website finally catches up with most of what the rest of the British media (except The Guardian) was reporting 24 earlier:

2 February 2013 Last updated at 13:32 

Naomi Oni, Dagenham acid attack victim, 'wanted to die'

A woman has said she did not want to live when she saw herself for the first time after having acid thrown in her face near her home in east London.

Naomi Oni, 20, said she was attacked by a person wearing a veil covering their face after getting off a bus in Lodge Avenue, Dagenham, on 30 December.

Keep reading for another eleven paragraphs and Naomi is quoted saying:

"I saw what seemed to be a lady wearing what I think is a hijab (sic), which was mostly black."

So there you go. They reported it after all: Late, saying "veil" at the top of the article rather than anything more specific to Islam and - the final insult - putting a "(sic)" after her use of "hijab" but, yes, they reported it after all.

The original much-read article, however, stands unchanged.

The Guardian, however, is persisting with its policy of not reporting the story. Which is typical of the Guardian.

A Case in Point

The BBC's sensitivity towards Muslim sensibilities is often seen by critics as being dangerous over-sensitivity. A common complaint on websites critical of the corporation is that it repeatedly censors details unhelpful to the Muslim community in reports about, say, crime. 

An example being discussed over a Biased BBC at the moment (here, here and here)  concerns the horrific acid attack on a young woman who works at a branch of the 'sexy lingerie' store Victoria's Secret. She was attacked by someone wearing a niqab (the Islamic veil). The acid was thrown into her face as she was nearing home after finishing work, leaving her disfigured.  

I think it's worth adding some flesh to the complaints being made at Biased BBC so that you can see why they are being made - and why they are made so often against the corporation. 

The story was broken by the Evening Standard:

Naomi Oni, 20, was on her way home from work when an unknown attacker dressed in a niqab threw a chemical substance at her leaving the retail assistant with severe burns on her head, neck, arms, legs and body. 

These shocking images have now been released by Ms Oni in an appeal for help to catch the attacker whose identity was concealed behind the Muslim women’s dress which completely covers the face apart from the eyes.

London 24 soon took up the story:

A friend of Naomi, Sheila Maclean, said the young woman had been on her way home from working at Victoria’s Secret at Westfield shopping centre in Stratford, when the frightening assault happened.

She said: “She was about to get off the bus at 11.45pm and noticed a woman in a niqab [a Muslim veil] standing at the opposite bus stop. When she got off the bus she noticed the person had gone.

“Naomi then heard someone walking close behind her. As she turned, the woman came up behind her and threw the substance in her face. 

Other news organisations then posted detailed reports of the attack. 

The Daily Mail was the first of the national news organisations:

Victoria's Secret worker scarred for life when niqab-wearing attacker threw acid in her face as she walked home from shop 

A young woman suffered horrific facial burns after a woman wearing a Muslim veil threw acid in her face.

Naomi Oni, 20, was walking home after finishing work at lingerie shop Victoria’s Secret when the woman, wearing a niqab – which reveals only the eyes – appeared and launched the apparently random attack.

It is not known whether the attack was motivated by the victim’s work for the store.

Other papers have followed, except for The Guardian, which has chosen not to report the story at all.

From The Times:

A young woman was left badly scarred and in danger of losing her sight after an attacker dressed in a niqab threw acid in her face.

From The Daily Telegraph:

Naomi Oni, 20, had just got off a bus when she was attacked by an assailant wearing a niqab, a traditional face covering worn by some Muslim women. 

From The Independent: 

London woman left disfigured by shocking random acid attack by mystery woman in niqab as she walked home from work at Victoria's Secret 

From The Sun:

Woman in niqab wrecked my life in acid assault

says Victoria's Secret salesgirl

The story is also being reported abroad. 

Now, the identity and motive of the attacker remains a mystery. Police have got nowhere so far, hence Naomi's decision to release 'before' and 'after' photographs of her face to the press, hoping to get a bit of momentum going in the case and, presumably, to encourage any witnesses to the attack to come forward. There's plenty of speculation on blogs about a possible link between her occupation and the disdain many Muslims feel for such companies, but the reports remain cautious over this - as well they might. 

But there's caution and there's caution..which brings us to the BBC's take on the story.

Unlike The Guardian they haven't ignored it altogether. This, however, is their online report on the attack, in full:

1 February 2013 Last updated at 16:26

Woman disfigured in Dagenham acid attack

A young woman has been left disfigured after acid was thrown in her face in east London.

Naomi Oni, 20 was walking in Lodge Avenue, Dagenham, when she was attacked at about 00:40 GMT on 30 December. The attacker fled from the scene.

The Metropolitan Police said Ms Oni managed to get home and an ambulance was called.

Ms Oni, who was treated for burns, has been released from hospital. Nobody has been arrested over the attack.

A police spokesman said officers "retain an open mind as to the motive at this early stage".

Unlike every other report mentioned, this remarkably short BBC report leaves out any mention of the fact that the attacker was dressed in the Muslim niqab, even though that's a key part of the story in that Naomi Oni says that her attacker was wearing it. If part of the purpose of the report is to encourage witnesses to come forward then failing to report one of the most important details that might job their memories and help to identity the attacker is very unhelpful. Moreover, it does offer a possible motive for the attack - as does the other detail that the BBC omitted from their report, that Naomi works for Victoria's Secret. 

I fail to see how the BBC's usual response to such complaints - that the detail of the niqab is not relevant to the story - would apply here. It is surely relevant on several levels. 

Can anyone think of a good reason why the BBC appears to have censored the detail of the niqab from this particular story, other than the BBC being sensitive/over-sensitive to Muslim sensibilities? 

Hopefully, Naomi Oni's brave decision to release those photos will pay off and her attacker will be caught and punished.