Today's issue that affects me: Over the
past few days the BBC has proved itself to be - yet again - a dictatorial and
biased supplier of one-sided poorly researched and often incorrect information.
Our TV Licence is due for renewal next month. My mouse pointer has hovered over
the "Cancel" button for the Direct Debit several times. Should I just do it and
face the (non-existent) consequences?
Jeremy Clarkson QI guest spot
shelved in wake of One Show row
The BBC has shelved
Friday night's scheduled edition of BBC2 panel show QI featuring Jeremy Clarkson
because of fears it would prompt another backlash from
viewers.
Well, thank goodness for the BBC for telling me what
should, and should not, offend me. Instead we were treated to a repeated episode
of QI from a few weeks ago. So we, as viewers, had no freedom of choice to view
a programme that was recorded during the summer. Does the BBC now think that
just the appearance of Clarkson's face will see a resumption of street riots?
Dream on. This is the BBC again telling us what to think.
Frozen Planet’s eight million devoted fans will not
take kindly to being left out in the cold. It emerged yesterday a key scene from
the hit BBC series showing a polar bear tending her newborn cubs was filmed in a
zoo using fake snow.
The old BBC proverb appears again: If you can't do
it for real, make it up!
http://blogs.pressgazette.co.uk/wire/8437
Mark Thompson: BBC does use
private eyes, but no evidence of hacking
BBC director
general Mark Thompson has admitted that the corporation does use private
detectives for journalistic purposes. But he has also said that the draft report
of a review of editorial practices at the BBC, commissioned in the wake of the
Milly Dowler phone-hacking revelations of July, was “very
encouraging”.
Oh, how I hope the BBC become embroiled in the Leveson
Enquiry.
From your favourite Daily Rag:
MPs say BBC must reveal details of journalists'
commercial deals
MPs have demanded that the BBC reveals
details of all commercial deals its journalists have with other organisations,
amid fears of an increasing number of conflicts of interest affecting their
work. The Corporation is under pressure following The Mail on Sunday’s
disclosure two weeks ago that senior BBC journalist Roger Harrabin accepted
£15,000 in grants from the University of East Anglia, which was at the heart of
the ‘Climategate’ scandal, and then reported on the story without declaring this
interest to viewers.
I just hope the MPs make this stick and the BBC
does have to reveal this information. First on my agenda will be your trips to
Iceland and India!
There are lots of others, and thankfully today's first
item will allow me to bring some of those to the attention of your goodself and
my blog readers...
1)
BRITISH VETO - Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg
is bitterly disappointed that David Cameron did use the British veto. Do you
agree with Nick or do you agree with Dave? : This is going to take more
than one paragraph...
It really does not matter who I agree with, but
this is just another attempt to drive a wedge between the two coalition parties
by the BBC. James Kirkup wrote in the Daily Telegraph that all is perhaps not as
you are reporting:
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jameskirkup/100123295/clegg-had-his-chance-to-stop-cameron-he-didnt-take-it/
Clegg had his chance to stop Cameron. He didn't take
it
The awkward fact for Mr Clegg is that the European
policy he castigates is his policy too. Mr Cameron acted as the head of the
Coalition Government, of which Mr Clegg and his party are a part, on a
negotiating strategy he had agreed. Not only that, but Mr Clegg was consulted
immediately before the PM's last-minute decision in Brussels. Admittedly, that
consultation was a 4 am phone call, but it was consultation nonetheless.
Remember that Mr Clegg gave his consent in that call. And early on Friday, he
expressed support for the decision he now lambasts; partial and nuanced support,
but support nonetheless.
Sir Antony Jay: slash the BBC by two
thirds!
The BBC's reporting of David Cameron's
recent adventures in Europe has been a disgrace. Last night – following
the example set by that very exemplar of quisling Europhile values the Today
programme – the BBC's Ten O'Clock News managed to reiterate about half a dozen
times its view that Britain had been left more "isolated" than ever by Cameron's
eminently sensible decision not to sell his country's interests for a mess of
pottage. To listen to Nick Robinson and co, you might actually have imagined
that it was somehow a bad thing for Britain not to wish to shackle itself to the
rotting corpse of the EU; you might even have thought that it was a good and
desirable thing for Cameron to accede to an arrangement which hamstrung
Britain's financial sector (on which so much tax revenue and around ten per cent
of our economy depends).
How Europhile BBC turned triumph over Britain's veto
into disaster
The BBC was accused of reporting
Britain’s veto of the eurozone rescue plan as a national catastrophe
rather than a tough decision David Cameron was forced to make. Conservative MPs
said the broadcaster’s ‘biased’ coverage began on Radio 4’s flagship Today
programme and continued throughout the day on radio and television. Presenters
used solemn tones to inform listeners about Britain becoming isolated following
David Cameron’s refusal to sign a new treaty.
EU Treaty: after a feat close to genius, David
Cameron’s status is now as high as it has ever
been
Crucially, it was clear last night to all but our
most one-eyed and dedicated enemies — and to the BBC, whose biased
reporting has once again been a disgrace — that the British prime
minister had behaved with propriety. And that is because he set out to Brussels
48 hours ago bent on conciliation not confrontation.You will, of
course, conveniently ignore these attacks on the BBC's integrity (ha! don't make
me laugh!) as you always do. This, Jeremy, is the news that I and many others
are interested in, so why won't you discuss it?
Perhaps the Prime
Minister needs to remind the BBC it doesn't have a 'mission to explain' - that
is just an excuse for biased journalism - it has a mission to report both sides
of an argument. And "the other side" has been almost totally absent from the
BBC's reporting
A notable absentee from the BBC broadcasts I saw over the
weekend was Miliband. He seems to have vanished in to his own muddlement as he
tries to decide what to do and say. So, no change there then. And it is unusual
for him to have nothing to say, and even more unusual for the BBC not to give
him an uninterrupted and unquestioned platform from which to preach.
I am just so sorry that you and your colleagues find this all so unpalatable.
Next...
2)
MARKET STALLS - Can market stalls save our
high street? Mary Portas says yes. Find out more in this article from the
Guardian : The market in our nearest town seems to be thriving, but it has
been there for as long as anybody can remember, so I'm not actually sure it is
making any difference at all. You said on Ken's show that markets stalls "...
sometimes sell tat". Well, you would know about tat. Next...
3)
SOLAR PANELS - From today, the government’s withdrawn the subsidy to help
households fit solar panels. Did you lose out or get there in time? : On
the basis that I have never even considered buying solar panels my answer to
your question has to be: Neither. Next...
4)
NEW TECHNOLOGY -
Finally, has new technology made your life easier so that you no longer go to
the travel agents, use a phone box or develop your photos? What old technology
do you stubbornly stick to? Find out more in this article from the
Telegraph : I still use a camera that needs film. I have a mobile phone,
but it only makes calls and sends texts. However, new technology allows me to
lambast you for producing a crap radio show every day, so let us be thankful for
that. Using the Telegraph's list: I have never:
2, 8, 10, 12,
15, 20, 28, 30, 36, 37, 41. I still: 7, 16, 17, 19, 21, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 29,
32, 33, 35, 38, 39, 40, 44, 48, 49.
You said on Ken's show, "
You don't have to be furious to call
the show, but it helps". Well, doesn't that say it all.
The Jeremy
Vine Show - live from the Brussels Broadcasting Corporation
