"A pity they missed the bitch" - one BBC staffer's reaction to the 1984 Brighton bombing

That is just one of the explosive revelations in Robin Aitken's new book - Can We Trust The BBC?

Mr Aitken, a long-time BBC reporter, begins a serialisation of his book in tomorrow's Mail on Sunday with a recollection of how a BBC colleague reacted to the IRA's 1984 attack on Mrs Thatcher and her Cabinet:

"In 1984 I returned to BBC Scotland after covering the Tory conference in Brighton. The IRA had come close to assassinating Margaret Thatcher with a bomb and the country was in shock.  Apart, that is, from some of my BBC colleagues. "Pity they missed the bitch," one confided to me."

I'm sure most BBC journalists would disassociate themselves from such disgraceful remarks but they point to a wider and more systematic political bias within the publicly-funded BBC that Mr Aitken documents.  Mr Aitken remembers his time as a BBC correspondent in Scotland and the BBC's imbalanced coverage of the effect of Thatcherite reforms:

"If BBC impartiality meant anything, we would have balanced our story by emphasising the growing banking, oil and electronics industries.  Instead, we constantly lamented the closure of shipyards and fretted about the ailing Ravenscraig steelworks."

When Major replaced Thatcher there was rejoicing amongst BBC journalists but on the night of the 1992 General Election "the atmosphere in the newsroom was one of palpable deflation. A young female producer was in tears."

Aitken confronted Greg Dyke, the Labour donor who became the BBC's DG, about the "uncritical" coverage that the BBC gave early years, pre-Iraq war Blair.  Aitken remembers Dyke saying "Who was that f****r?" as he was leaving their meeting.

Mr Aitken's article recounts three very controversial statements made by BBC presenters:

1. Exhibit one: "What do they think [Arab people] feel about them? That we adore them for the way they murdered more than 3,000 civilians on September 11 and then danced in their hot, dusty streets to celebrate the murders? That we admire them for being suicide bombers, limb amputators, women repressors?" - Robert Kilroy-Silk
2. Exhibit two: "The Pope's approach to AIDS has been outrageous. He has called for a ban on the use of condoms in fighting the disease in Africa...The orders from Rome are verging on the wicked." - John Humphreys
3. Exhibit three: "The first guy I ever f***** without a condom gave me HIV.' Since I've been HIV-positive, I've had 'unsafe sex' more times than I can remember, often with men whose names I could not tell you now." - Nigel Wrench

All three were BBC journalists when they wrote those remarks but only one BBC journalist - Kilroy-Silk - lost his job.  The fact that the other two kept their jobs suggests that certain controversial views are acceptable within the publicly-funded Corporation.

Mr Aitken believes that on a whole range of issues the BBC is institutionally biased.  At a recent talk to the New Culture Forum he highlighted anti-business sentiment, support for higher taxation, multiculturalism, sympathy for Irish Republicanism, suspicion of Euroscepticism and, of course, the BBC's dominant new creed; hostility to America's approach to the war on terror.  An internal BBC seminar highlighted other biases only a few months ago.

I hope Tory media spokesman Hugo Swire (who has avoided the tough questions on the BBC) will read Mr Aitken's book as the extract in the Mail on Sunday contains a very useful (and modest proposal):

"It is time to give people a choice in Britain.  Perhaps the BBC should divest itself of a small part of its £3 billion a year income for an alternative service. Two per cent of revenues would give a newcomer £60 million a year for a speech-based rival to Radio 4.  The centre-right in Britain needs to be clear-sighted about its situation.  The BBC is a profoundly influential opponent of nearly everything conservatives believe, with the Right forced to accede feebly to the Left-liberal consensus.  If the time comes when British conservatives feel like fighting back, broadcasting policy might not be a bad place to start."

I'm off now to order the book on Amazon.

Comments

[Andrew Woodman]

Made me even more annoyed about having to pay my BBC poll tax next week. I also hope Hugo Swire has a read because his line on the BBC so far has been a little too fawning imo.

[Yet Another Anon]

Simple - place the media under regulation by the Intelligence Services and Security Services to filter out such pro fenian and unpatriotic sympathies, additionally Sinn Fein should have been banned and their assets all seized and their supporters imprisoned and or executed, the Good Friday agreement was yet another sellout of the Unionists as has been the Parades Commission, of course also the Anglo-Irish agreement as well - Sinn Fein and the IRA have literally been allowed to get away with murder and anyone who endorses it should be executed for treason, the same with those calling for the killing of British troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, they should be put to death for treason.

[Umbrella man]

I've ordered my copy!

...and to answer the Editor's question... I do not think that there is 1% chance of HS or DC agreeing to RA's very sensible alternative use of the BBC licence fee.

[Scotty]

The BBC are inherently biased as shown by their horrendous hatchet job on Michael Howard before the last election.
Their editing team were more concerned about trying to make a story out of 6 month old local issue for a tory councillor rather than the huge story surrounding the PM, or giving a Labour minister an easy interview when dating a member of the team. One of their main presenters goes on holiday with Jack McConnell and his family.
On the issue of the conservative councillor, how often do they run these kind of lead stories on Labour,Libdems or other minor parties? Correct me if I am wrong but I can't remember anything similar, although there are plenty of examples highlighted in local papers or on various political websites.
The headline quote is disgusting and more a reflection on the person who said it than anything else. I really want to see Labour kicked out of power by the ELECTORATE, but if something similar to Brighton happened, I would see it as an attack on my country's democracy not on an individual I may despise because of their politics.
Sky are not much better with their political journalists, Jon Craig a couple of weeks ago "sniggered" before replying to a news anchor's question about the conservatives.

[Opinicus]

Taking revenge on the BBC will be one of the chief pleasures of restored office for any true Conservative government.
Two possibilities. One privatise the BBC. This is the knee jerk response but leaves the journalists and Liberal producers in charge and capable of making huge pay cheques after privitisation. They would go on abusing us.

A much better way would be to Berlusconi the BBC. Just accept that it is politically biased and say that as they think this is OK with a new Labour government that when we get into power we have every right to bias it our way by sacking/sidelining the most biased executives, producers and governors and replacing them with our own placemen. To bring this off we should draw up a dossier listing every instance of bias but say nothing about it until after the election.

Of course the second pleasure will be fixing Murdoch..

[Jack Bains]

"BBC journalists" - Kilroy Silk was not a journalist, he was a presenter who was writing for a national newspaper. There are enough things to rant about when it comes to the BBC without having to make them up.

Nigel Wrench's comments are taken out of context - his work on HIV prevention and safe sex has been rightly commended by many people who actually know about the topic.

Can we have the full quote and a context for JH - but lets face it, comdoms for Africa are a good idea and the Pope is wicked for not letting them be used just so he can keep the Catholic birthrate up. Show me in the Bible where it says you can't use a condom and I'll change my mind. Meanwhile, there are plenty of Biblical references urging us to stop suffering.

[Jennifer Wells]

You can't get away with that Jack. Robert Kilroy-Silk's quote was in the context of 9/11. All were clearly controversial statements. The only difference is that BBC employees are free to be controversial if it fits the BBC mindset but they are stamped on if it is a right-wing or Christian view.

[Sally Roberts]

The sooner the compulsory tax we call the TV Licence is scrapped, the better!

[Denis Cooper]

Scotty @ 23:58 - "Sky are not much better with their political journalists".

Correct, ITV and Sky are more or less as biased as the BBC. Yes, the BBC is a special case because of the way it's funded, but clearly there's a wider problem which would not be solved by privatising the BBC. It's arguable that potentially the public have more leverage over a BBC funded through the licence fee than over a privatised broadcaster, but we haven't yet discovered how to exert that leverage.

[ToMTom]

Can we have the BBC Licence Fee de-criminalised ?

It surely would not take much legislation to make non-payment a civil offence without criminal penalty, would it ?

[ToMTom]

and to widen exemptions...

[ToMTom]

but lets face it, comdoms for Africa are a good idea and the Pope is wicked for not letting them be used just so he can keep the Catholic birthrate up

That implies Africa is Catholic and devoutly so and that HIV is only transmitted within marriage.

No doubt the Anglican areas and Muslim areas of Africa have little HIV infection and the Animist areas even less.

I would like to see your statistics Jack Bains. I had not realised South Africa and Zimbabwe were quite so Catholic...no doubt had NIgel Wrench been a good Catholic he would not have picked up HIV in one of his encounters on Hampstead Heath....but then again if the Pope had not told him to bareback....

[South East Blogger]

Take all the licence fee away from the BBC - set up instead a commissioning body to award a share of the licence fee to any broadcaster for producing public service broadcasting and other high quality programming including drama. It could be on a bid system, in part.

There would need to be clear guidlines, no adverts interupting the programmes, for instance though a little less obtrusive advertising could be allowed.

Care would be needed to avoid some of the disasters we have seen when public money gets involved in 'art' and film.

[Editor]

Just watched Andrew Marr interview Tony Blair on Sunday AM. Thirty minutes interview and not one question on cash-for-peerages. Quite extraordinary.

[Arthurian Legend]

As an alternative or additional proposal to privatising the BBC and/or giving some money to a centre-right broadcasting company (18DS!), what about requiring that a minimum of 45% of all BBC journalists and editors shall affirm that they are politically favourable to Conservative/libertarian politics and that no more than 55% shall declare socialist/left-liberal sympathies. That would at least help to even things up a bit.

The question then becomes how to monitor/enforce that, but that is a secondary issue. It is the principle of rough ideological parity that is important.

[Modern Conservative]

I hadn't realised that Conservative Home was full of so many dedicated ITV and Sky watchers.

Every time people talk about scrapping the license fee it makes me wonder what you're watching - I guess you must be Primeval fans rather than Doctor Who... :-)

Seriously we shoul be careful because when you attack the BBC it's like attacking the NHS. While people are irritated by parts of it they love other bits completely.

I for instance I love Radio 1, Doctor Who Radio 5, Spooks and much more. While each of our individual plans for reform would preserve the bits we like we all like different bits. No Eastenders viewer would vote for a Party with a plan that might threaten it - and thats about a third of the nation.

I believe that the BBC does have an institutional bias against small c and big C Conservaties. However anecdotal evidence citing individual incidents in an organisation as huge as the BBC does not take us forward. For that you need cooly calculated statistics.

[Sally Roberts]

Modern Conservative - I'm certainly not attacking the BBC per se - it does have some excellent programming - I'd just like to see it privatised and the Licence "Tax" scrapped! There must be a better way of financing it!

[Editor]

I think it's important Modern Conservative to make a distinction between the licence fee and the BBC. The licence fee allows a higher quality of programming and could fund the alternative to Radio 4 that Robin Aitken proposes. The BBC uses the licence fee to pay for generally left-liberal output. We need to find a way of defending the kind of things that the licence fee funds but we need to say that the monopoly that the Corporation has on licence fee revenue does not need to continue.

The postscript to this is that the licence fee will probably not continue to be the fairest way of funding a public service broadcasting budget but that's a discussion for another day.

[Modern Conservative]

"BBC uses the licence fee to pay for generally left-liberal output."

I that's an exaggeration, Editor. The majority of the programming across the it's many channels and radio stations isn't political at all.

Even if you tune in randomly to Radio 4 which is perhaps the most political of stations today you are as likely to hear Gardeners Question Time as Broadcasting House. What is it that an alternative to Radio 4 and Radio 5 should be providing?

Sally - I don't think the license fee is perfect but to misquote Churchill "it's the worst form of financing except all those others that have been tried from time to time".

I also think the quality of the programming is as a result of the security of funding that the licence fee provides as it allows them to take some risks. I don't think the recent revival in family orientated drama broadcasting would have happened without that security.

[simon]

If i got in No 10- i'd summon all the BBC top-knobs: DG , news editor etc, and let them know in no uncertain terms they are out of a job. Second, privatisation moves would follow. Third, a cross-party body would be set up to monitor the main news providers. If they step out of line, the top-brass would be dismissed from their positions, and all advertising revenue for a undisclosed period would be given to charity. Why the Conservative Party are playing soft-ball with the BBC- God knows!

[Alex Forsyth]

Let's privatise the BBC and have done with it. If they want to be a bunch of far-left nutters they can do it with someone else's money for a change.

I well recall the night of the bomb. I was in the lobby of the Grand talking with friends from Manchester less than two hours before it went off.

Then I staggered back to my guesthouse in Kemptown where, homophobe-sensitive Mr Hinchcliffe please note, I was sharing my (twin) bedroom with a friend who was well known to be gay and with whom I never had any problem whatsoever.

When the bomb went off we both woke up and he shouted 'What the hell was that?' I said 'probably a gas main' and went straight back to sleep. As soon as I woke up I put on the TV and saw the pictures of Tebbit being carried out.

That morning there was a real 'Dunkirk Spirit' in the conference hall, which I doubt today's wimp-friendly Conservative Party would ever be capable of recreating.

[Editor]

Modern Conservative: "The majority of the programming across the it's many channels and radio stations isn't political at all."

Not quite true. Listening to The Archers this morning you heard propaganda for not importing clothes over long distances. You mention Spooks - a great drama - but one that has been criticised for anti-Israeli themes. A key drama before Christmas was Born Equal - it was relentlessly anti-capitalist. If anything BBC Drama is more impactful and corrosive.

In terms of an alternative to Radio 4 I'd suggest output that was as like The Telegraph/ Times/ Mail as Radio 4 is like The Guardian/ Independent.

[Jack Bains]

Tim, rush upstairs and check there are no Reds under your bed. Can I suggets a series of hearings into the media where those who express liberal opinions are banned from working for the BBC?

[ToMTom]

I still have not heard a good reason why I as a taxpayer should fund prosecutions of those who do not have a TV licence.

Why can't Capita or the BBC pay the court costs and legal costs ? why should I pay VAT so people without a licence go to Magistrate's Court rather than County Court ?

[Umbrella man]

The way lefties like you defend the BBC Jack has nothing to do with the support you get from its output. Oh no.

[Alex Forsyth]

You mention Spooks - a great drama - but one that has been criticised for anti-Israeli themes.

BBC dramas seem to have dropped their once-favoured 'Masonic Conspiracy' slant since they started hiring Freemasons' Hall to stand in for everything from KGB/MI5 HQ to the House of Commons toilets.

All the other far-left favourites continue including, of course, "Israel is the new Nazi Germany".

Do you remember the trouble Joanna Trollope's former husband (sorry - forget his name but I sat with the pair of them at a dinner once and he was talking about it) had in getting the BBC to accept a Falklands drama which was not fanatically anti-Thatcher?

[Jack Bains]

Umbrella Man, at least I have the balls to go by my real name. I am also very proud not to be a lefty - I simply hate the way sections of the party I love get confused about the real issue. We have a silly regressive tax that makes little sense - forget the bias issue and play on real concerns - the money. You can argue about bias forever and no one will listen. Tell the electorate that they will not have to pay over £100 a year and they will vote for us and we get rid of this insult to the market that has no place in 21st century Britain.

[Editor]

Ian Curteis was the author, Alex, of The Falklands Play.

[Alex Forsyth]

Thanks Editor. I remember now.

I often listen to The Archers out in the car on business and it's very obvious that whenever some contentious issue is dragged in, the prejudices and attitudes represented are not those of rural "Middle England" but those of a BBC-style liberal elite.

The recent "Gay Wedding" had all but a couple of statutory reactionaries billing and cooing, and even one of those two recanted at the last minute.

In the village where I live I would be the nearest thing to a liberal on that particular issue, and I suspect my neighbours and I are rather more representative of village opinion countrywide.

[William Norton]

Modern Conservative:I also think the quality of the programming is as a result of the security of funding that the licence fee provides as it allows them to take some risks.

That's the error of post hoc ergo propter hoc. If you go back a few decades both BBC and ITV were making better programmes than either is now; and the logic behind the current funding arrangements is that eventually the BBC becomes to all intents a news organisation with a commissioning dept tacked on. A lot of the content is already bought-in - just read the end credits. The real story has been the utter collapse in programme-making standards on all channels, except that ITV has collapsed totally, whereas in some parts of the BBC it lingers on. The whole industry is infected with lazy thinking, formulaic approaches and gimmick-obsession.

(I'll slightly argue against myself and concede that the certainty of ITV's advertising revenue has declined, because there are more commercial outlets for advertising now. But even when there was only one BBC channel and one ITV channel they still had to earn a living up against a poll tax funded quango which did not.)

This argument is rather reminiscent of the old theory that once you let supermarkets operate it would inevitably eliminate everything except a lowest common-denominator pile-em-high-sell-em-cheap approach: which hasn't happened.

We know people are prepared to pay top dollar for top quality (or rather, enough of them are to make it a very worthwhile market in which to operate; I don't suppose Rolls Royce gets too bothered that Nissan shifts more cars). The demand is there. We also know, actually, that a commercial organisation can deliver a quality product: a lot of the best programmes on the box at the moment are imports from the much-derided US "tv hell". So why the hell is there no comparable UK supply? Just how spineless are these wimps?

[Modern Conservative]

Editor - Mmmhhh was it in character though? Archers characters are going to be in part political people. The ethics of importing goods from abroad (be it regarding carbon emissions or the working conditions of those producing the goods) has been discussed recently.

I'd hope it evens itself out - weren't the majority of Archers characters pro hunting?

Regarding Spooks one could argue that it's very existence as a programme exaggerates the threat of terrorism - which is hardly a left wing theme at all.

I don't know about Born Equal but I think capitlism is fairly secure.

I think asessing BBC Drama in the round is difficult because there is so much of it and certain amount of stuff we don't agree with has it's place anyway.

However I stand my point that the majority of BBC output isn't very political at all. Radio 1, Radio 2, Radio 3, BBC Sport, BBC Local Radio the other digital stations - most entertainment shows, Cbeebies, CBBC, and much more and definitely Gardners Question Time realy isn't political.

One further point regarding some of the other posts - 1984 was nearly 25 years ago. It was an awful thing to say but an indivduals comment from all that way back has no relevancy to today.

[Yet Another Anon]

The licence fee allows a higher quality of programming and could fund the alternative to Radio 4 that Robin Aitken proposes.
BBC Radio takes up a relatively small amount of money compared to BBC TV - the Licence Fee could be abolished with BBC being funded commercially with much of BBC Radio seperated out and either kept seperate or handed over to Channel 4 - privatise Radio 1 and Radio 2 and bits of Local Radio and the rest could easily be funded at £0.5bn pa.

[deborah]

Regarding Spooks one could argue that it's very existence as a programme exaggerates the threat of terrorism - which is hardly a left wing theme at all.

Have to disagree with you there. Terrorism provides a very nice "1984 - style" constant threat as an excuse to introduce more state control and keep the populus in check.

[Modern Conservative]

Yet Another Anon - Before you privatise R1 and R2 I suggest you listen to the commercial alternatives for a few days -which are awful

I also question why people who like classical music deserve an ad free station more than the majority of the nation who like a bit of pop and rock.

[Post-Modern Conservative]

Modern Conservative must be a strangely depoliticised creature if he can sit through Spooks without being antagonised by the pervasive leftist propagandising.

Do you ever wonder how the Left gains acceptance for its agendas? By winning the Culture War. And what is the Left's principal instrument for doing that? The BBC - not current affairs programmes(watched by only small numbers) but drama.

Quite a few episodes of Spooks were written by 1970s agitprop playwright Howard Brenton (of Romans in Britain infamy). My favorite example of Spooks brainwashing was the storyline that dealt with Islamist terrorists.

I was quite surprised because Spooks had been notably slow to pick up on a very obvious subject. Instead, we'd had MI5 dealing with anti-abortion terrorists etc, etc. When they did eventually get round to tackling the pre-eminent security threat of our times the plot twisted and turned until it was revealed that, lo and behold, the Islamists were really Mossad agents in disguise!

Millions of people, who are not particularly politically committed, are being spoonfed anti-western, anti-British and anti-conservative propaganda by those with an avowedly leftist agenda - and it's all happening at our expense.

That's the Culture War that Hugo Swire and Ed Vaizey should be preparing for. No point is saying anything before getting into power - if they do the BBC will try much harder to stop us getting into power - but the day after Cameron walks into 10 Downing Street, senior BBC management should be called in and have a dossier of political and cultural bias thrown at them and told "This stops now - or you lose the licence fee."

[Denis Cooper]

I still think that the problem centres on staffing, not financing. Of course it rubs salt in the wound that we have no choice about paying for the BBC, not if we want to watch any TV channel, but even if the BBC disappeared tomorrow we'd still be left with the other channels mainly staffed by people with a particular world view and largely incapable of keeping their personal political views to themselves and out of their work as broadcasters. Perhaps we should be looking at where these people come from, and how they become infected with this bias.

[AlexW]

I think that ToMTom's suggestion of decriminalisation of the licence fee is one of the best I've seen here in a long time.

If I refuse to pay my gas bill, electricity bill, or phone bill, the utility provider will not doubt sue me and get a county court judgment against me. Refuse to pay the licence fee, and you are subject to criminal sanctions.

[Modern Conservative]

William Norton -

I just don't recognise the situation you are describing. In the last few years all the innovation in this country has come from the BBC or from programmes they have commissioned from independant production companies (which they will still have a hand in).

Can you imagine Dragons Den on ITV, or for that matter The Apprentice, they couldn't have brought back Doctor Who, and Dancing on Ice is plainly a rip off of Strictly Come Dancing.

While BBC News is vast it is still only a portion of the organisation and I recognise has bias within it.

We get a tiny proportion of American TV and even then we see some pretty poor stuff. For every Desperate Housewifes or Lost there are multiple Sunset Beach's out there somewhere (I know Sunset Beach isn't still on).

Anyway this is probably a redundunt debate anyway as by the time the license fee is next renewed technology will have moved the goal posts considerably i suspect.

[Annabel Herriott]

I've just finished watching Jon Sopel doing his damnedest to screw DC. He did not manage it. But by golly he tried! Thats the first one to sideline when we get back!

[Modern Conservative]

Re Spooks - I now see the danger of mentioning something without havings seen all the episodes - I humbly withdraw that example.

[Alex Deane]

This book, and the systematic analysis of bias it contains, are to be welcomed.

There's quite a lot of momentum at the moment behind doing something about our disgraceful "national broadcaster." That momentum mustn't be allowed to fall away and I sincerely hope that a Conservative government would act very soon after taking office.

Modern Con @12:33 your withdrawal of that example is right, I think - I remember one of the first Spooks episodes - faced with the real concerns our world and nation faces, it was about fundamentalist, erm, Englishmen!

[malcolm]

I'm not sure you're right about there being obvious bias on ITV news as there is on BBC Denis Cooper. I've been looking at this for several months and whilst ITV is often a bit tabloidy and sometimes not very good as they are short of finance their attitude to subjects such as climate change and Iraq are not predictable as they are on the BBC. One easy way of checking is by looking at how Ceefax (BBC) or Teletext cover the same story or lokk at the news priorities.
Unlike others I do not favour privatising the BBC as much of its output quality is far and away better than that available on commercial channels. But I do believe that the governers should have real power and that an Oversight committee should be formed which would have the power to impose massive fines and staff dismisal should they believe the BBC to be biased.

[Post-Modern Conservative]

I worry much less about BBC News than I do about departments like Drama or Childrens TV. There IS bias in News but it is open to quite heavy internal scrutiny and external lobbying, especially if there's a party political component to the bias.

The real problem comes in areas where intellectually lazy, second rate luvvies peddle their student-style ideologically loaded assumptions onto the rest of the population. The biases listed by Robin are alive and well in the BBC (although, it should be said, slightly less all-pervasive than was formerly the case) and it only takes one politically committed, Brentonesque figure to influence the whole set up.

Occasionally, the Right wakes up to specific biases (pro-EU, anti-hunting) and lobbies the BBC. Eventually, we achieve a measure of success but it's an uphill struggle to shame the bureaucrats. However, generally the Right is far, far less ideologically vigilant than the Left. The biases of the Guardian remain the ruling assumptions of many within the BBC and only a much more proactive, organised and across-the-board attack from the Right will bear real fruit.

If we don't use this excellent new book as the springboard for such an attack we don't deserve to win.

[Scotty]

"Just watched Andrew Marr interview Tony Blair on Sunday AM. Thirty minutes interview and not one question on cash-for-peerages. Quite extraordinary."
Editor, it will be interesting to see if his next interview with Cameron, or an other shadow minister contains any reference to allegations about drugs! If he does not think that the on going enquiry into cash for honours with the arrests of key advisor's is worth mentioning, then unfounded allegations in an autobiography would be even less worthy of mention.

On a wider note regarding impartiality of the media in general you only have to look at the way that the Scottish political media operate to see just how biased they are to the conservative party.
Just look at the militant history of the Scottish newspaper industry and you have your answer. I believe that the comment made about Mrs Thatcher came from someone working in BBC Scotland.
After all the criticism the Scottish conservatives receive from certain Broadsheets up here, I was gob smacked to see two journalists from the worse offenders
giving their thoughts on a programme about the silent Libdems in the run up to the elections in May. They both had no criticisms of the party or its role as a coalition partner to Labour. In fact their opinion was that not even doing anything would be an okay strategy for them to pursue and "not to worry they would be all right come the election"!.
I think that it is almost inherent in their nature to write a regular damning critique of the conservatives while being less than balanced with other parties.
The media up here are to personally involved with the politicians and "balanced" journalism is the casualty of that relationship. I cannot take Paul Dacre's comments about political parties any more seriously than I can Kirsty Wark considering their close links to Brown and McConnell.

[Alex Forsyth]

I also question why people who like classical music deserve an ad free station more than the majority of the nation who like a bit of pop and rock.

Well there we do part company. Radio 3 is perhaps the one section of the BBC which requires statutory protection.

If the majority of the nation prefer aural sewage to music, that is their misfortune. How this rubbish is paid for, as long as I don't have to contribute, is of no consequence whatsoever.

The degree of civilisation of a nation is chiefly measured by its committment to art and culture. Those who are incapable of appreciating great art simply don't count.

[Alex Forsyth]

unfounded allegations in an autobiography

"Unfounded allegations" which DC says he is not prepared to deny.

[Dave Bartlett]

Can anyone recommend a non-BBC radio news programme?

I tend to listen to either PM or The World Tonight on Radio 4 but I'm interested in alternatives from commerical radio.

[Dave Bartlett]

Modern conservative said:

Yet Another Anon - Before you privatise R1 and R2 I suggest you listen to the commercial alternatives for a few days -which are awful

I also question why people who like classical music deserve an ad free station more than the majority of the nation who like a bit of pop and rock.

Radio 1 and 2 have many commercial alternatives, Radio 5 has Talk Sport.

Radio 4 has no commercial alternative I'm aware of, and Radio 3 is much more than just classical music so while Classic FM is an alternative for some of its programming, it's not a like for like comparison.

[Justin Hinchcliffe]

I've always advocated privatising the BBC - at least Mr. Forsyth agrees with me on something!

[Andy Stidwill]

Has anyone else noticed how awful BBC news is these days? I think "hectoring" would be the best word to describe it.

[Dave Bartlett]

Anthony Browne's The Retreat of Reason: Political Correctness and the Corruption of Public Debate in Modern Britain is also very good on the BBC's institutional bias.

[Justin Hinchcliffe]

Did anyone see the BBC reporter interviewing Noel Gallagher? She was nodding enthusiastically when he was bashing Blair and Cameron from the far-Left.

[Don Hoyle]

My own particular belweather is the BBC's implied metrication.

Time and again BBC News reports distances and areas in metric as though this country is totally metric. It is not.

It is a little-known sales trick that if you speak and act as if a particular goal is already achieved (missing out the persuasion bit in the middle) you effectively obtain a fait accompli.

Total metrication of Great Britain is another step on the path to subsumation within the SSRE (Soviet Socialist Republic of Europe). As that is a desire of neither the majority of posters on this site, as far as I can gather, nor the Conservative Party nor even most of the whole population, we ought to do something about it, if we care. We can act now i.e. not waiting until we form the next government.

Whenever I hear a reference to brainwashing metrication, I text 'phone or e-mail the BBC to complain. For instance the pointless 2090 sq km 'exclusion zone' around Bernard Matthews' dead turkey featured heavily on TV and radio news but especially the BBC News web-site. I e-mailed in that 800 square miles sounds far more relevant to normal people (even though I included myself, here) "and when was Lowestoft 27 kilometres from anywhere?" (the web-site described Holton, the location of the Matthews turkey farm, as 27 km south-west of Lowestoft). Whether it was me or no, I noticed that miles crept back in to news reports shortly after my complaint.

My back-stop is that the EU, the government, the local council and the BBC are my servants, not my masters telling me what to think or do or believe. I pay them to serve me. As they flagrently do not work to my benefit but towards fulfilling a (notso) hidden agenda of their own, I feel fully entitled to object in the strongest possible terms to what they get up to. I am not sure if I would think differently if it were the other way round.

To bring my post back to subject, I think it is very wrong of the publicly-funded BBC to act as the government's gauleiter (though Dr Who almost makes them untouchable. Almost.).

[Dave Bartlett]

Modern conservative said:

One further point regarding some of the other posts - 1984 was nearly 25 years ago. It was an awful thing to say but an indivduals comment from all that way back has no relevancy to today.

How about James Naughtie (of Radio 4's Today programme) "if we win the election" comment to Labour's Ed Balls.?

[ToMTom]

I also question why people who like classical music deserve an ad free station more than the majority of the nation who like a bit of pop and rock.

That is so obvious that you must be asking a rhetorical question.

Pop and Rock Music is COMMERCIAL - sales of these CDs, records, MP3s subsidise sales of Classical Music in Record Company business models.

It is known that one is a volume Commercial business and that other a limited volume Arts business

[Sean Fear]

There is much of value that is produced by the BBC. Just as there is much of value on the Guardian's website.

But ultimately, we need to think politically. We should not be providing our opponents with a State-subsidised platform to trash everything we believe in.

[Don Hoyle]

Hear, hear Sean Fear

[Dave Bartlett]

TomTom said:

Pop and Rock Music is COMMERCIAL - sales of these CDs, records, MP3s subsidise sales of Classical Music in Record Company business models.

Are you sure about that? I've always thought that Classical music was good business.

[Patsy Sergeant]

I think that 'Modern Conservative' either works for the BBC, or represents a large group of people in this country, who probably as a result of decades of democratic government - UNTIL NOW - have not felt it incumbent upon themselves to make judgements as to whether what they listen to or watch is constructed to influence them politically. Obviously I am NOT referring to political broadcasts as such, but to the mainstream of output in every 24hr period.

I suppose to illustrate one needs to define what political indoctrination means. Oh dear, yes, that sounds so 'over the top', but howabout if you consider the theme of a play, a sitcom, even a childrens programme. Someone - an editor or someone with a particular 'axe to grind', decides to 'slant' the script to illustrate particular angles of an idea, and then uses the characters or whatever to 'support' that idea. THAT is indoctrination and it DOES happen on the BBC.

I have also watched perforce programmes made for very young children where to be a beauty queen was advocated as the ultimate ambition, and the puppets of whatever they were, were quite snide about other puppets not present, which I do not think is appropriate teaching for youngsters!

[ToMTom]

Are you sure about that? I've always thought that Classical music was good business.

Posted by: Dave Bartlett | February 18, 2007 at 17:36

Not really - look at EMI or Sony Music. The rise of MP3 and iPOd has made them basket cases and sales of Classical CDs are not saving them.

Years back there was a plan in the music business to push CDs up to £20 each - they never managed it which just shows how far they misjudged their market

Go look at the sales figures for EMI, Warner, Sony-Bertelsmann and see what their top-selling Classical CDs are - in volume.

Naxos makes some money by keeping overheads low but Classical Music does not pay for companies with the cost base of EMI

[Matt Wright]

I think we are missing the point. Many young people who go into the media tend to have somewhat "leftist" views of the world. Once in this culture they reinforce each others views. Trying to stop the perceived bias by vetting and sackings etc ( as suggested in various posts) will achieve nothing as plenty more will fill the spaces left. We have to win the culture war by encouraging a new generation of more open-minded centre right supporters,

Matt

[Derek Johnson]

I am part way through Aitken's long-awaited and much trailed book.

It is not disappointing....

It is confirming everything I thought about the BBC and it will be a travesty if his book does not have the same impact in this country as Bernard Goldberg's "Bias" has in the States.

Aitken should be applauded for this book and every Conservative should rush out to buy a copy tomorrow.

NO, I DO NOT TRUST THE BBC!

[Alex Deane]

I don't know if the book covers this or not, but this discussion brought to mind a recent revelation from the Carter Library.

The BBC contacted the Americans and asked for assistance from the Carter Administration in their opposition to Thatcher's proposed cuts in the Beeb budget (which were pretty significant).

They thought Carter & Co would help because of the Beeb's work promoting democracy etc internationally. Indeed, the NSC et al thought this issue a significant one. I'm not necessarily criticising anything. But it's interesting. And although it's from 1979 so earlier than the time of the repugnant "a pity they missed the bitch" line, it may give some insight into one of the reasons for such a feeling ...

You can see the relevant document from the Carter archives here:

http://www.margaretthatcher.org/archive/arcdocs/791004_BBCExt.pdf

[Peter Hatchet]

The BBC are an absolute disgrace.

The licence fee (my god, are we still having to pay to "licence" our TVs in the 21st century??) should be scrapped and replaced with a subscription per channel.

I'm sick of their politicking.

[Dave Bartlett]

TomTom said:

Classical Music does not pay for companies with the cost base of EMI

Nothing to do with the BBC but Courtney Love penned an artist's view of the the recording industry that shows the big music companies in a very poor light.

[Patsy Sergeant]

In this image conscious age, something that perhaps CCHQ should pay attention to, is the 'idea' of 'socialism' or left of centre political ideas - think the Spanish Civil War and its appeal for so many English university students of its day. Men particularly like the 'ideal' - saving the poor, working for total equality, 'fighting the good fight', the romance is in the 'idea'. Of course men do 'do', they go off to fight for a 'cause' from the Crusaders onwards.

To get back to pragmatic reality I think that socialism holds a romantic cache that attracts people like luvvies, partly because it sounds an OK sort of politics to appear to believe in. What is not even considered, is that nowadays no political party can afford to put the socialist principle anywhere but at the top of the agenda, but the media and principly the BBC, do a fantastic job of mudslinging in order to divert attention away from any other party than their chosen socialist ideal.

David Cameron is often called an ideas man, but straightaway his ideas are belittled. Brown waffles on about'poverty in Africa', but essentially he behaving like a classic socialist voicing ideas, that sound good. In fact you could say that this entire ......government got in on a spurious 'ideal' mantra - tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime!!

[Alex Forsyth]

Many young people who go into the media tend to have somewhat "leftist" views of the world. Once in this culture they reinforce each others views.

That's very true Matt Wright. It applies equally to the type of young person who is sucked into the world of the Tory Reform Group or whatever other other leftist organiation now dominates the world of the Camerloons

As for getting people like, presumably, you to infiltrate the BBC it's happened. His name was Nick Robinson, he was a fully-fledged member of the TRG, and he hasn't looked back since.

Seems the "Tory" left are part of the problem

[Justin Hinchcliffe]

Snzzzzzzzzzzzzz

[Serf]

The idea of decriminalising licence fee evasion is superb.

By the way, if you don't buy a licence until they call around (they have no right of entry) you can get away without subsidising the enemy, at least for a while. If everyone did it, it would put a huge hole in their budget, and the business model would fall to pieces.

We really are sheep, to continue to play their game.

[Alex Forsyth]

Justin, are you suffering from a resident blowfly?