The BBC is biased
There has been some debate about whether the BBC bias is provable.
It is.
There is an excellent report from the Centre of Policy Studies from which I draw out several items starting with the introduction to Gordon Brown (Labour conference 2004) on Today. It was quick and punchy;
***
John Humphrys: When Gordon Brown rises to his feet here in Brighton, to make his big conference speech today, he will do so as the longest serving chancellor for nearly two centuries. And, as the most successful chancellor the Labour Party has ever had. You’d have trouble finding a delegate here or an economist anywhere who would argue with that.
****
Setting aside the extraordinary implication that every economist in the world links Gordon Brown with success this compares with the introduction to Oliver Letwin after the Tory conference (2004) on Today. It was a long ramble of which elements below....
.... you don’t get away with that any more. The media, think tanks like the Institute for Fiscal Studies – they’ll expose unaffordable plans. So the first question for any party is – do the sums add up.... So on Friday, the Conservatives promised to quote to spend 2.7 billion pounds more than Labour on defence. This sounded implausible as the Conservatives are planning to restrain defence spending.... ....It brings to mind an old war joke – that Hitler asked his key scientists to find a way of making margarine out of manure. The scientists went away with this impossible task and after a long delay Hitler demanded to know what progress they had made.....
*****
And in the interviews themselves....
The longest that Oliver Letwin was allowed to speak for uninterrupted was 112 words, compared to 342 words for Gordon Brown. Michael Howard’s longest uninterrupted passage was 211 words and David Davis’ only 153.8 Yet Tony Blair was able to speak for 375 words unchecked, closely followed by Gordon Brown with 342 words and John Prescott 286.
It does make you think that even John Prescott can get away with 286 words uninterupted without falling over.
*****
Monitoring the output of the Today programme from that day until the end of the first week of formal campaigning (15 April) shows a remarkable disparity in the studio interview airtime allocated to Labour compared to the Conservatives: in these two weeks of the campaign, Labour spokesmen had a total of 37 minutes 49 seconds to make their economic case, compared to just 16 minutes 30 seconds for the Conservatives. This was patently unfair. The Labour spokesmen had far longer to make their case and more opportunities to attack the Conservatives. The following analysis suggests that the disparities in editorial approach and treatment were marked – and all in favour of Labour...... (cont.)
****
Similar discrepancies appear when examining the lead stories in the national press with those that the programme decided to run with. Of two front page stories in The Times over these two weeks that were directly critical of the Government, the Today programme pursued neither. On 11 April, the lead story, “Labour to halt postal vote fraud but only after election” did not feature anywhere in Today’s political or election coverage – despite the scandals in Labour constituencies in Birmingham and Blackburn. On 13 April, the day of the Labour Manifesto launch, the front page of The Times read, “Doctors who backed Blair desert Labour”. Today did not run this story. Nor was it raised in a long interview that day with the former Health Secretary, Alan Milburn. In contrast, at the start of the second week of the campaign, “Howard faces flak as Labour stretches poll lead” was the front page article in The Times. To this, Today reacted. It was the subject of the 6.32 am political two-way interview, of a stringent interview with Liam Fox, and of amused gossip by an election panel peopled by two left-of-centre journalists (Harold Evans and Piers Morgan), along with the once Labour Party card-carrying holder and now Liberal Democrat defector former Director-General of the BBC Greg Dyke.
It is.
There is an excellent report from the Centre of Policy Studies from which I draw out several items starting with the introduction to Gordon Brown (Labour conference 2004) on Today. It was quick and punchy;
***
John Humphrys: When Gordon Brown rises to his feet here in Brighton, to make his big conference speech today, he will do so as the longest serving chancellor for nearly two centuries. And, as the most successful chancellor the Labour Party has ever had. You’d have trouble finding a delegate here or an economist anywhere who would argue with that.
****
Setting aside the extraordinary implication that every economist in the world links Gordon Brown with success this compares with the introduction to Oliver Letwin after the Tory conference (2004) on Today. It was a long ramble of which elements below....
.... you don’t get away with that any more. The media, think tanks like the Institute for Fiscal Studies – they’ll expose unaffordable plans. So the first question for any party is – do the sums add up.... So on Friday, the Conservatives promised to quote to spend 2.7 billion pounds more than Labour on defence. This sounded implausible as the Conservatives are planning to restrain defence spending.... ....It brings to mind an old war joke – that Hitler asked his key scientists to find a way of making margarine out of manure. The scientists went away with this impossible task and after a long delay Hitler demanded to know what progress they had made.....
*****
And in the interviews themselves....
The longest that Oliver Letwin was allowed to speak for uninterrupted was 112 words, compared to 342 words for Gordon Brown. Michael Howard’s longest uninterrupted passage was 211 words and David Davis’ only 153.8 Yet Tony Blair was able to speak for 375 words unchecked, closely followed by Gordon Brown with 342 words and John Prescott 286.
It does make you think that even John Prescott can get away with 286 words uninterupted without falling over.
*****
Monitoring the output of the Today programme from that day until the end of the first week of formal campaigning (15 April) shows a remarkable disparity in the studio interview airtime allocated to Labour compared to the Conservatives: in these two weeks of the campaign, Labour spokesmen had a total of 37 minutes 49 seconds to make their economic case, compared to just 16 minutes 30 seconds for the Conservatives. This was patently unfair. The Labour spokesmen had far longer to make their case and more opportunities to attack the Conservatives. The following analysis suggests that the disparities in editorial approach and treatment were marked – and all in favour of Labour...... (cont.)
****
Similar discrepancies appear when examining the lead stories in the national press with those that the programme decided to run with. Of two front page stories in The Times over these two weeks that were directly critical of the Government, the Today programme pursued neither. On 11 April, the lead story, “Labour to halt postal vote fraud but only after election” did not feature anywhere in Today’s political or election coverage – despite the scandals in Labour constituencies in Birmingham and Blackburn. On 13 April, the day of the Labour Manifesto launch, the front page of The Times read, “Doctors who backed Blair desert Labour”. Today did not run this story. Nor was it raised in a long interview that day with the former Health Secretary, Alan Milburn. In contrast, at the start of the second week of the campaign, “Howard faces flak as Labour stretches poll lead” was the front page article in The Times. To this, Today reacted. It was the subject of the 6.32 am political two-way interview, of a stringent interview with Liam Fox, and of amused gossip by an election panel peopled by two left-of-centre journalists (Harold Evans and Piers Morgan), along with the once Labour Party card-carrying holder and now Liberal Democrat defector former Director-General of the BBC Greg Dyke.
posted by Richard John | 3:14 pm
<< Home