Conservatives have long worried about the BBC and this year has provided new evidence for the BBC’s unreliability: The internal seminar revealed that the Corporation itself admitted serious biases; There was the BBC’s staggering and arrogant refusal to grant one serious interview to Robin Aitken after the 25-years-BBC-journalist exposed Corporation bias in his authoritative book; […]
The Centre for Policy Studies is publishing a paper tomorrow, Confessions of a Reformed BBC Producer, by Antony Jay, co-writer of Yes, Minister. Robin Aitken, a more recent employee of the BBC who has spoken out on its institutional bias with his book, has yet to be interviewed about it by the BBC. The Telegraph […]
In a speech to the British Phonographic Industry last night, David Cameron promised action against copyright theft and to extend the copyright term to seventy years. In return he urged the industry to be more socially responsible in its output. He asked his audience a series of questions: "Does music help create, rather than just […]
In my live blog of today’s historic PMQs I wrote this: "In what has to be one of the lowest points in public service broadcasting BBC2’s Daily Politics coverage stops halfway through the Prime Minister’s concluding remarks to cut to Wimbledon." Shadow Culture minister Ed Vaizey MP has just emailed me this reaction to the […]
Channel 4 is currently defying calls from the Conservatives and friends of Princess Diana to axe a programme which contains reportedly graphic images of the Paris car crash that killed her nearly ten years ago. Ed Vaizey MP, our broadcasting spokesman, told ConservativeHome: "We think Channel 4 has crossed a line by showing the inside […]
In an unguarded moment the BBC Radio Five Live’s Jane Garvey remembers how the BBC greeted Labour’s 1997 victory with champagne. Listen here. And courtesy of Biased BBC, here is the transcript: "Ah, well – I had been up for most of the night but I was doing this Five Live breakfast programme with our […]
Where New Labour wooed the Murdoch empire, Project Cameron woos the BBC. Project Cameron often appears careful not to take up positions that will antagonise the Corporation on its own future, climate change or the war on terror. In his unmissable column on the press (for The Independent) Stephen Glover notes how the wooing of […]
The appointment of Sir Michael Lyons as the Chairman of the new BBC Trust follows the appointment in recent years of Labour supporters Gavyn Davis as BBC Chairman and Greg Dyke as Director General – not to mention his predecessor Lord Birt who went to work for Tony Blair after leaving the BBC. Lyons is […]
On yesterday’s BritainAndAmerica blog I identified BBC coverage of external threats as one of ten key vulnerabilities of our country in these early years of the war on terror. When our nation’s dominant (and publicly-funded) broadcaster subjects failings of coalition forces to incessant scrutiny but offers little public education of the threat posed by regimes […]
I recently took part in a Radio Five Live discussion about the BBC. I was the critic of the BBC and someone from The Guardian (naturally) was its defender. Sounds balanced? Not a bit of it. Throughout the whole interview I was intensely questioned and interrupted while The Guardian’s representative was given softball questions. I […]
Yesterday ConservativeHome drew attention to the fact that Robin Aitken, author of an insider’s account of bias at the Corporation, had not been granted a single interview by his former employer. Five national newspapers and many blogs have focused on Mr Aitken’s powerful expose of the BBC’s failings but the Corporation has arrogantly chosen to […]
Tonight at 9pm on 18DoughtyStreet.com you’ll be able to watch a one hour long interview about bias at the BBC. The interview is with Robin Aitken – 25 years a BBC journalist and author of the devastating Can We Trust The BBC? book. Robin has written for 18DoughtyStreet.com today about the fact that the Corporation […]
On Saturday ConservativeHome reported the news that Robin Aitken’s book on BBC Bias had been launched. Watch this 15 minute video from 18DoughtyStreet.com for an overview of the book’s main themes. You can embed this video on your blog by getting the code from here.
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 […]
"Today’s Tories are obsessed by the BBC. They saw what its attack dogs did to Hague, Duncan Smith and Howard. Cameron’s cuddly blend of eco-politics and work/life balance, his embrace of Polly Toynbee, a columnist who loathes everything Conservatism stands for, but is a totemic figure to the BBC, his sidelining of Thatcherism and his […]