Make Britain great again, let's cull the BBC

[LondonManc]

How about this debacle...

Do you not feel that the BBC screwed that one up?

Ah, yes. There's a longer list, I was just citing a few examples.

They did and are admitting they did and are going to great lengths to apologise for it. Whereas your favorite daily fail will only do so after being convicted and forced to do that

*cough* Sir Cliff *cough*

[hairymouse]

Have any of you ever watched Fox news? All you need is a few minutes of viewing for it to be obvious what a bad idea this is. You'll also realise why this idea is so attractive to both Conservatives and Murdoch.

In a few years we'll have a media and political landscape that looks like America, with each half of the population living in a different bubble to the other and malevolent actors controlling fictional news. The Americans are on the cusp of literally ending democracy with %40 + of the population in enthusiastic support. If we emasculate the BBC, we'll be in exactly the same position in 10 years.

[Mordac]

BBC should get same funding from general taxation without insane separate TV tax

This*. And they should sack at least half their management. And of those that remain, sack all those who take 3 weeks to make a simple decision such as the font size on the menu of an intranet page. If you ever get offered a gig at the BBC, turn it down - if only for the sake of your sanity. Their contract with Siemens** was written by a small child with no commercial awareness whatsoever, so they waste eye-popping amounts of time and money getting the smallest things done. And never, ever go to any meetings. You will be overcome by a desperate need to punch somebody...

*But not the same funding - they have the public sector mentality that if you give them £3bn they will do their utmost to spend it all, whether sensibly or not. Usually not. And since the licence fee covers Freeview as well, a subscription model is impossible without separate funding for Freeview.

**I don't know if they're still there, I'm going back a dozen years or so. But still in occasional therapy...

[LondonManc]

Have any of you ever watched Fox news? All you need is a few minutes of viewing for it to be obvious what a bad idea this is. You'll also realise why this idea is so attractive to both Conservatives and Murdoch.

In a few years we'll have a media and political landscape that looks like America, with each half of the population living in a different bubble to the other and malevolent actors controlling fictional news. The Americans are on the cusp of literally ending democracy with %40 + of the population in enthusiastic support. If we emasculate the BBC, we'll be in exactly the same position in 10 years.

You mean they're not already?

[unixman]

The BBC has wandered so far from its charter that it will never find its way back. A unidirectional hiring policy over the last 4 decades has left it with a staff composed almost entirely of Guardian readers and left-leaning commentators.

Guardian readers are fine and I have nothing against them, so don't come at me. And I think the Beeb has genuinely tried to be more balanced over the last few years. But you have no chance of achieving balance if all your staff vote for the same party. What can they do? Sack half the corporation and replace them with Conservative voters? Impossible and probably illegal.

I would love the BBC to recover, achieve political balance and be proud to follow its charter. But there is no hope of that, unfortunately.

[unixman]

BBC should get same funding from general taxation without insane separate TV tax

To those making this reasonable argument, no, because it would make the BBC a true state broadcaster, with independence from government reduced/lost.

[TestMangler]

The BBC has wandered so far from its charter that it will never find its way back. A unidirectional hiring policy over the last 4 decades has left it with a staff composed almost entirely of Guardian readers and left-leaning commentators.

Guardian readers are fine and I have nothing against them, so don't come at me. And I think the Beeb has genuinely tried to be more balanced over the last few years. But you have no chance of achieving balance if all your staff vote for the same party. What can they do? Sack half the corporation and replace them with Conservative voters? Impossible and probably illegal.

I would love the BBC to recover, achieve political balance and be proud to follow its charter. But there is no hope of that, unfortunately.

So, you're implying that Laura Kuensberg, for example, votes Labour ? F**k off....

[WTFH]

So, you're implying that Laura Kuensberg, for example, votes Labour ? F**k off....

Or Andrew Neil or Jeremy Paxman

Or that Farage got too little air time

[darmstadt]

http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/guideline...partiality.pdf

https://www.cps.org.uk/files/reports...erLathamfc.pdf

A study by Cardiff University academics, funded by the BBC Trust, was published in August 2013, examining the BBC's coverage of a broad range of issues. One of the findings was the dominance of party political sources. In coverage of immigration, the EU and religion, these accounted for 49.4% of all source appearances in 2007 and 54.8% in 2012. The data also showed that the Conservative Party received significantly more airtime than the Labour Party. In 2012 Conservative leader David Cameron outnumbered Labour leader Ed Miliband in appearances by a factor of nearly four to one (53 to 15), while Conservative cabinet members and ministers outnumbered their Labour counterparts by more than four to one (67 to 15).

...


In the run up to the 2019 UK General Election, the BBC was accused by some Labour politicians and pundits of coverage that favours the ruling Conservative Party. For instance, they took issue with a clip used from a BBC Question Time leader's special episode where the part showing audience laughter at Prime Minister Boris Johnson's response to a certain question was edited out. BBC officials addressed the issue and admitted their mistake. Furthermore, the BBC was accused of subjecting Jeremy Corbyn and Jo Swinson to a gruelling interview by Andrew Neil but not requiring Boris Johnson to go through the same and arranging it beforehand. Guardian columnist Owen Jones also took issue with the BBC rescinding its policy to not let Johnson be interviewed by Andrew Marr unless he goes through one with Neil. The BBC defended its decision to waive the requirement by citing national interest amidst a terror attack in London on 29 November 2019.


...


... Robbie Gibb, who edited the BBC’s political programmes, has been appointed Theresa May’s Director of Communications ...


The BBC’s political output has long had more than its fair share of Conservatives in prominent roles – none more so than Andrew Neil, who previously worked for the Conservative’s Research Department and who now chairs the holding company that owns the Daily Telegraph and the Spectator.


...


May’s predecessor David Cameron appointed the then head of BBC TV News, Craig Oliver, to be his Director of Communications and before him the then Conservative Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, appointed Guto Hari, a BBC political correspondent, to head of his media team.

[JozefBlofeld]

Or Andrew Neil or Jeremy Paxman

Or that Farage got too little air time

Or former BBC Chairman and ex-Tory MP Lord Patten.

Or previous political editor Nick Robinson - At university he was President of the Oxford University Conservative Association in 1985.

......................and too many others to bother mentioning.