"A director of HSBC, Rona Fairhead, also heads the BBC Trust, which governs the BBC. But Fairhead’s appointment seemed to go against the whole idea of "trust": While working in the HSBC risk department, Fairhead was responsible for overseeing the department that enabled drug gangs and terrorists to launder millions of pounds. Fairhead continues to receive a salary of over half a million pounds from HSBC, along with the shares she holds in the bank – all of which amounts to far more than the sizable salary she already gets from the broadcasting corporation. Fairhead has denied all accusations that her dual roles helped influence any BBC content.

Really, the corruption is breathtaking.

Bias, Bullshit, Conspiracy.


Tory Spin Doctor

"Steel then tries to excuse Montague’s appalling silence as Israel’s defense minister took over the BBC airwaves by claiming that Montague was badly briefed by researchers and didn’t have much time to make the recording."
Amena Saleem, Electronic Intifada

"This was the sole Gaza content on the BBC home page this morning."

Was it yesterday or the day before? I heard Norman Smith, the BBC's "chief political correspondent" refer to the union UNITE as "Labour's paymaster". I wonder if he will ever refer to the multi-passported Lord Ashcroft as the Conservative's paymaster?
That's Lord Ashcroft who WASN'T involved in drug smuggling or money laundering.

http://thinkingoutquiet.wordpress.com

Jeremy Paxman leaving the BBC - Director General Tony Hall called him "a rare and dazzling talent". Imagine how pathetic the rest of the BBC crew are. "Rare" probably means he's not a paid up member of the Conservative Party (though one can never be sure).

COME TO SUNNY GAZA says the BBC hack, and it isn't satire.

"Somehow he manages not to see, as he admires the view, the Israeli gunboats that are ever present on the horizon, waiting to shoot at Gaza’s fishermen as they struggle to make a living for their families.
Nor, at any point during his visit, does he spot the Israeli warships which patrol the waters. And he fails to see or even hear the drones which constantly buzz in the skies above Gaza, causing fear and uncertainty in those below."

Amena Saleem

What do you know? The BBC commissioned an academic to prepare a report on its record as an impartial reporter. He found that it was biased to the right. The report didn't suit so was shelved.
Now the professor has decided to let the public know what the BBC and its government paymasters don't want us to know. So the voice of reaction has had to react. It has done so in the manner those of us who complain about its bias are used to -

“BBC News aims to provide clear, impartial and balanced coverage across all output to represent a range of views. Inevitably, there may be disagreements over the level of prominence given to any story. We are editorially independent and do not bow to pressure from political parties.”

And that's that.
Still the truth will out in time.

"The serious criticism by a distinguished media professor suggests that the BBC has compromised its impartiality by depending too heavily on sources from business, the media, law and order and politics.
By contrast, ITV and Channel 4 make much greater use of sources from academia, medicine, science and non-governmental organisations"

"Cardiff research found that 50 per cent of BBC sources came from politics, business, law and order and media, compared to 10 per cent from the knowledge-based professions and civic groups. Business sources accounted for 11.1 per cent of the total on the BBC, but only 3.8 per cent on ITV and 2.2 on Channel 4."

More here

I often try to listen to the 'Today' programme on BBC4. I usually change stations within fifteen minutes, disgusted by the blatant right-wing bias, and presentation of the government line on any topic as the reasonable option.
One of Today's gimmicks is to have the programme produced and presented occasionally by non-journalist guests. This is in line with what Marina Hyde has dubbed 'celebocracy', the line that anything can be improved by the towering presence of someone famous in another field, entertainment being favoured. No doubt the BBC ascertains that the guest producer is "a safe pair of hands", i.e., a right-winger or a political naïf.
However, something went awry earlier this month. The guest was the recording artist P.J.Harvey who introduced taboo subjects and people on the BBC's blacklist. Thus my prediction that John Pilger would never be allowed to broadcast from a BBC studio has had to be discarded
So, Ms. Harvey, your relationship with the BBC is subject to revision. I hope someone keeps a check on how often Ms. Harvey's recordings are aired on the corporation's music programme's following her act of subversion.

Predictably, reactionary voices bewailed afterwards that the BBC had broadcast 'left-wing tosh' and 'liberal drivel'. Nick Robinson, the BBC's 'impartial' political editor, took particular exception to the contribution by John Pilger, while the pro-war Murdoch employee David Aaronovitch, a Times columnist with a penchant for wagging a warning finger at Glenn Greenwald, objected to being 'lectured at in a news programme'

That's Nick Robinson the out and proud Conservative Party member, and Aaronovitch, the self-proclaimed socialist who is well paid for spewing out anti-left propaganda.

'For the 21st-century British Right, though – used to seeing their sense of what is important go largely unchallenged in day-to-day political broadcasting – the programme was an outrage. [...] Since this year's group of guest editors also included such establishment figures as Dame Eliza Manningham Buller, former head of MI5, and Anthony Jenkins, CEO of Barclays Bank, there are clearly no grounds for complaint from the Right about the overall balance of this year's holiday editions.'

(Medialens)

Another offense to add to the BBC's rap sheet - theft.
Once more they are caught misusing film for propaganda purposes, but this time with stolen property.

Poor old BBC - a worldwide Million Mask March on the 5th November. Cops "kettling" marchers in London; Buckingham Palace a protesters' target. And the poor old Beeb knew nothing about it. Or did it suppress all news of the event?

I just checked the BBC News website; it gets a mention there. But the thousands who blocked Parliament Square have been whittled down to a "few hundred", and no mention of the march being a worldwide event. Well done, thou good and faithful servant of the ruling class.

BBC Trust promotes then demotes (almost) the Working Definition of Antisemitism
Jews sans frontieres

The facebook group called Republicans Against Biased BBC Coverage Of Royal News And Trivia
has written a letter of complaint to the BBC, viz. -

There are an estimated 15 million supporters of the UK republican movement, hardly a fringe group/audience I am sure you would agree ?!!! Bearing this in mind the Public Accounts Committee will be asking senior Buckingham Palace aides questions about royal spending. Just recently you covered quite substantially on your main TV news bulletins the fact that Prince Charles read out one of his favourite poems, you even went to the cringeworthy lengths of showing him reading it out. As you will appreciate the majority of the UK population (not just republicans) would find this royal trivia not newsworthy in anyway whatsoever. As you may (or may not as it would seem !!!!) be aware there are a number of ongoing issues with the royal finances, in particular the tax dodging that both the Queen and Prince Charles engage in and also the creaming off of profits from public assets (the Duchies) that they also engage in, however the main issue being the overall cost of the upkeep of the monarch and her taxpayer funded family. The BBC are quite clearly in the pockets of the palace PR machine because never are the more negative news items about the royal finances featured in your main news bulletins, they are usually (if at all) hidden away on your online news pages. Could you kindly explain why the BBC favour giving coverage to royal trivia as opposed to the more negative real news items about these royals? Will you also be covering the PAC questioning and findings?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/

"When a team from the BBC Panorama programme visited Chile in November 1973, staff at the British embassy secured them 'maximum co-operation from the junta'.
"The embassy was optimistic about the slant of the documentary, which included interviews with members of the Anglo-Chilean business community speaking approvingly about the coup. A British embassy official wrote: 'The balance of the programme should be 60 to 75% favourable to the new regime.' The embassy was not so pleased with a World in Action Granada TV team that arrived at the same time. The same official wrote: 'I gathered that the WIA producer … came to cover torture and shootings … Granada's activities were certainly known to the junta whose press secretary told me that they had been seeing 'things they should not see'.' An FCO official back in London scrawled on the letter: 'Ominous news about the World in Action film'."
(Guardian)

Good old "World in Action"; same old right-wing BBC.

The Angry Arab News Service/وكالة أنباء العربي الغاضب: BBC Middle East website

The Angry Arab News Service/وكالة أنباء العربي الغاضب: BBC Middle East website: "Raffi Berg was promoted to head the BBC website's Middle East desk earlier this month, having already worked as a journalist wit...

BBC censors the Smashing of Guardian’s Hard Drives