If BBC staff could be open about their views, we would all be better off

How should our unelected and unaccountable television and radio presenters and interviewers conduct themselves, so as to avoid the continual allegations of political bias?

Last week, in this magazine, Charles Moore had a bit of fun at the expense of Jim Naughtie, the Today programme presenter, for having balked in a rather sententious manner when a guest on the programme described him as ‘a liberal’. Jim apparently replied, ‘You have no idea what my political views are’, provoking Charles into a few paragraphs of typically elegant and dry parody: ‘As Bagehot must have pointed out somewhere, the Naughtie can constitutionally have no views of his own and acts only on the advice of his ministers (or “researchers”, as they are called).’

Well, quite. It is truly ludicrous that we should be expected to believe that our television and radio journalists, even those belonging to the state broadcaster, are devoid of personal political opinion and are mere ciphers for a glistening stream of untrammelled, objective, truthful inquiry. The reverse is true: they are (for the most part — and certainly including Jim) intelligent, extremely well-informed individuals who, of course, have strong views about pretty much everything, no matter how tidily they put such baggage aside on air. But they are forced into the untenable position of having to gainsay such an obvious fact at least in part because of the bias and inconsistency in the arguments of the likes of Charles and others on the political Right: they wish to have it both ways. Let me explain.