Melanie McDonagh Melanie McDonagh

The BBC’s obsession with diversity has ruined Gardeners’ Question Time

There’s nothing wrong with radio continuity announcers; one is a friend of mine and he’s very sharp. But the doubts about whether reading the news and the jokes between one item and another is a qualification to present programmes that actually require you to know what you’re talking about remain, now that Kathy Clugston has completed her first session as presenter of Gardeners’ Question Time.

She’s got nice diction, Kathy, but as a gardener she hasn’t got a clue – and in fairness she did let this be known at the outset. She started off by getting her audience at Tiptree in Essex to shout out – on the basis they live near a jam-manufacturers – whether they put jam or cream on their scones first. I don’t think the mellifluous Eric Robson, the man she replaced, would have done anything quite so rubbish.

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