Bbc

Thursday

Martin Vander Weyer

Rona Fairhead will be good for the BBC – but who was so keen to nobble her rival?

Hats off to Rona Fairhead, the former Financial Times executive who will succeed Lord Patten as chairman of the BBC Trust. It requires a brave spirit to take on this poisonously politicised role — and Fairhead starts with the disadvantage that everyone thinks they know the roll call of candidates who might have been preferred but declined to apply, including her own former boss Dame Marjorie Scardino, for whose job as head of Pearson, the FT’s parent, Fairhead was passed over last year. But a mole tells me she’s ‘as steely as she’ll need to be’; and leading ladies of the non-executive circuit (she’s on the boards of HSBC and

Tuesday

Martin Vander Weyer

The real reason behind the BBC’s kicking of Nick Prettejohn

This is an extract from this week’s Spectator. Subscribe here: Hats off to Rona Fairhead, the former Financial Times executive who will succeed Lord Patten as chairman of the BBC Trust. It requires a brave spirit to take on this poisonously politicised role — and Fairhead starts with the disadvantage that everyone thinks they know the roll call of candidates who might have been preferred but declined to apply, including her own former boss Dame Marjorie Scardino, for whose job as head of Pearson, the FT’s parent, Fairhead was passed over last year. But a mole tells me she’s ‘as steely as she’ll need to be’; and leading ladies of

Friday

William Cook

The false paradise of Metroland | 29 August 2014

Gaily into Ruislip Gardens runs the red electric train… Near the end of the Metropolitan Line, where London dwindles into woods and meadows, stands a Tudor manor house, built within the moat of a motte-and-bailey castle. Now a quaint museum, charting the history of the farms that once surrounded it, this modest landmark shares its name with the local Tube station, Ruislip Manor. A century after they built it, the railway that runs through here still feels out of place. There are fields on one side, suburban semis on the other. Welcome to Metroland, the bizarre no-man’s-land between town and country, created by the Metropolitan Railway, which celebrates its 150th

Thursday

Kate Chisholm

Who needs drugs when you have Radio 3?

I’m willing to bet it’s only on the BBC’s Radio 3 that you’ll find yourself listening to a programme quite like Words and Music (Sunday evenings). You might want to disagree. Surely, it’s just a few bits of music stuck together with some poems and other readings on a random theme dreamt up by the production team? How easy must that be to pull off? Seventy-five minutes (or sometimes even longer) of dirt-cheap radio, quick to make, very few overheads, involving just a few hours per programme of research (nowadays so easy on Google) and a dead-simple edit job splicing everything together. But name another station anywhere that could make

James Walton

BBC2’s Hotel India: slums? What slums?

Viewers who like their TV journalism hard-hitting should probably avoid Hotel India, a new BBC2 series about the Taj Mahal Palace in Mumbai. The tone of Wednesday’s episode was set immediately when the narrator introduced us to ‘one of the oldest and grandest hotels in the world’, where ‘no detail is too small or demand too great’, and there’s ‘an army of staff dedicated to flawless service’. To prove it, head of housekeeping Indrani then strode fearsomely down a corridor like a more elegant version of Hattie Jacques’s matron in the Carry On films. After using a torch (in daylight) to make sure the sheets just back from the laundry

James Delingpole James Delingpole

Frankie Boyle is a cowardly bully, and I’m ashamed I ever stood up for him

‘Outspoken comic Frankie Boyle has called on the BBC to sack “cultural tumour” Jeremy Clarkson.’ Can anyone tell me what’s wrong with this opening sentence from a recent news report? Clue: it’s that first word. In order to qualify as ‘outspoken’, surely, you need to be the kind of person who fearlessly, frequently and vociferously sets himself in opposition to the clamour of the times. Does demanding that a public figure lose his job for some mildly sexist/racist/homophobic/ableist remark fit into that category? Hardly. In the current climate it’s about as heroically contentious as, say, a private school prospectus that promises ‘We believe in educating the whole person’; or a

Thursday

James Walton

The Village: Sunday-night TV at its most unsubtle and addictive

Proof that television has changed a bit since 1972 came with an archive clip shown on BBC4 on Sunday. ‘My first guest:’ Michael Parkinson announced matter-of-factly on his Saturday-night chat show, ‘W. H. Auden.’ Auden then made his way gingerly down the stairs, lit a fag and began by discussing the failure of the poetry of the 1930s to effect political change. ‘Nothing I wrote,’ he told Parky, ‘postponed war for five seconds or prevented one Jew from being gassed.’ The clip appeared in Great Poets in their Own Words, the first of a two-part series combining archive film with talking heads to provide a useful if workmanlike history of

Kate Chisholm

Why is Radio 3 still leaderless?

It’s happened almost by stealth but the number of listeners to 6 Music has now overtaken Radio 3, creeping up to 1.89 million per week (just .05 million more than the classical-music station). Actually the margin between them is probably greater because 6 Music has no analogue signal and can only be heard digitally. Whereas 6 Music sounds cool and with its digital playlist capability and big-star DJs is just so on-trend, 3 is being left behind. Even more disturbing, there was no controller available to defend the station and remind us that the listening figures will bounce back in the next quarter because of the Proms effect — two

Wednesday

James Forsyth

Why won’t the Salmond / Darling debate be shown in England?

The future of Britain is at stake, but you wouldn’t know it from how ITV is behaving. On Tuesday, STV will broadcast a live debate between Alex Salmond and the leader of the No campaign, Alistair Darling. This promises to be one of the pivotal moments in the referendum campaign.  But, depressingly, the only way anyone outside of Scotland will be able to watch it is on the internet via STV Player. The failure to put it on ITV across the whole of the UK reflects the failure to understand that, while only the residents of Scotland may have vote in the independence referendum, the result will affect all of

Steerpike Steerpike

Lunchtime lobbying from Tristram Hunt

The search for a new Chairman of the BBC Trust is in utter chaos. After Mr Steerpike revealed that the job description had been altered to insert the ‘Seb Coe clause’, Robert Peston stuck his neck out and said that Lord Coe was a ‘shoo-in’ for the gig. But Coe has since ruled himself out (for whatever reason — maybe sporting, maybe mayoral) and the race is wide open again. With all to play for, Tristram Hunt, the shadow education secretary, has taken to Twitter to talk up his buddy, the sainted Neil MacGregor: A personal thought on the search for new Chairman of BBC: how about the British Museum’s

Thursday

The Spectator

Spectator letters: In defence of women ministers, Handel and lefty sex

Give the women a chance Sir: Melissa Kite’s article about the reshuffle seems downright unfair (‘A misogynistic reshuffle’, 19 July). Whatever David Cameron’s motives may be, the women he has promoted to cabinet and other posts in his government are presumably intelligent and hardworking and have certainly demonstrated great stamina. This is true of anyone who reaches these levels in politics. They are no doubt excited to be facing extremely tough challenges, but they must also be quite nervous. Instead of giving them congratulations and encouragement, the best Ms Kite can offer is a prediction that none of them will be very successful. Colin Angwin London W14 Media circus Sir: The

Tuesday

Steerpike

More big changes expected at the BBC

Mr S hears that the race to succeed Paxo came down to two candidates: the PM programme’s Eddie Mair and Today’s Evan Davis. Davis’s move frees up the morning slot — with the berth potentially pencilled in for Nick Robinson after next year’s general election. That, in turn, would trigger a race for one of the most coveted jobs in journalism: Political Editor of the BBC. Rest now; but Aunty’s game of musical chairs is far from over.

Monday

Steerpike

It’s Evan Davis for Newsnight

With the BBC set to make a formal announcement about Jeremy Paxman’s replacement at Newsnight imminently, tweets from BBC staff revealing the news were hurriedly deleted. Not quite all of them, though. Evan Davis to join #newsnight following the departure of Jeremy Paxman. — Lucy Walker (@lucybellewalker) July 21, 2014   It’s Evan Davis, apparently. Hardly a controversial choice for the increasingly lefty show, under the stewardship of former Guardian man Ian Katz. Incidentally, hipster Katz has taken to signing off his emails ‘iKatz’. Enough said. Update: Talking of email signatures, journalist Neil Midgley tweets Mr S to say ‘apparently James Harding uses ‘Allbest, James’. Which one BBC wag said ‘makes

Thursday

The Spectator

Letters: Lord Lawson is not banned from the BBC, and Wales is wonderful

No ban on Lawson Sir: You write that the BBC ‘has effectively banned’ Lord Lawson from items on climate change unless introduced with ‘a statement discrediting his views’ (Leading article, 12 July). There’s a lot of muddled reporting of this story. Lord Lawson hasn’t been in any sense ‘banned’, and the Editorial Complaints Unit finding didn’t suggest that he shouldn’t take part in future items. It found fault with the way the Today item was handled in two respects: firstly that it presented Lord Lawson’s views on the science of global warning as if they stood on the same footing as those of Sir Brian Hoskins, and secondly that it didn’t make clear

Tuesday

Rod Liddle

Will the BBC accept that Hamas wants to kill lots of Jews?

A fairly typically partisan report on the Israel and Palestine crisis last night on the BBC ten O Clock News. The focus was entirely on the killed or injured Palestinians, referred to exclusively as ‘civilians’; the point was made, at the top of the report, that Hamas had killed nobody. Yes, but only because Hamas is utterly useless: it clearly WANTS to kill lots of people, which is why, on a daily basis, it bungs over the rockets – indiscriminately – in an attempt to do so. The rockets which precipitated this crisis. We are enjoined to have sympathy for the Palestinians and treat the Israelis with odium because the

Monday

Steerpike

Tulisa tongue twister

The BBC has departments devoted to pronouncing dialect and names; but they must have been in management meetings this morning, leaving news presenter Joanna Gosling to struggle with the name Tulisa Contostavlos: ‘We’ll just leave it at Tulisa,’ said the tongue-tied presenter. The Spectator sympathises with Ms Gosling: try pronouncing Taki’s name.

Thursday

The Spectator

In apologising for having Nigel Lawson on to discuss climate change, the BBC has breached its charter

Listen to ‘Is climate change a factor in the recent extreme weather?’ on Audioboo It is only a matter of time before Nigel Lawson — if he is allowed on the BBC at all — has to have his words spoken by an actor in the manner of Gerry Adams at the height of the IRA’s bombing campaign during the 1980s. In the case of Mr Adams, whose voice was banned from the airwaves by the government, the BBC stood up for free speech. But it is quite a different story with Lord Lawson. The BBC has effectively banned the former chancellor (and former editor of this magazine) from appearing on its

Thursday

Peter Phillips

Roger Wright’s legacy at Radio Three – and his one big mistake

Roger Wright’s precipitate departure from both Radio Three and the Proms came as a surprise. At first the news was that he would go at the end of the season, but then it became apparent he was leaving at the beginning of it. Whatever his reasons may have been — and one sympathises with the idea of a carefree summer holiday after all these years — it brings Edward Blakeman, who becomes acting director of the Proms during the interregnum, deservedly into the limelight. Wright, meanwhile, will become the chief executive of the Aldeburgh Festival from September. Wright has been the controller of Radio Three since 1998, and has been

Monday

Alex Massie

Yes, of course the BBC is biased against Scottish Nationalists

There are many reasons for this but let’s begin with the first and simplest: it is the British Broadcasting Corporation. Who could have imagined that an organisation that, rightly or not, sees itself as both creator and guardian of much of modern Britain’s identity and culture might think itself threatened by a movement hell-bent on destroying, or at least significantly changing, that identity and culture? I know, me neither. Now of course the BBC is not consciously or deliberately biased against the SNP and against Scottish independence. It is scrupulous about ensuring ‘No’ voices are balanced by ‘Yes’ voices just as, in other areas and debates it does its best to be

Thursday

The Spectator

Spectator letters: VAT and sugar, Boris Johnson and cricket, whisky and bagpipes

Sugar added tax Sir: Julia Pickles (Letters, 14 June) suggests a sugar tax to combat the obesity epidemic and discourage food manufacturers from adding sugar to everything from bread to baked beans. A more realistic alternative might be to simply adjust the VAT rules: currently, VAT is levied on essentials such as loo paper, toothpaste and washing powder, presumably because they’re considered luxuries. Items such as breakfast cereals, however, are VAT-exempt, even though many are more than 30 per cent sugar and should really be in the confectionery aisles. Levying VAT on products with, say, more than 20 per cent added sugar and removing it from others could form a