Deinonychus antirrhopus

I Have A Question About the BBC

Can any of its reporters tell his or her ass from a hole in the ground? My answer upon reading their "blog" is no.

After the Hutton Report which exonerates the Blair government and heavily criticizes the BBC and Gilligan has only resulted in some mild comments from the reporters.

Andrew Marr :: Houses of Parliament :: 1830GMT

The BBC does not have a Chairman of Governors at the moment. That is a prime ministerial appointment. And at a time when relations between the Government and the BBC are probably as bad as they've been for some 50 years, that is an awesome difficulty and responsibility for the Prime Minister.

No Mr. Marr the awesome difficulty and responsibilty is the BBC trying to restore even a shred of credibility.

Nick Higham BBC Correspondent :: BBC Television Centre :: 1822GMT

The BBC's reputation has not been improved, what we've had today is a sort of contest between the government and it's reputation for truth telling.... and the BBC.

The BBC has been weighed and found wanting. With the top man resigning, it may go some way to restoring that trust, but it's going to be a long haul.

Wanting? Found wanting? How about completely and totally embarassed.

It looks to me like they are in almost completely denial.

Guto Harri :: Westminster :: 1745GMT

I think the Government will tread quite carefully in the future. Alistair Campbell's not there anymore, so there's less of a danger of one person deciding to go for all-out war. Despite going about tonight saying that a stain has been removed, many Labour MP's feel very lucky. They didn't expect to escape today so totally unscathed.

Torin Douglas :: BBC Television Centre :: 1720GMT

It was very out-spoken, there was not a lot of balance in there and the BBC has got to look at that..... This puts the whole regulation of the BBC back into play and Tony Blair said that this would be looked at as part of the whole review of the BBC's charter. There is one other issue in that the government appoints the Chairman of the BBC.

Amazing.

Update: BBC Chairman resigns.

"What the report shows very clearly is the prime minister told the truth, the government told the truth, I told the truth. The BBC, from the chairman and the director general on down, did not," Campbell told a news conference.

Posted by Steve at January 28, 2004 10:51 AM