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The BBC has recently undertaken a consultation on its draft editorial guidelines in which it has made much of the issue of impartiality. In light of widespread concern that its news agenda appears to be increasingly shadowing that of the Conservative press and that its programme panels are stuffed with pundits from the self-same right-wing newspapers. With shills from Tufton Street and MPs on the far right of the political spectrum, it is greatly needed.
However, what the consultation seems to be suggesting is increased visibility for those engaged in the endless culture wars against liberal values – in other words, for those on the far right.
The consultation notes that “the guideline on breadth of opinion has been expanded and recognises that appropriate breadth and diversity, combined with freedom of expression, may mean the inclusion of views some in the audience find offensive”.
It also highlights the fact that the section of the draft guidelines entitled Contentious Views and Possible Offence “now puts greater emphasis on freedom of expression and the need to sometimes take into account impartiality in judgements about ‘offence’, which itself may now encompass issues beyond, for instance, extreme political views”.
BBC impartiality threatens consequence-free rhetoric of the far-right
The problem is that the notion of offence has become inextricably entangled with extreme political views, because it, along with freedom of expression, has been comprehensively weaponised by the culture warriors of the far right. Those who argue for the regulation of certain kinds of speech generally do so not because they find such speech offensive but because, among other things, it stirs up hatred and division, propagates disinformation or is used to harass, bully and threaten.
However, calls for its regulation are immediately characterised by the likes of the right wing of the Tory party, Reform, the Free Speech Union and Elon Musk as ‘woke’ demands for censorship, which has now shifted from being a concern primarily of liberals to becoming a hobby horse of the far/hard/alt/libertarian right. In doing so it has essentially mutated into a demand for consequence-free speech and for those who object to such speech to shut up.
Increased coverage of Reform UK raises concerns of the consultation’s true intentions
It’s hard to see the consultation as anything other than an attempt to gain consent for changes which have already been made by the BBC in relation to impartiality, as it appears to take every possible opportunity to platform Nigel Farage, Richard Tice and now Tim Montgomerie – in spite of Reform UK having a mere five parliamentary seats. The most obvious example of this is Farage’s ubiquity on Question Time, with 38 appearances in all to date – far more than the vast bulk of politicians from the mainstream parties – and only since July as a Westminster MP.
It might be argued that some of his earlier appearances could be justified by his status as a UKIP MEP from 1999 to 2020, but this fails to explain why Farage himself appeared far more than any other MEP, and why not a single pro-EU UK MEP appeared on the programme between 2010 and 2019.
According to Question Time’s webpage, the programme is:
“ … rooted in politics and therefore has to achieve fair and appropriate representation from the various political parties across the UK. This means there will nearly always be a representative from the UK government and the official opposition on the panel. The panel will also feature representatives from other political parties across the series, taking as our guide the level of electoral support at national level which each party enjoys.”
In the past this appeared to mean that MPs from parties with a large number of seats were featured more frequently than those from parties with fewer. The real problem here, particularly in the light of the results of the July 2024 general election, concerns the amount of appearances made by MPs from ‘other political parties’. The main ones (leaving aside Scottish. Welsh and Northern Irish parties) performed as follows in the general election in July:
Two possible reasons for this suggest themselves. Firstly, the BBC has taken an editorial decision that Reform (as with UKIP before it) deserves a level of broadcast representation out of all proportion to its parliamentary presence, and is utilising its share of the total vote as a yardstick. (However, this doesn’t account for the disparity with the Liberal-Democrats in terms of broadcast appearances). And second, that Farage – a “master of political storytelling” according to BBC political editor Chris Mason – is simply regarded as the broadcast equivalent of ‘good copy’, however poisonous his message.
The BBC’s ‘public purpose’ is in question
Neither reason is remotely acceptable. The first would represent a major shift of policy regarding the representation of political parties on air, undertaken without any public consultation. And the second would represent a complete abandonment of the journalistic standards proper to a public service broadcaster.
The consultation on the draft editorial guidelines should be an opportunity to engage in a wide-ranging and critical debate on how the BBC understands impartiality, not a chance for the BBC to seek agreement to changes which it appears to have already made out of public view.
Article first published in Media North: Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom (North). For more from Media North, and to subscribe to their newsletter, visit their website.
