BBC fights against Freedom of Information Act, (1 Viewer)

[Synch]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/10/15/nbeeb15.xml

The BBC has spent thousands of pounds of licence payers' money trying to block the release of a report which is believed to be highly critical of its Middle East coverage.




The corporation is mounting a landmark High Court action to prevent the release of The Balen Report under the Freedom of Information Act, despite the fact that BBC reporters often use the Act to pursue their journalism.
The action will increase suspicions that the report, which is believed to run to 20,000 words, includes evidence of anti-Israeli bias in news programming.






The court case will have far reaching implications for the future working of the Act and the BBC. If the corporation loses, it will have to release thousands of pages of other documents that have been held back.

http://www.pressgazette.co.uk/article/161006/bbc_foi_balen_high_court

By Martin Stabe
Monday, 16 October 2006
The BBC will appeal to the High Court to overturn an Information Tribunal ruling that the corporation should release a report into its coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict under the Freedom of Information Act.

Hope the higher courts uphold the tribunals ruling.

 

[BudLizard101]

Does this actually suprise anyone?

 

[The face of Jacob]

Panel: BBC reports misleading

Report: BBC coverage of Mideast conflict inconsistent, but no evidence of systematic bias

Ynet Published: 05.02.06, 17:26

The BBC does not "consistently give a full and fair account" when it comes to covering the Middle East conflict, a British report published on Tuesday charges.

The report, ordered by the BBC to examine claims of bias, was prepared by five independent figures.

The evidence examined points to the "elusiveness of editorial planning, grip and oversight," the report said. "In short, we found that BBC output does not consistently give a full and fair account of the conflict. In some ways the picture is incomplete and, in that sense, misleading."

Overall, the report said, there was stronger evidence of pro-Israel bias compared to pro-Palestinian bias.

However, the report said there was no evidence of systematic bias in covering the Mideast conflict, but urged the British corporation to call terrorism by name when appropriate.

"We say that the BBC should get the language right. We think they should call terrorist acts 'terrorism' because that term is clear and well understood," the report said, but noted that "our assessment is that, apart from individual lapses, there was little to suggest deliberate or systematic bias."


'A channel that serves the Arab world'

The panel tasked with preparing the report also noted some gaps existed in analyzing and relating certain events without providing proper context or history.

The panel was formed following complaints about partial reports when it came to BBC news broadcasts. Panel Chairman Sir Quentin Thomas
said that evidence showed the BBC's "commitment to be fair, accurate and impartial," but said the corporation should aim for even higher standards.

The saga started in June of 2003, after The BBC aired a promo for a program on Israel's nuclear capabilities. Foreign Ministry officials were infuriated with what they said was a biased presentation and threatened to sever their ties with the BBC.

The Ministry was reevaluating its relationship with the BBC, Ministry Deputy Director Gideon Meir said at the time. "We asked the embassy in London to look into the issue, and we will decided whether to take steps after we get answers", he said.

Officials at the Ministry said that "with all due respect, the BBC has crossed the line. There is a feeling that the station has simply turned into a channel that serves the Arab world. For some reason the promo didn’t mention that Israel is the only country in the region whose existence is threatened."

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3246460,00.html

 

[Synch]

Does this actually suprise anyone?

Yes it surprised me, I would expect this of the Guardian(although that is presumed), but not the BBC.

 

[Vader]

Yes it surprised me, I would expect this of the Guardian(although that is presumed), but not the BBC.

Typical biased journalists trying to avoid exposure.

 

[GarzaUK]

Does this actually suprise anyone?

Actually it does. The British government regulates the television media so that it can't be biased. Newspapers can be as biased as they want tho.

If the BBC is biased, it is very suttle.

 

[Tashah]

The British government regulates the television media so that it can't be biased.

If this is so, why then would the BBC oppose release of this report? That doesn't make any sense.

 

[GarzaUK]

If this is so, why then would the BBC oppose release of this report? That doesn't make any sense.

I know it doesn't make any sense, not to me anyway. The BBC have always been a secretive lot though.
I do know that BBC have anti-Isreali reports, but they also have anti-Palestinian reports as well. If the Beeb somehow by passed Government Regulations that every British broadcaster is abided to, it was very very suttle.
Channel 4 and the Beeb has the right to withdraw its material if it chooses to do so. So in conclusion I don't know really whats going on.

 

[Gardener]

I was flipping through the channels a couple of months ago and the sound was off on the t.v. because it was nappy time for the boy child. I had the closed caption on, though. As I was going through the channels, I hit upon a show with a very histrionic young women going on and on about the plight of the poor beseiged Palestinians at the hands of the brutal and oppressive Israelis. She went on and on about this "brutality" and how the poor Palestinians this and the poor Palestinians that and she was just so overthe top I could hardly believe it. I figured that somehow an anti Israeli propaganda piece had found its way to American Telivision.

It was only when the break came that I realized I was watching the bbc and what I was watching was their regular news program.

Subtle? I guess this was subtle if one considers being hit over the head with a two by four subtle, but this stuff was so amazingly biased and short of anything even remotely conforming to ethical journalistic stndards that it might as well have been written by Hamas.

 

[Volker]

I know it doesn't make any sense, not to me anyway. The BBC have always been a secretive lot though.

They explained it in the first source in the initial post.

The court case will have far reaching implications for the future working of the Act and the BBC. If the corporation loses, it will have to release thousands of pages of other documents that have been held back.

Like all public bodies, the BBC is obliged to release information about itself under the Act. However, along with Channel 4, Britain's other public service broadcaster, it is allowed to hold back material that deals with the production of its art, entertainment and journalism.

They have competitors, if they loose the case, they probably have to give other papers to the public, too. This is not really something companies like to do.

 

[oldreliable67]

This BBC prediliction for promotion of the views of its management goes back to radio days, well before WWII. Biographies of Winston Churchill note mostly in passing that the BBC systematically barred Churchill from discussing his defense and foreign policy views during the 1930's; Sir John Reith was head of the BBC at the time. In the second volume of his Churchill biography, for example, William Manchester states that "Reith saw to it that [Churchill] was seldom heard over the BBC..." Reith wrote of Churchill in Reith's monumentally voluminous diaries, "I absolutely hate him."

In the fall of 1938 Churchill was scheduled to appear on the BBC for a half-hour talk -- on the Mediterranean. When the Czech crisis erupted, Manchester reports, Churchill asked that the program be cancelled. On the Saturday before Parliament's debate on the Munich Agreement, Churchill agreed nevertheless to meet with (future Communist spy) Guy Burgess of the BBC. Churchill complained to Burgess, according to Burgess's recollection, that "he had been very badly treated in the matter of political broadcasts and that he was always muzzled by the BBC."

Why did Reith detest Churchill? In Reith's eyes, Churchill was of course a warmonger, and Reith, not coincidentally, held Hitler in the highest regard. How little times have changed.

The Sunday Daily Mail carried a story about the BBC's recent so-called "impartiality summit." It said, in part:

t was the day that a host of BBC executives and star presenters admitted what critics have been telling them for years: the BBC is dominated by trendy, Left-leaning liberals who are biased against Christianity and in favour of multiculturalism.

A leaked account of an 'impartiality summit' called by BBC chairman Michael Grade, is certain to lead to a new row about the BBC and its reporting on key issues, especially concerning Muslims and the war on terror.

It reveals that executives would let the Bible be thrown into a dustbin on a TV comedy show, but not the Koran, and that they would broadcast an interview with Osama Bin Laden if given the opportunity. Further, it discloses that the BBC's 'diversity tsar', wants Muslim women newsreaders to be allowed to wear veils when on air.

At the secret meeting in London last month, which was hosted by veteran broadcaster Sue Lawley, BBC executives admitted the corporation is dominated by homosexuals and people from ethnic minorities, deliberately promotes multiculturalism, is anti-American, anti-countryside and more sensitive to the feelings of Muslims than Christians.

 

[Vader]

I know it doesn't make any sense, not to me anyway. The BBC have always been a secretive lot though.
I do know that BBC have anti-Isreali reports, but they also have anti-Palestinian reports as well. If the Beeb somehow by passed Government Regulations that every British broadcaster is abided to, it was very very suttle.
Channel 4 and the Beeb has the right to withdraw its material if it chooses to do so. So in conclusion I don't know really whats going on.

Wow. I am really *really* curious now. I wonder what is going on.

BTW... isn't it odd for the BBC to act like their part of MI-6?

:mrgreen:

 

[Volker]

This BBC prediliction for promotion of the views of its management goes back to radio days, well before WWII. Biographies of Winston Churchill note mostly in passing that the BBC systematically barred Churchill from discussing his defense and foreign policy views during the 1930's; Sir John Reith was head of the BBC at the time. In the second volume of his Churchill biography, for example, William Manchester states that "Reith saw to it that [Churchill] was seldom heard over the BBC..." Reith wrote of Churchill in Reith's monumentally voluminous diaries, "I absolutely hate him."

There's nothing wrong with hating Churchill. In the fourties this guy was involved in planning terrorist acts, he ordered terrorist acts and he heavily supported the British terrorist leader Bomber Harris.

Not giving him much airtime in the thirtees can be seen as an attempt of terrorism prevention.

As to the Daily Mail article, I don't understand, why the BBC should be unbiased. These are media folks, these are not blue berets. Is there a law in the UK which tells them they have to be unbiased? What is so great with being unbiased?

 

[BudLizard101]

"What is so great with being unbiased?"

So people can make up their own minds instead of being led like sheep?

 

[Volker]

"What is so great with being unbiased?"

So people can make up their own minds instead of being led like sheep?

Please don't get me wrong now, but in your signature I read this.

"The hottest places in Hell are reserved for those who, in a time of moral crisis, remain neutral.
--Dante"

Well, I don't believe in hell, but isn't there a contradiction?
Or are neutral and unbiased different things?

Another thing is, the newspaper I read most is Handelsblatt. The articles are not much biased, but the columns are, they are rather liberal. I am not liberal in the European meaning, but I can read this, get information, I know it's partial biased and I have no problem with it.

 

[BudLizard101]

Please don't get me wrong now, but in your signature I read this.

"The hottest places in Hell are reserved for those who, in a time of moral crisis, remain neutral.
--Dante"

Well, I don't believe in hell, but isn't there a contradiction.

Another thing is, the newspaper I read most is Handelsblatt. The articles are not much biased, but the columns are, they are rather liberal. I am not liberal in the European meaning, but I can read this, get information, I know it's partial biased and I have no problem with it.

No, there isn't a contradiction because official news sources are meant to be unbiased, informative sources only revealing the facts.

If you want biased reports, go to al-jaazera or some other paper run by a bunch of wacko's.

I'm glad you can get the information, knowing full well that it is biased and not have a problem with it. Unfortunately, most(a BIG most) people can't do that. They read something biased and think it's the complete truth. That's why we need unbiased sources of information so that during a moral crisis, they make up their owns minds instead of being led by whoever wrote the article.

 

[Volker]

No, there isn't a contradiction because official news sources are meant to be unbiased, informative sources only revealing the facts.

Ok, but then you have diversity only in the content, not in direction anymore.

If you want biased reports, go to al-jaazera or some other paper run by a bunch of wacko's.

Maybe I don't know enough about it, but I thought Al Jazeera is a good source. Many former BBC employees from the Middle East work for them.

I'm glad you can get the information, knowing full well that it is biased and not have a problem with it. Unfortunately, most(a BIG most) people can't do that. They read something biased and think it's the complete truth. That's why we need unbiased sources of information so that during a moral crisis, they make up their owns minds instead of being led by whoever wrote the article.

I don't know, if many people have this problem. It's about media diversity. You can listen to different candidates to decide about elections, you can check different stores for prices, you can get information from different media companies to know what's going on. Sure it's not practical to watch news at three different channels, but it should be possible to pick a channel which fits someone's needs.

 

[BudLizard101]

Ok, but then you have diversity only in the content, not in direction anymore.

Maybe I don't know enough about it, but I thought Al Jazeera is a good source. Many former BBC employees from the Middle East work for them.

I don't know, if many people have this problem. It's about media diversity. You can listen to different candidates to decide about elections, you can check different stores for prices, you can get information from different media companies to know what's going on. Sure it's not practical to watch news at three different channels, but it should be possible to pick a channel which fits someone's needs.

Nothing wrong in diversity of content as long as they get the full story and not tiny parts here and there.

Any news source that calls terrorists "fighters" and forgets to mention how most of the palestinians killed recently were also terrorists is pretty biased in my opinion.

And yes, you can check out different news stations for different news. And you are right, it's very unpracticle. That's why most people chose one station and just get all their answers from there. That's the problem b/c no one station can give you the full story. Just take what you see from a conservative station, add in a liberal station, divide by two and you get the truth. :lol:

 

[Volker]

Nothing wrong in diversity of content as long as they get the full story and not tiny parts here and there.

This is true.

And yes, you can check out different news stations for different news. And you are right, it's very unpracticle. That's why most people chose one station and just get all their answers from there. That's the problem b/c no one station can give you the full story. Just take what you see from a conservative station, add in a liberal station, divide by two and you get the truth. :lol:

Yes, the funny thing here is the stations closer to the right and the station closer to the left in Germany seem to differ less than changing to the French-German channel arte. At arte they have another focus in world politics and sometimes they report the same thing differently. I prefer n-tv. We have CNN here, too.

 

[Gardener]

Maybe I don't know enough about it, but I thought Al Jazeera is a good source. Many former BBC employees from the Middle East work for them.

.

Thank you for providing the most D@mning evidence so far for the incredible degree of bias by the BBC.

 

[Volker]

Thank you for providing the most D@mning evidence so far for the incredible degree of bias by the BBC.

Is it an evidence? Do you consider Al Jazeera biased? I can not receive it here, I only know it from the internet. They look rather fair to me. The BBC changes information and movie material with Al Jazeera, they have closed a contract in 2003.

Oh, and Al Jazeera bought 78 sequels of our Sandmaennchen last month. I would think, almost every East German kid knows it, it is for going to sleep for kids :2razz:

 

[Vader]

Is it an evidence? Do you consider Al Jazeera biased? I can not receive it here, I only know it from the internet. They look rather fair to me. The BBC changes information and movie material with Al Jazeera, they have closed a contract in 2003.

Oh, and Al Jazeera bought 78 sequels of our Sandmaennchen last month. I would think, almost every East German kid knows it, it is for going to sleep for kids :2razz:

Al Jazeera has definately gotten better or the last few years; however, they are definately anti-Israel and anti-American. Al Jazeera has a history of telling only one side of the story (their many chronicles on Iraq are evidence of this) ---the side they want the arab world to see.

Al Jazerra never bothered to tell the side of the story wherein the coalition was portrayed as good people working to rebuild Iraq. Instead Al Jazeera prefers to ignore everything that this good (such as Americans and Brits rebuilding schools, untilities, roads, airports, and everything else that was effected durring the war) and only broadcast the very rare instances of corruption and abuse among America's and/or Brittans overworked and badly underpaid military members currently in that region of the world.

 

[Red_Dave]

There's nothing wrong with hating Churchill. In the fourties this guy was involved in planning terrorist acts, he ordered terrorist acts and he heavily supported the British terrorist leader Bomber Harris.

Not giving him much airtime in the thirtees can be seen as an attempt of terrorism prevention.

As to the Daily Mail article, I don't understand, why the BBC should be unbiased. These are media folks, these are not blue berets. Is there a law in the UK which tells them they have to be unbiased? What is so great with being unbiased?

Well it would be unfair if the bbc was biased given the fact its paid for by the licence fee [the fee you have to pay to get a tv]. So as far as im concerned if the BBC never broadcasts anything that represents you and your paying for it you have a right to be pissed off.

I think theres plenty of examples of biased reports from both sides of the fence. I remember protesting against an airshow run by Brittish Aerospace, a company thats sold weaponary and aircraft to countrys with appaling human rights records like Saudi-Arabia Indonesia and Isreal with the help of the tax payer. We where filmed by some guys with BBC cameras but when i got home and switched on BBC news all i saw was a lengthy report about how good the festival was for buissness.

This is an example of how the bbc sometimes shows a pro-buissness/pro-government bias. Its not surpriseing that the footage i mentioned was edited out given the fact the brittish aerospace has always had disturbingly strong ties with the government. If the BBC was as full of leftists as many presume it would have been complaneing about how Brittish Aerospace arms Israel.

On the other hand the BBC did give the Govt a very hardtime about the Iraq war [and rightly so] and you get a number of journalists going from working for the guardian to working for the BBC and visa versa. So i can see why some think it has a left-wing bias. I guess it depends on the journalist. You get just as much coverage of palestinian suiside bombing as isreali human rights atrocities.

That said maybe a left-wing broadcaster is needed to counter the right-wing tabloid-esque media spewed by other outlets.

 

[Volker]

Al Jazeera has definately gotten better or the last few years; however, they are definately anti-Israel and anti-American. Al Jazeera has a history of telling only one side of the story (their many chronicles on Iraq are evidence of this) ---the side they want the arab world to see.

Al Jazerra never bothered to tell the side of the story wherein the coalition was portrayed as good people working to rebuild Iraq. Instead Al Jazeera prefers to ignore everything that this good (such as Americans and Brits rebuilding schools, untilities, roads, airports, and everything else that was effected durring the war) and only broadcast the very rare instances of corruption and abuse among America's and/or Brittans overworked and badly underpaid military members currently in that region of the world.

Badly underpaid military members? Americans and Brits rebuilding schools? You won't see something like this here, too. Compared to the Iraqi's, who actually do the rebuilding work, I would think, Americans and Brits there are badly overpaid.

 

[Volker]

Well it would be unfair if the bbc was biased given the fact its paid for by the licence fee [the fee you have to pay to get a tv]. So as far as im concerned if the BBC never broadcasts anything that represents you and your paying for it you have a right to be pissed off.

Yes, but we have a dozen of tv stations payed by public fees and they are all biased :mrgreen:

Sometimes the different federal and state governments try to get their people into the tv stations, but whatever they do, the bigger public stations seem to tend to side with the Social Democrats and sometimes maybe more critical with the respective government than private owned stations are.

I think theres plenty of examples of biased reports from both sides of the fence. I remember protesting against an airshow run by Brittish Aerospace, a company thats sold weaponary and aircraft to countrys with appaling human rights records like Saudi-Arabia Indonesia and Isreal with the help of the tax payer. We where filmed by some guys with BBC cameras but when i got home and switched on BBC news all i saw was a lengthy report about how good the festival was for buissness.

This is an example of how the bbc sometimes shows a pro-buissness/pro-government bias. Its not surpriseing that the footage i mentioned was edited out given the fact the brittish aerospace has always had disturbingly strong ties with the government. If the BBC was as full of leftists as many presume it would have been complaneing about how Brittish Aerospace arms Israel.

That's an odd thing.

On the other hand the BBC did give the Govt a very hardtime about the Iraq war [and rightly so] and you get a number of journalists going from working for the guardian to working for the BBC and visa versa. So i can see why some think it has a left-wing bias. I guess it depends on the journalist. You get just as much coverage of palestinian suiside bombing as isreali human rights atrocities.

That said maybe a left-wing broadcaster is needed to counter the right-wing tabloid-esque media spewed by other outlets.

We had a kinda left-wing tv station, this is Vox, but they had problems with making enough money, then Rupert Murdoch bought it, changed the concept and sold it to RTL Group later, it's more entertainment now, but still a good TV station.

There are two big German news channels, this is n-tv and n24. n-tv moved to West Germany meanwhile, but looks still somehow East German to me and was build with a lot of English money. n24 moved to East Germany meanwhile, but I still consider it being more West German. I only watch n-tv.