Monday 3 May 2021

Johnson, the BBC and truth

There is a video that has been circulating on Twitter for a few days, perhaps a couple of weeks, made by the journalist Peter Stefanovic. It catalogues a few of Johnson’s more obvious lies. It has been viewed over 14 million times and is still rising. He has retweeted it a lot and asks why Laura Kuenssberg at the BBC doesn't cover it (see below). A lot of people are linking her article on the BBC website to Stefanovic's video although she doesn’t actually mention it by name.

This is the video in case you haven’t seen it.

Kuenssberg herself is taking quite a bit of criticism about the piece because she manages to avoid giving one single example of a Johnson lie, although she would have had plenty of choice.  It looks like the BBC is being 'balanced' or avoiding taking any editorial line.

I think it’s a bit unfair. For the BBC to publish her article at all is quite a step. I don’t remember a similar occasion when the BBC has ever raised the slightest doubt about a prime minister's personal integrity and honesty, so it's quite something to me.  Blair had the dodgy dossier and the Iraq war of course, and that was a disaster for him -and Iraq as it turned out - but even then I don’t think the BBC ever accused him of being a congenital liar on an industrial scale, which is what Stefanovic does.

Personally, I can't remember any political figure in British history whose behaviour and cavalier contempt for the truth comes close to Johnson. He is in a league of his own so perhaps it's not surprising the BBC is struggling to manage it.

But now another state broadcaster has taken it up and put out a report using comments by Green MP Caroline Lucas and the Stefanovic video:

The French now know what an incorrigible and unreliable liar he is but most people in this country don't.

Kuenssberg's piece doesn’t accuse Johnson of being a liar but it comes pretty close. It talks about the prime minister’s "relationship with the truth" and as far as I can see nobody says he is truthful, honest, transparent and a decent human being. All the quotes from anonymous sources either damn him a little or a lot. 

This is about the most mild.  One of Johnson's former colleagues  told Kuenssberg: "Is there wilful lying? I would struggle to point to a direct example. Does he recreate the truth to suit him? Yes."

Can't point to a direct example of a lie?  He should look at the video clip, there are quite a few.  But even this former colleague says he 'recreates the truth.'  I'm not sure I know the difference between that and lying.

If you read Kuenssberg's article, he does not come across as being straight at any level and there are some who think he's "complex and strategic and [that] people don't give him credit for how calculating and clever he is."   This is a man who is about to accidentally split the nation into two or three or even four different parts. Clever and strategic?  He is an idiot.

Also the BBC is slowly being politicised as Robbie Gibb, a former Downing Street communications director, who has donated £400K to the Tory party, is joining the BBC board as the member for England, starting this week.

He worked in No 10 for the Conservative Party between 2017 and 2019, and before that Gibb had a successful 25-year career at the BBC, where he was once deputy editor of Newsnight and editor of The Daily Politics and This Week. He is a dedicated Brexiteer and has made highly critical comments about the corporation and perceived bias:

"In an article for The Daily Telegraph, he wrote: "The BBC has been culturally captured by the woke-dominated group think of some of its own staff. There is a default left-leaning attitude from a metropolitan workforce mostly drawn from a similar social and economic background..."

In the same piece, he continued: "Almost as soon as Britain's verdict [in the EU referendum] was delivered, the rigorous rules were relaxed and anti-Brexit bias and metropolitan 'group think' crept back into the corporation's coverage."

Gibb has talked about "impartiality" but apparently sees no conflict with his appointment.

Finally, Johnson is starting to come under real pressure after the leader of the Scottish Tories Douglass Ross, has clearly said if he’s broken the ministerial code he should resign.  Meanwhile Andrew Rawnsley in The Observer spells out how the sleaze allegations are beginning to look more menacing for the PM, especially the investigation  by the Electoral Commission. 

They are independent with statutory powers to interview witnesses under caution and gather evidence. If they conclude there was wrongdoing, it will impose a fine. If it decides that there are reasonable grounds to suspect that a criminal offence has been committed, the commission can refer the case to the police. 

Rawnsley says, "This is the probe causing the strongest ripples of fearful panic through Number 10 and Tory party HQ."  Let's hope so.

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