First eight minutes of the ten o’clock BBC News is about the BBC and Gary Lineker. Not the Prime Minister sabre rattling about China, or the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank which will impact 350 U.K. tech firms to the extent that they might not be able to pay their staff and are threatened with receivership- unless the taxpayer steps in. Concern about ripple effect on other banks in US ( yeah. We learned **** all from 2008). What a joke.
Seems Lineker's grouse with the BBC extends to tax. Jugs is appealing an eye-watering £5m HMRC claim in unpaid income tax for being part of an aggressive tax avoidance scheme. Jugs says the BBC should be paying. Either way, it's costing him hundreds of thousands in legal fees.
If the BBC can't rein Lineker in contractually, it could be a big step towards the end of the BBC as it is now, and the end of the licence fee. Increasingly, the BBC is reliant on viewers paying for the licence voluntarily, because although not yet decriminalised, it's coming close. If there was a sizeable part of the population that boycotted it, that would be serious. Personally, I don't want Jugs sacked or to give an apology, but he has to be bound by the BBC's impartiality rules going forward. The freelance stuff is all about tax avoidance.
Why, out of interest? I have no qualms with a BBC Sports presenter or employee expressing political views. I think Huw Edwards, however, ought to be bound by the BBC's impartiality rules...
Personally I don’t think it’s the most important thing happening in the UK at the moment and it should not be taking precedence over other news that has greater impact on many more people. The immigration policy itself for example, whatever your or my, or Lineker’s opinion of it. Lineker and the BBC is news but not big news.
Simply because the taxpayer is paying large amounts of money (in Lineker's case, very large) to give the "star" a continuing platform. When that person has extreme but legal political views, or in this case, political views expressed in an extreme way, it will breed huge resentment among a section of the tax-paying public. To give another example, suppose a high profile BBC entertainment star was tweeting to his/her followers that the government of the day were murderers or Nazis for not outlawing abortion... In my view, the BBC has enough problems without paring down its impartiality rules.
Me neither. However, the BBC's own guidelines say that all presenters should still try to avoid being outspoken on politics etc, even if it isn't their particular area. I still think that the main problem is the language used. Any comparison, however vague, with Nazi Germany is, at best misinformed and at worst an example of swivel eyed Tory hating.
Good replies, thanks. Think I still err more towards re-writing the impartiality rules to make it clear they only apply to BBC News staff, as I don't really care what a sports celeb thinks about politics, but your points are well made. I have mentioned Godwin's law on this thread more than once, so can't disagree too much with your point, Col, either...
Nice work from Rishi on the Silicon Valley Bank. As a capitalist of course he should have let it fail, that’s what capitalism does. Instead he managed to get it sold to his mates in HSBC for £1, with apparently minimal regulatory oversight (unless the FCA is fully staffed on a Sunday). I’m glad that the tech companies, and more importantly their employees, don’t have to worry about their cash flow and losing their capital/debt management facilities, but this sector will lead us all to doom, again, one day.
Where do you get that from? This is what the social media guidelines (published in 2020) say.... If your work requires you to maintain your impartiality, don’t express a personal opinion on matters of public policy, politics, or ‘controversial subjects' New measures reaffirm BBC’s commitment to impartiality - Media Centre As they said in 2018 after a similar controversy, as Lineker is not a news or current affairs presenter, there is no requirement for him to avoid expressing personal political opinions.
Tim Davie has apologised. Lineker will be back this weekend. Richard Sharp clinging on for now. All a bit embarrassing.
It said on the news that the guidelines have been updated. As I said, I'm not bothered about a sports presenter airing their political views. Pretty much everyone is condemning his reference to Nazi Germany and that's the issue imo.
Whatever. BBC news said last night that all employees were asked to be more careful about what they aired in public. As I say, that's not the issue for me.
It says.... If your work requires you to maintain your impartiality, don’t express a personal opinion on matters of public policy, politics, or ‘controversial subjects' Seems pretty clear to me this wouldn't apply to sports presenters.
Agree. Davie has apologised to viewers for the disruption and pledged to give the guidelines an overhaul, which is clearly needed. The irony is, in this age of instant gratification, 1/2 million more people watched MoD on Sat. and it's all over Twitter, how much people enjoyed this cut-down format!
