Britannia Radio

Biased BBC

Wednesday, April 08, 2009 sue # Unbias! I thought Evan Davis did a gratifyingly balanced interview with David Howarth and Peter Smyth this morning about the incident at the G20 protest. If only they could apply that approach to other subjects, things wouldn’t seem quite so hopeless. I’d like to hear what everyone else thought. Comments: 15 (unread) - Biased BBC Home sue # Rather Taxing Didn’t listen to start the week, but because of the half-price offer I’ve been reading the Telegraph quite a lot. There’s always something in there about the BBC, and today there's another item by Tim Walker, “Mandrake,” headed “Mystery of BBC’s tax cut for Bono.” A guest on Marr’s programme on Monday morning, Marina Hyde, alluded to Bono’s tax arrangements. “Your lifestyle can undercut the moral seriousness of your mission,” she said pointing out that the singer continually lobbies the Irish government to increase its aid budget, while he has a company based in the Netherlands for tax purposes. This seemed to disturb Marr, who quickly added: “I should say I don’t know about Bono’s tax affairs. I don’t know if it’s true or not.” Hyde responded: ”This is true and you’re welcome to check it out.” The evening repeat is 15 mins shorter, and one of the things that had been edited out was the snippet. A BBC spokesman claimed it was chosen because his tax avoidance was “old” news. When informed that U2’s tax avoidance had, in fact been a big story in the Irish newspapers only last month, the spokesman relied: “Oh, I don’t know why he (the editor of the programme) would say that, then. I don’t intend to start another tiresome discussion about Bono, but why is the BBC so keen on the fella? Comments: 23 (unread) - Biased BBC Home ed thomas #