A dose of reality?

 

Katya Adler, so often just another of the BBC’s pro-immigration cheerleaders, has come up against the uncomfortable truth, and decided to print it…

The arrival of so many asylum seekers in one go will impact Germany’s economy, its society and its politics.

And she can’t do the usual BBC thing of dismissing this as the concern of a few far right neo-Nazis…

It didn’t much look like a protest.

Lots of casually dressed, smiley very middle-class Germans – some with children, others with dogs, chatting animatedly in beautiful parkland on the outskirts of Hamburg on a sunny Sunday afternoon.

But this was indeed a protest group, putting together a petition in an attempt to stop a new refugee centre being built on the green.

Adler though can’t help but slip in a bit of the usual ‘reassurances’…

People here were keen to emphasise that they were not anti-immigrant.

To be clear: most Germans don’t question a duty to help those fleeing war or human rights abuses…

And there’s the claim so often denied but known to be the truth, and admitted by the migrants themselves more often than not, about why the migrants flock to countries like Sweden, Germany and the UK…benefits….

“We have to get the balance right,” said Lorenz Caffier, CDU Interior Minister of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.

“The German constitution demands that we look after refugees but the benefits we give them are too generous.

“Frankly, I’m amazed at any migrant who doesn’t choose to come to Germany. Our benefit system acts like a travel agency. We must put the wellbeing of our own people first.”

German newspapers are full of reports about the benefits refugees receive compared to German citizens on welfare, leading, in some quarters, to a sense of injustice.

There’s also a more widespread worry about strains on the national health and education systems.

‘Just a bunch of racists’ is the usual response to such talk in the UK.

Is the BBC going to start to reflect the genuine concerns of people in the UK about immigration and admit that those concerns are based upon very real problems that mass immigration causes or will this type of report be a flash in the pan, a one off, that does nothing to change the tidal wave of pro-immigrant sentiment that floods out of the BBC?

Perhaps Adler was unnerved by reports of journalists coming under attack for spreading lies and smearing anyone who speaks up about immigration…..

In earlier days, Pegida members often derided the media as the “lying press,” but those calls, increasingly, are being supplanted by actual physical attacks on journalists. Two weeks ago, Pegida supporters attacked journalists with MDR and the Dresdner Neuesten Nachrichten newspaper, with one reporter getting punched in the face. Officials at MDR, which is the public broadcaster for Saxony, Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt, have reported insults, vandalism and physical attacks by Pegida supporters at all of their state studios and say the number of incidents is growing, particularly in Saxony. The “growing aggressiveness” toward its employees, officials say, is a “new experience.”

 

 

 

 

 

Question Time Live Chat

Tonight’s show, hosted as ever by David Dimbleby comes from Dover. Joining him are Ukip’s leader in the European Parliament Roger Helmer, amusing Spectator columnist Rod Liddle, historian Simon Schama, Labour shadow minister Louise Haigh and Conservative Energy secretary Amber Rudd.

Kick off tonight (Thursday) at 22.35

Chat here

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A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NAME?

Well, the BBC has done all it can to push the “Britain stronger in (sic) Europe” campaign launched today.

Staying in the EU can be the “patriotic course for Britain”, former M&S boss Lord Rose said as he launched the campaign for the UK to remain a member. Lord Rose, Britain Stronger in Europe chairman, said leaving was “not worth the risk” and said Britain was “surely bigger” than “walking away”.  The EU referendum is due to be held before the end of 2017.

It will be fascinating to watch this one unroll in terms of BBC coverage. I reckon that Rose is a poor choice – and the very NAME for the campaign contains an overt attempt to conflate the EU with Europe. It won’t be the first such effort and I am surprised the BBC’s world class journalists did not call Rose to account for it…..

EVENING ALL!

Just a quick word to say I am back from my holiday and awoke to the Today programme’s relentless bias this morning. However to be fair to the BBC, although the item at 7.10am was ALL SET UP for some left wing self righteous indignation over our failure to embrace gazillions of …coughs …”refugees’ the interviewee – Catriona Jarvis who is a  retired judge of the Upper Tribunal – was unable to answer the simple question HOW MANY of them should we have then!!! Give it a listen if you missed it – her answers were truly pathetic.

BBC rigs its submission to Charter Review

 

 

From the Mail:

BBC ‘ignored public’s views on its future and instead used paid-for-study to represent the views of the population’

The BBC Trust side-lined the views of the public from its official report on the future of the Corporation – despite lecturing everyone else that the public’s voice should be ‘heard loud and clear’.

It also skewed the results of a survey, even after telling MPs that any decisions about the future of the broadcaster should be based on ‘evidence’ rather than any preconceptions.

Rona Fairhead, chairman of the Trust, spent the summer arguing that the BBC’s future should not be dictated by ‘prejudice’.

Instead, she argued, it should be decided by the public who pay for the broadcaster, and based on firm ‘evidence’.

‘This should all happen through a proper debate in which the public’s voice is heard loud and clear. The BBC’s future is simply too important to be settled behind closed doors.’

However, it would seem that the Trust failed to listen to its own advice.

Around 40,000 people then responded to the Trust’s questionnaire about the BBC, in the belief that the governing body would then pass their views on to the Government.

But the Trust decided not to include the survey results in its official report on the future of the BBC, and relied on a much smaller, paid-for study to represent the views of the public instead.

Last night, people who filled in the survey were outraged that they took the time and effort to set down their views, only to have them dismissed in the Trust’s official report.

Caroline Levesque Bartlett, who runs a campaign to ban the licence fee, said: ‘I find it really irritating…we are allowed to share our view only once every ten years, and the BBC Trust rigs. What a sham.’ A BBC Trust source admitted that the results of the public questionnaire were not properly included in the official document, and hinted that it may have run out of time to do the analysis it wanted.

She added that some of the broad findings were ‘reflected’ in the report, and that the full analysis would be published at a later date – after the deadline for submissions to the Government’s Green Paper on the future of the BBC has already passed.

Question Time Live Chat

David Dimbleby presents this week’s show from Leicester, with journalist Melanie Phillips, Employment Minister Priti Patel MP, Lib Dem Leader Tim Farron MP, SNP Deputy Leader Stewart Hosie MP and Shadow Energy Secretary Lisa Nandy MP. No Ukip representation, but the irrelevant SNP are back. Interesting

Kick off tonight (Thursday) at 22.35

Chat here

Register here if necessary.

Rats in a sack

 

 

It’s getting nasty as the blame game starts…….

Scotland Yard accuses the BBC of hampering its investigations into historical child sexual abuse

Scotland Yard has accused the BBC of undermining its investigation into historical child sex abuse, claiming that the corporation’s actions risked deterring victims from coming forward.

Scotland Yard said that the BBC’s actions “could compromise the evidential chain should a case ever proceed to court”.

In a strongly worded statement it cited the example of Jimmy Savile, who was propelled to stardom by the corporation, to illustrate the dangers if potential witnesses are deterred from coming forward. Savile went unchallenged for years despite rumours of him abusing underage girls.

“Hundreds of people never came forward in part because they feared the consequences of making allegations against a powerful public figure,” said the statement.

“We are worried that this programme and other recent reporting will deter victims and witnesses from coming forward in future.”

Scotland Yard has insisted that the BBC’s handling of the investigation threatens to hamper its own criminal inquiries. .

A spokesman for the Met said: “We trust that the BBC has given due consideration to the impact of its reporting on ‘Nick’ and how it fulfils its responsibility to a witness making allegations of a sensitive and personal nature which were broadcast to millions of people.”

 

I’m guessing the police and the BBC won’t be teaming up again to raid a celebrity’s house on spurious, flimsy and unsubstantiated charges.