The journalist Andrew Neil is unlikely to be the poster boy of many readers of Bylines Scotland. His trenchant brand of free market economics and opposition to the EU and the ‘big state’ in general does not endear him to social and economic liberals. His politics are not my cup of tea but, get ready for this, he gets big Brownie points from me for his recent evisceration of broadcast regulator, Ofcom.
Regular Bylines Scotland readers will recall that last month in Bylines Scotland I criticised Ofcom for lashing GB News for the behaviour of its politician presenters while levying no sanctions or fines. Ofcom, we said, is toothless.
Neil, a former chairman of GB News, agrees with us. The one-time Sunday Times editor and long-serving BBC political heavyweight was giving evidence to a House of Lords inquiry on 23 April into the future of news.
In September 2020 Neil was appointed chair of GB News. He quit before it got on air, saying he didn’t want it to be associated with “an outlet for bizarre conspiracy theories.” Neil has a big ego so quitting a ship he had so publicly lent his fame and authority to must have been painful.
Love him or loath him, Andrew Neil is a very good journalist, famed for the rigour and depth of his research and the forensic nature of his questioning. He sees journalism as speaking truth to power. His tough approach to the big fish in the political pond probably accounts for Boris Johnson’s refusal to be interviewed by Neil in the run-up to the 2019 general election. The Paisley-born and Glasgow University-educated Neil had already interviewed the SNP’s Nicola Sturgeon, the Lib Dems’ Jo Swinson and UKIP’s Nigel Farage. He used three minutes of his BBC airtime to lambast the fearful Old Etonian’s rejection of an interview with Neil, saying at one point:
“The Prime Minister of our nation will at times have to stand up to President Trump, President Putin, President Xi of China. So, we’re surely not expecting too much that he spend half an hour standing up to me.”
Surprised at Ofcom tolerance
It was a courageous thing to do and effectively spelt the end of his BBC years. Now he has turned his analytical laser beam on GB News and Ofcom. He told the Lords, “I’m surprised at how tolerant Ofcom has been of GB News.
“I am surprised that any regulator would allow politicians sitting in the Houses of Parliament to present political TV programmes.
“I just find that incredible and I think on these areas Ofcom needs to find a backbone and quick.”
So far, Ofcom’s backbone is still in a weak state. In a lacklustre interview on the BBC’s Today programme on 24 April (the day after Neil’s Lords testimony) Ofcom said that no sitting MPs or candidates would be allowed to front programmes during a general election. It later emerged that figures like Nigel Farage and Richard Tice, who together control the Reform party, could still present, as long as they are not general election candidates.
Farage is a political figure
This is a nonsensical position by Ofcom. Farage is a 100% political animal. Few, if any other British personalities have had such an obvious and profound impact on British life and the public dialogue. Without Farage, Brexit would not have happened. Without Farage we would not have had the quartet of May, Johnson, Truss and Sunak and the chaos each has brought to government. Without Farage our recent history would have been totally different. To somehow not see him as a wholly political figure is incredible and irrational. No impartial observer of even the meanest intelligence could see Farage in any other light than that of a prominent political figure of the British and global right-wing elite.
Ofcom’s defence is that it is not a sensor and that it is listening to the public, not the media.
“We’ll shortly publish new research into what viewers and listeners think about politicians presenting programmes,” says the regulator.
We need an impartial Ofcom
We can see where that’s going. Ofcom is no more impartial than Andrew Neil is; a 23-year-old Russian physicist with an interest in shot putting, geranium breeding and the novels of Jane Austin. There’s a lot more than a backbone needed at Ofcom. The entire entity is unfit for purpose. It must be replaced with a new body with a stiff backbone and sharp teeth, one that acts without fear or favour and is impervious to political pressure. This is about democracy and truth. Both those elements must be bigger than regulators and bigger than demagogue politicians.
More on media
Remember photographic voting ID is now law!
You must show an approved form of photo ID to vote at general elections and some others.
To find out more, visit:
