QUINN-TESSENTIALLY BIASED

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Radio 4's Westminster Hour continues to spit in the face of impartiality.
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This being Monday morning it's time for that (ever-growing) list again! This week's all-seeing journalist was Nick Watt of The Guardian, back again to discuss the political week with Carolyn Quinn (pictured).
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Last week I wrote:

"When can we expect a Conservative (or UKIP) supporting journalist from the Times, the Telegraph or the Mail to receive an invite to appear on this most unbalanced of BBC programmes? Surely next week?"

Fat chance!
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Here's the list, complete with its latest member:
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7/2/10 Nick Watt of the Guardian
31/1/10 George Parker of the Financial Times
24/1/10 Kevin Maguire of the Mirror
17/1/10 Andrew Grice of the Independent
10/1/10 Nick Watt of the Guardian
3/1/10 Michael Savage of the Independent
27/12/09 no programme
20/12/09 no journalist
13/12/09 Andrew Miller of the Economist
6/12/09 George Parker of the Financial Times
29/11/09 Toby Helm of the Observer
22/11/09 no journalist
15/11/09 Nick Watt of the Guardian
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As it has done for the whole of the last month, the programme began by discussing on the 'woes' of the Conservative Party: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/the_westminster_hour/8503270.stm

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So for weeks now Westminster Hour has opened its political coverage with overviews from almost exclusively Left-leaning, Labour-supporting journalists. Not a single Conservative supporting journalist has been invited - no Peter Oborne, no Ben Brogan, no Matthew Parris.

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And it isn't as if Carolyn Quinn tries to play devil's advocate. Her questions are hardly calculated to help the Conservative Party - far from it! Her first question to Nick Watt was about whether the Tories had 'wobbled' this week and if so why? Her second was about whether their austerity message had been 'undermined'. Her third question talked of a 'rowing back' by the Tories and asked if the public services could now 'relax a little bit' because they won't immediately face 'swingeing cuts under the Conservatives'.

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