LATE DIMBLEDATA

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Apologies for the lateness of this week's Dimbledata. The programme was on a day earlier, but that's not my excuse. Question Time is the one programme I review that I still feel a certain reluctance to watch. Still, armed with a glass of wine and the 'Biased BBC' commentary as ever in the bottom corner of my screen (loved the stopwatch comment, David P!), I bit the bullet tonight. So this is Morecambe calling. Here are the results of the Icelandic jury:
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Who got most time to speak?
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1. Sir Ming Campbell (LD) - 11 minutes 20 seconds
2. David Miliband (Lab) - 11 minutes 17 seconds
3. Theresa May (Con) - 9 minutes 52 seconds
4. Simon Schama (arm-waving historian) - 8 minutes 38 seconds
5. Janet Daley (fabulous journalist) - 5 minutes 50 seconds (a disappointingly short time, given that she was the best of the guests)
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Who received the most interruptions from David Dimbleby?
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1. Theresa May - 9
2. Janet Daley - 4
3. Simon Schama - 4
4. David Miliband- 3
5. Sir Ming Campbell - 3
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Who scored the highest interruption coefficient?
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1. Theresa May - 0.9
2. Janet Daley - 0.7
3. Simon Schama - 0.5
4. David Miliband - 0.3
5. Sir Ming Campbell - 0.3
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Who was asked the most supplementary questions by David Dimbleby?
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1. Theresa May - 10
2. David Miliband - 8
3. Janet Daley - 6
4. Sir Ming Campbell - 5
5. Simon Schama - 4
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Like much of the BBC's election coverage, Question Time seemed to be mostly concerned with attacking the Tories, whether it be over NI, Chris Grayling (whose ears would have been burning again throughout the 13 minutes the programme devoted to him) or class.
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David Dimbleby was at his most biased, butting into Theresa May's answers far more than he did to anyone elses and asking her the toughest questions, then repeatedly challenging Janet Daley over her nuanced defence of Chris Grayling's comments. During the Chris Grayling question, when all manner of smears were slung at Mr Grayling, the Conservatives and their European allies, it never seemed to occur to Dimbleby that he ought, as an allegedly impartial chairman, to act as devil's advocate to all his guests. He challenged only the ladies of the centre-right on this subject, repeatedly. The smears went unchallenged. And to think that this man is going to be hosting the final prime-ministerial debate!
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I did approve though of Dimbleby's swift puncturing of Simon Schama's attempted pretence that he too was a floating voter (presumably so that when he swung behind Labour later in the programme he would appear to do so merely as a independent-minded TV historian rather than as an active partisan), pointing out that Schama is a well-known, long-term Labour supporter - as everything he said subsequently made crystal clear. That was not the last time Mr Schama, who has written some very fine books, made a fool of himself.
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CODA: On the subject of David Dimbleby, here's a great post from Not a sheep - and it features a notorious clip of Dimbleby at his very worst (hint: Harriet Harman, puppet strings, smirks). If you've never seen it before, prepare your jaw in advance, as it will be about to drop!:
http://notasheepmaybeagoat.blogspot.com/2009/09/is-question-time-audience-biased.html