Well, the BBC's electioneering blog kept at it right to the very end. As of 9pm yesterday evening, it had featured 18 posts quoting Gordon Brown, 10 quoting Nick Clegg and just 6 quoting David Cameron. It wasn't over! After 9pm we were taken to a final Brown rally and 'treated' to two more posts featuring substantial campaign quotes from the Great Helmsman, raising his tally to 20. The BBC blog surpassed itself in terms of bias in its final two days (I presume it's over now - the blog I mean, not the bias!)
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Here is yesterday's tally of the number of posts on the BBC's live election blog that report comments (direct/indirect quotations) from party politicians:
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Wed 4/5
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Labour - 32
Conservatives - 15
Lib Dems - 14
Greens - 3
Plaid Cymru - 3
UKIP - 2
SNP - 2
Alliance - 1
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As testimony to the BBC's partisanship, I think this is pretty damning.
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Now for the running (final) total for the whole campaign. How do things stand after 29 days?
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Labour - 742
Conservatives - 558
Lib Dems - 471
SNP - 75
UKIP - 42
Plaid Cymru - 42
Greens - 33
BNP - 22
DUP - 8
Independents - 4
English Democrats - 3
Independent Network - 2
Mebyon Kernow - 2
Christian Peoples Alliance - 2
SDLP - 2
Sinn Fein - 2
UUP - 2
Monster Raving Loony - 1
Communist Party - 1
Socialist Labour - 1
Liberal - 1
Christian Party - 1
Respect - 1
Social Democrats - 1
Alliance - 1
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As candles begin to be lit in BBC studios across the nation and prayers said for the health of the Great Leader, the BBC should fall into purdah today. Norman Smith & co's lips should be sealed.
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All that remains to be done now is to vote.
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Well done by confirming this bias with empirical data.
ReplyDeleteIt's pretty disgusting seeing it laid out like that in numbers.
It's a good job I cancelled my licence ages ago - seeing this would have got me reaching for the beta-blockers!
Today's Toady Programme was totally lost without its political Govt spinning machine.
ReplyDeleteOnly events in Greece and the oil spill kept the programme going, yet there was nothing on the Farage acccident - it was literally lost for words and showed its paucity of real news.
Also the failure of the play "Enron" in New York would not normally have got the exposure it did.
hats off to Craig for his sterling work over the past month.
ReplyDeleteI just hope the next government takes heed and bbc bias is stamped on from this point onwards
Some hope !
Thank you.
ReplyDeleteWhat a night! What a day to come!
What a shambles, more like it. This country is so useless now , it can't even organise an election properly. Pathetic.
ReplyDeleteI certainly wouldn't trust the result.
Dear Craig,
ReplyDeleteJust got the result from Morecambe. Not just sunny, but now Tory !
Also, my best friend in Gambia, wife excluded, Musa, is listening on BBC World Service. He just sent me a text " Grant, please explain what is happening in the UK election ? "
My reply " God only knows " !
Grant,
ReplyDeleteWe Morecambrians like to keep the world waiting, out of a sense of drama of course, unlike our neighbours in Lancaster, who delayed their count out of sheer bone idleness!!
As for the result, well...having heard so many people saying that they can't make up their mind what to do (despite months of endless election coverage!!), and a fair few overheard conversations from people who were going to have to decide once they got into the polling booth itself, and quite a few more who were asking others who they should vote for, and who was standing (etc), it's perhaps not surprising that we're in such a stupid position.
Add inept voter registration, disturbing signs of widespread postal vote fraud, and there being not enough ballot papers at polling stations, and - as you say - it's a shambles.
Craig,
ReplyDeleteFair summary.
How could people not make up their minds when the issues are so clear ?
Only been in Morecambe twice. Once as a schoolboy on a geography field trip, in the days when geography was geography, and some years ago for a wedding as my late father has relatives there. Well, actually Heysham, which, of course is superior !
I have just texted dear Musa in Gambia saying " you are lucky you live in a , relatively, benevolent dictatorship" !
Emigration beckons !
Craig,
ReplyDeleteOff topic, I know , but last time I was in Gambia there was an verbal altercation between some Gambian policemen ( luckily I knew one of them ) and two British tourists in the street. The wife/ girlfriend was in tears even before I intervened.
Using my distraction technique, I said to the man "by your accent you sound like you are from Lancashire".
He said " No , Sheffield , actually ".
I said "Oh sorry, profuse apologies".
His reply, "Don't worry, I have had worse insults" !
There's plenty of fine geography in and around Morecambe Bay. Much more for you to see next time Grant. Heysham Village is, I concede, almost as attractive as my end of Morecambe. Almost.
ReplyDeleteSomeone asked me who they should vote for. I resisted the obvious temptation to do just that and told them to decide for themselves. I refused to lead them in any way. On principle.
There are some people in my region who would vote Labour even if they put up...Hazel Blears. They will moan like crazy about the state of the country but still vote Labour, because they've always voted Labour, and their parents would turn in their graves if they didn't continue to vote Labour...I suspect you know that feeling up where you are!
Well, that's Yorkshire folk for you. A Lancastrian policeman would never have made that woman cry!
ReplyDeleteCraig,
ReplyDeletePlease don't blame the Gambia police. It is a yellow/green taxi issue there ! And a government problem. But this blog is not the place to go into it !
Take care,
Grant