Good news from the BBC

Good news, at last! We can all breathe a little easier. According to the BBC website, February saw the 'fastest rise in permanent staff placements in ten months' and the 'sharpest increase in temporary positions since May 2007.' Despite my constant talk of a 'double dip' recession, faltering growth and the need for a 'Plan B', perhaps we have turned a corner? I hate to admit it but it would appear that the Chancellor has backed the right horse. Thank good...oh hang on a minute. What's this?

Only last week, as the media spotlight fell upon Rupert Murdoch's News Corp takeover of BSkyB, a little story emerged that I thought was just as significant. While the new and old media outside the control of Murdoch were predicting the end of press freedoms in the UK, I was distracted by a report from the Liberal Conspiracy website that revealed, 

'BBC journalists have been instructed by senior editorial staff to use ‘savings’ instead of ‘cuts’ in their news coverage, Liberal Conspiracy has learnt, in order to offer a “rosy” picture of government announcements.' 

Liberal Conspiracy reported that senior BBC management told journalists at BBC London that 'cuts' made the news appear too negative. The pressure on the BBC has grown after David Cameron publicly 'blasted' the 'British Broadcasting Cuts Corporation' in an interview in February for reporting every reduction in spending. The Daily Mail said that Downing Street was 'increasingly frustrated with the way the corporation is reporting the Government’s austerity programme.'

A BBC spokesman issued the following response to the suggestion that they were bowing to pressure, 

'We are reporting impartially on reductions in council and government spending and no instructions have been issued about terminology to be used in our coverage.'

However, Liberal Conspiracy reported that the official BBC statement had been contradicted by people working at BBC London and two separate journalists confirmed that the 'editorial decision at BBC London had been challenged several times this week in evening meetings.' Elsewhere, across the Corporation, a number of staff confirmed that discussions had taken place on the 'biased' reporting. 

So I arrive at today's BBC story, under the headline,  

Job market growth 'increased in February'

The article goes on to support the headline with some positive economic news. However, if you read beyond the first few paragraphs it quickly becomes apparent that the sums don't add up. In fact, the article actually says that unemployment increased,

'the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said unemployment had increased by 44,000 to almost 2.5 million in the three months to the end of December.'

The ONS also highlighted that the vast majority of the reported 40,000 new job vacancies were temporary jobs related to the 2011 census. Excluding these posts made the total vacancies, only 8,000. So much for a recovery driven by the private sector. 

Unemployment rose. That is the bottom line. Is this a good news story? I don't think I'll start cracking open the champagne or even ordering a take-away just yet. All the organisations mentioned in the BBC article, the ONS, REC and KPMG who carried out much of the research, report prospects for the economy are bleak. So why the spin? Does the information in the body of the article justify the positive headline? After all, how many people don't get beyond the first few lines of an article? If that is the case, what sort of impression would they have taken from the story? I hope they're not celebrating with a chicken madras.  

​I've always been aware that Murdoch's media empire has strong political bias, perhaps we need to worry more about who is influencing BBC editorial policy.

Of course, I can assure you that my posts will continue to be as impartial as ever.