The BBC’s coverage of the Redwood report has come in for much criticism, notably from The Sun and Iain Dale. Helen Boaden, the director of BBC News, has now responded, conceding that the BBC’s use of footage of Redwood failing to sing the Welsh national anthem was inappropriate but defending the substance of the reporting.
Boaden lists the intros to each of the BBC’s news bulletins in the Corporation’s defence. Some of them do give the audience a good sense of the story but others do seem to put the cart before the horse, especially this one from Five Live at 11 am:
“Labour has condemned the latest review of policy carried out by the Conservatives as a lurch back to the right wing of politics. The review — led by John Redwood — identifies ways of deregulating business. The secretary of state for business, John Hutton, said the Tories were now more right wing than they had been under William Hague and Michael Howard.”
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