There is anxiety at the BBC, where the Cummings effect is thought to threaten the Today programme. If ministers are told not to appear on it, people ask how it can survive. Although a supporter of the Cummings frost towards the BBC, I feel it would be perverse if Today were the victim. It is well-edited, with a much wider range of subjects and attitudes than are displayed on PM, Woman’s Hour, Newsnight, virtually all comedy shows and arts programmes, and many more. Woke BBC persons regard it as scarcely better than the Daily Mail.
Today is in the eye of the storm because it is the BBC’s main political programme, not because it is the worst. The problem with the BBC goes wider and deeper. First, there is an astonishing lack of editorial leadership by the bosses. Second, filling that vacuum, is journalistic triumphalism. It was revealing during the election campaign that Nick Robinson complained of the Tories misinforming ‘some very high-profile journalists’.
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