Freedom of Information Act Does Not Apply To The BBC
This is a guest post by HP commenter Alec
First things first, I like the BBC. It has all the potential, and a lot of the realization to be one of the institutions which is truly great about Britain. When pottering about the house or vegetable patch, I usually have Radio3 playing in the background.
As part of a professed belief in transparency of government, it has argued for and made use of the Freedom of Information Act. It maintains a Open Secrets blog, written by Michael Rosenbaum, to discuss such issues. I like the concept of the FoI-A.
But, time and again, the BBC comes out with real stinkers. No, I do not mean the eye-defiling Bonekickers – which, thankfully, never will be seen again – or the updating of the Robin Hood legend into the Age of Stupid – which keeps getting shown. I mean stuff like folding like a pack of cards when the Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Britain, whose Deputy has been reported as calling for attacks on British service personnel, objected to a panellist on BBC Newsnight claiming the organization supported attacks on British service personnel. Well, Kaa sound/lookalike MCB-spokesman Inayat Bunglawala has said “no pleasure” should be taken in attacks on British service personnel.
Or the BBC’s resistance to, through the expenditure of a six figure legal sum, to two challenges brought by the Information Commissioner and Great Wen lawyer, Stephen Sugar respectively to apply the spirit of the FoI-A.
Dispiritingly, it has seen off both, as Rosenbaum discusses on Open Secrets.
Both were decisions were delivered by Mr Justice Irwin, one after another on 2 October. The first relates to financial transparency by BBC, regarding its use of the license fees. This referred specifically to the Gordon, Jackson, Trice and Goslett Requests:
On 21 January 2005 Mr David Gordon (Belfast Telegraph Newsroom) submitted a request to the BBC for the following information:
“1. What is the annual gross salary paid by the BBC to each of the following George Jones, Stephen Nolan, Hugo Duncan, Gerry Anderson, John Daly, David Dunseith, Donna Traynor, Noel Thompson, Conor Bradford and Seamus McKee?
2. How much did the BBC pay Straighforward Productions last year and what programmes did this relate to?
3. What was BBC Newsline’s annual budget for outside broadcasts in each of the last five years?
4. How many individual foreign trips have been made by personnel working for BBC NI Spotlight programme in the past three years?
5. What has been the total cost of BBC NI Spotlight programmes involving overseas travel in the past three years?
6. What has been the single most expensive BBC NI Spotlight programme involving foreign travel in the past three years?”
(”The Gordon Request”)
On 28 February 2006 Mr Jamie Jackson (The Observer) submitted a request to the BBC for the following information:
“how much the BBC paid for the rights and to cover the recent winter Olympics in Turin Italy”
(”The Jackson Request”)
On 28 March 2006 Mr Arthur Trice submitted a request to the BBC for the following information:
“In respect of your successful soap Eastenders:
[...]
4. Total annual staff costs (performs, writers and production staff) of the programme.
5. [….] the range of contract values (excluding extras) from minimum to maximum.”
(”The Trice Request”)
On 31 May 2006 Mr Miles Goslett (The Evening Standard) submitted a request to the BBC for the following information:
“1. What is the budget for the current series of Top Gear on BBC2? (Please specify whether this figure includes presenters’ fees.)
2. What is the annual budget for EastEnders on BBC1? (Please specify whether this figure includes actors’ fees.)
3. What is the annual budget of Newsnight on BBC2? (Please specify whether this figure includes presenters’ and journalists’ salaries.)”
(”The Goslett Request”)
Other possible cases of BBC profligacy, which I can recall just now, are: blabbermouth J-J-J-J-John Humphrys, who considers whatever he receives for presenting Mastermind to be “money for old rope“; sending a cotorie of 407 staff – including the well-known music commentator, Andrew Marr – to the Glastonbury Festival and to stare at girls’ bottoms; the Director General, Mark Thompson, insisting that he is worth every penny of a salary which is almost 60 times that which I ever have received (whilst paying the same license fee as viewers on his salary)
The FOI-A has a provision that information held primarily for purposes of journalism, art or literature are exempt from requests; and it was to this that the BBC referred when it declined the above requests. The requesters then complained to the Information Commissioner, who took the cases on their behalf; which has now been rejected.
On the Open Secrets blog, Rosenbaum reports matter-of-factly that this is in keeping with the letter of the FOI-A, and no further debate is required. Readers think otherwise, though.
I would be prepared to argue the case that a journalists require a degree of privacy and protection for their sources or output, but I am struggling to see just how some of the above requests can be defined as “art or literature”.
The second case which Mr Justice Irwin considered, and similarly rejected, concerned Steven Sugar’s long-running attempt to make public the 2004 Balen Report. As recently as February 2009, the House of Lords had ruled that the Information Tribunal had been correct in 2006 when it ordered the BBC to comply with requests for its publication.
An in-house publication, senior journalist Malcolm Balen had reviewed tens of thousands of hours of footage and reams of reports on the BBC’s coverage of Israel/Palestine issues following complaints of bias against both parties. Balen had reportedly said that, on completion, the Director of BBC News had effused praise for his work.
Yet, the BBC declined the publicize the report. I am incline to agree with (but not approve) the argument that this was a general principle of maintaining confidentiality of its own internal documents; highlighted by its refusal to grant the Gordon, Jackson,Trice and Goslett Requests. Yet, the Balen Report refers to a tinderbox issue on which, again off the top of my head, it has arguably shown bias when it: as Hani al-Sibai almost said, showed its feelings towards Israelis by sending a Middle East Correspondant called Foreskin, who then decried the arrest of a mentally-handicapped Palestinian boy who had been tricked into becoming a walking-bomb; eventually accepted that another correspondent breached partiality rules when she admitted to crying at the departure of known Egyptian tea-leaf, Yasser Arafat; employing, as BBC Middle East Editor, Tim Llewellyn who believed that the duplicitous Zionists spoke forms of English to order, selected unassuming Anglo-Saxon names, dressed impecably and, presumably, bled when pricked.
I will add that I do not think the BBC is necessarily liberal or Left-wing (in the derogatory sense). It is less than 30 years since its then Director General, Alasdair Milne (not pictured above) reputably black-balled Harold Rosen – father of Michael… no, sorry, not that one… this one – due to his Communist activities.
Bloated and unaccountable, and thinking the rules apply to the little people is more accurate.
When the FOI-A was passed, I recall a sketch on the BBC (with Dawn French?) about one hapless requester being frustrated by an official in his attempts to see a document which referred to himself. The reason being was that another party, who had not issued consent, was also mentioned.
That other party was the official.
Nor do these rulings apply only to the BBC. The precedent which has been set is that many other publically-funded bodies or organizations could stick a feather in their hats and call it journalistic or artistic or literary macaroni, and not be obliged to account for how they spend public money.
Considering the justified coverage by BBC News of the MPs’ expenses disgrace and admirable use of the FOI-A for its own reporting, and the efforts by entire organization to make public details of the ‘dodgy dossier’, this circumlocutious route to block efforts to impose on it a similar degree of transparency makes it as credible as the thought of MPs attempting to exempt themselves from the FOI-A.
Or the sight of the Potus hugging a seven foot rabbit.
Comments
| 4 October 2009, 11:08 pm |
Get your facts right, Alec. Harold Rosen was never blacklisted by the BBC. He was at the time of Milne’s Directorship of the BBC one of the most highly reputed Professors at the Institute of Education and not involved with the BBC.
It was Michael Rosen who was blacklisted, and the man responsible was a Brigadier Michael Stonham who was stationed in Broadcasting House as an in-house vetting officer on behalf of MI5 for the supposedly “independent” BBC.
The role of Brigadier Stonham was documented in an Observer expose published on 18th August 1985, which detailed the facts about the non-confirmation of Michael Rosen’s permanent contract following his blacklisting by Stonham. Rosen had previously been a trainee at the Beeb, had openly declared his marxist afflliations when recruited and had subsequently made pro marxist and anti US documentaries.
Clearly, those who recruited and those who commissioned programmes at the Beeb in those days were not under Stonham’s control, but he must have had a veto on permanent appointments.
As Michael Rosen has subsequently repeatedly pointed out, it never prevented him from subsequently being employed by the Beeb as the presenter of Word of Mouth and other nominally non political programmes. But of course he never got to make further programmes celebrating such marxist luminaries as Regis Debray and and anti-US programmes. Not that that made any difference. There were plenty of others who did and still do.
| 4 October 2009, 11:34 pm |
The case for having a BBC no longer exists, in the way it did at the inception of broadcasting. And the BBC gave up it’s track record as an unbiased news organisation long ago. I am sick of paying a licence fee so I can watch other channels, I am sick of their profligate spending on public events, to which they send far more staff than any other channel.
If you read the Times, you can fairly well predict who is going to turn up on Radio 4 next week in the arty farty programmes apart from the usual assorted cronies of Sandy Toksvig. My guess is next week it will be the risible Grayson Perry.
The BBC has become irredeemably warped, it needs the chop.
| 4 October 2009, 11:38 pm |
Then, Judy, I stand corrected. My mis-memory must have come from the father/son link between Alasdair and Seamus Milne. Could someone correct it?
| 5 October 2009, 1:30 am |
The four sorts of money;
A) spending your own money on yourself.
B) spending your own money on someone else.
C) spending other peoples money on other people.
D) spending someone else money on yourself.
In the case of B, money is spent very carefully, whereas in the case of C, only the best is good enough.
| 5 October 2009, 1:36 am |
If you read the Times, you can fairly well predict who is going to turn up on Radio 4 next week
Murdoch’s grip on the British media knows no bounds
| 5 October 2009, 9:17 am |
Some of you think Radio 4 is biased but try the world service. If you thought Grendal evil try his mother! The world service is not of this planet!
| 5 October 2009, 9:38 am |
Alec, you should remember the motto of the Circumlocution Office in Dicken’s ‘Little Dorrit’; ‘How Not To Do It’.
| 5 October 2009, 8:54 pm |
Alec. The Open Secrets blog is written by Martin Rosenbaum, not Michael Rosenbaum. Please do not confuse him with Michael Rosen.
| 5 October 2009, 10:52 pm |
And now for something completely different:
Monty Python turns forty!
Forty years ago today, on Oct. 5, 1969, the first episode of
Monty Python was broadcast on BBC2.
| 6 October 2009, 8:50 am |
I guess this is going to seem very naive, but I always assumed that the BBC published all of their financial information given that it is not a private company and has no money of its own – only taxpayers funds. Given that it does not need to compete, and that its run by a small cabal of managers and thus open to abuse, it would seem sensible that a full accounting of their financial expenditure should be available.
I can’t believe I’m reading that the BBC is deliberately obfuscating. Why on Earth would they try to keep things like this secret unless they have something to hide?
The sickening thing is they have been given a green light to keep information out of the taxpayer’s view. That’s a little bit like a private company withholding financial data from its shareholders.
I don’t hate the BBC – they can be a force for good. But recently they have sunk far too far into their comfort zone, turning into a club of smug, liberal cheerleaders. There are quite a few people who work for the BBC that I still respect – I like Andrew Marr, and I have a huge amount of respect for their roving political journalist who turns up on Newsnight but whose name escapes me. I would count these as genuinely independent and good value.
I have a suspicion that before long the BBC will transform into something akin to the wet, liberal Channel 4 News. That will be a sad day for us all.
| 9 October 2009, 3:47 am |
If anyone is still reading this, perhaps it will be no surprise that know-all Judy, while correcting others’ mistakes, makes mistakes of her own. I quote and insert in caps in her text where she is wrong.:
“It was Michael Rosen who was blacklisted, and the man responsible was a Brigadier Michael Stonham [NO HIS NAME WAS 'RONNIE'] who was stationed in Broadcasting House as an in-house vetting officer on behalf of MI5 for the supposedly “independent” BBC.
The role of Brigadier Stonham was documented in an Observer expose published on 18th August 1985, which detailed the facts about the non-confirmation of Michael Rosen’s permanent contract [NO, IT WASN'T A 'PERMANENT' CONTRACT] following his blacklisting by Stonham. Rosen had previously been a trainee [NO, THAT'S WHAT I WAS AT THE TIME OF STONHAM'S INTERVENTION. IE A 'TRAINEE'] at the Beeb, had openly declared his marxist afflliations when recruited and had subsequently made pro marxist [THAT'S A LIE] and anti US documentaries [THAT'S A LIE]. ”
I MADE ONE RADIO DOCUMENTARY ABOUT THE ILL-FATED LAST EXPEDITION BY GUEVARA SEEMINGLY INSPIRED BY REGIS DEBRAY. MY OWN ATTITUDE TO THIS EXPEDITION, TO DEBRAY AND TO GUEVARA AT THE TIME WAS THAT IT WAS MUDDLE-HEADED, POLITICALLY CRAZY AND DOOMED FROM THE START. MOST OF THE DOCUMENTARY CONSISTED OF READINGS FROM GUEVARA’S DIARY THAT IN EFFECT CONDEMNED HIS LACK OF PREPAREDNESS AND WRONG-HEADED APPROACH IN HIS OWN WORDS.
AS FOR ‘ANTI-AMERICAN’ APPROACH, THE DOCUMENTARY OF COURSE TOLD THE STORY OF HOW HE WAS KILLED WHICH INVOLVED CIA INTERVENTION.
I ALSO MADE SEVERAL DOCUMENTARIES FOR SCHOOLS TELEVISION. THESE WERE NO MORE THAN CUT AND PASTE JOBS USING ARCHIVE ALREADY OWNED BY THE BBC. ONE OF THESE WAS ABOUT CHEMICAL WARFARE. IN THE BBC ARCHIVE WAS A SHORT CLIP OF THE US ARMY USING LSD ON ONE OF ITS OWN SOLDIERS IN ORDER TO SEE WHAT THE EFFECT WOULD BE IF IT WAS ADMINISTERED TO ENEMIES. YOU SEE IN THE CLIP A MAN UNABLE TO COMPLETE AN ASSAULT COURSE. I INCLUDED THE CLIP. THE BBC RECEIVED A COMPLAINT FROM THE US EMBASSY. THE CLIP WAS REMOVED FROM THE DOCUMENTARY THE NEXT TIME IT WAS PUT OUT.
IF THIS IS WHAT JUDY MEANS BY ‘ANTI-AMERICAN’, SHE’S TALKING OUT OF HER TUKKHES. IT MAY HAVE BEEN MILDLY ANTI-MILITARY BUT NO MORE THAN THAT. I’M NOT ‘ANTI-AMERICAN’. HALF OF MY FAMILY IS AMERICAN.
| 9 October 2009, 3:56 am |
By the way, for the record, I didn’t think of Debray as a ‘marxist luminary’ at the time. I don’t know. I thought he was a bit of a jerk. I still do. However, he played a part in 1960s history, particularly in Latin America at that moment. You may remember his ‘foco’ theory which informed Guevara’s approach and partly explains his failure. Perhaps Judy thinks that radio and TV shouldn’t make programmes about people she disagrees with. An interesting idea.
Thank you for that.
Was it proper for Mr Justice Irwin to have ruled on the complaints by both Steven Sugar and the Information Commissioner on the same day?
Also, I realize that this is inevitably going to segue onto the background of the Balen Report, but this is only tangentially related to these two rulings. There is the issue of many publically funded bodies – including, on balance, damn fine ones like the BBC – of not submitting to the spirit of the FOI-A, which they have made use of themselves.
MPs did similar when they stuck their heels in at being made accountable and visible to hoi polloi on their conduct and expenses, and look how that turned out.