A letter to auntie

Hopefully the ripples from the fascist stuff last week will subside quickly, but I thought I'd post up this letter of complaint to the BBC anyway.

Next piece comming soon.

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Sir / Madam

I am writing to complain in the strongest terms about the systematic hype given to Nick Griffin's appearance on Question Time last week. I also have a series of questions in bold I would like answered as soon as practically possible.

Normal practice in Question Time is for guests to be announced at the end of the preceding edition. As a licence payer I require you to tell me:

- Why the BBC built up to the programme by regular mentions in news bulletins across the network of Mr Griffins appearance.

- Why the show was oriented around the appearance and opinions of one guest .

Both these phenomena are unique in my experience of watching the show since childhood.

You have given Mr Griffin enhanced status as a guest you consider newsworthy.

- Who made these decisions, when, via which procedures and under what auspices?

If it was a matter of chasing ratings then I hope the BBC is pleased that in return for a 4 fold increase in ratings on the back of your orchestrated publicity there has been a vast increase in interest in the fascist party and ideology.

Although claims may be made about wanting to "expose" the party or that Mr Griffin may have looked foolish to some, it is pretty clear that he and his party benefited, first from the hype for their brand, then from the victim status they can legitimately claim from the unique way the show was conducted.

Please understand I am in no way objecting to the invitation granted to an elected MEP to appear on the show. I also accept that a degree of controversy was inevitable. However, the completely different treatment accorded to him was needless, naive and highly irresponsible.

For years the BBC has given disproportionate coverage to this medium sized party.


I also require to know if an editorial decision was taken at any time or level during the recent European election campaign that the BNP were to be one of the "major" stories.

As an example The Green Party get more votes nationwide and have many more elected representatives. Why do they not get the same amount of attention? Are they just not sensationalist enough to suit your "news" agenda?


I trust that when Mr Griffin or other BNP speakers are to appear on such shows in future, they will receive exactly the same amount of low grade publicity given to other speakers. Any other approach will indicate a continuing fetish for fascism. The BBC needs to look long and hard at the dynamics behind this. I trust you can speak to this issue as well as answering my questions and give me some account of discussions about last week's circus that are taking place at higher levels.


Thank you for your time, I look forward to a full and detailed reply.

Steven Durrant

Election Fever Cranks Up! - Democracy's Great Farce

The final pre-election conferences are nearly done. The fevered hype starts here. But what really is at stake as a thick fog of "debate" descends in future months?

How much of the endless analylsis and propaganda will be genuinelly relevant to country, people or planet?

Churchill described a General Election as "Democracys Great Feast". He might have been right then, but this is now. Even if we have a different governing party, how much effect do they really have when resources and labour are so heavily dominated by a global casino capitalism mediated by failed financial elites?

For the economy it's probably too late whoever wins: The 2 main opposition parties would have landed us more or less where we are now through "light touch regulation" of the banking sector. So although £880,000,000,000 national debt will be mentioned a great deal, the main cause of it won't get very much mention. Sure, there's talk of controlling the banks, but read the small print and there are not even medium size changes proposed to the system.

Nearly £40,000 per household has gone to the banks. For months Brown jibed at Cameron for being "Mr 10%", but soon he and the LibDems were admitting to their planned cuts. They will say they are "telling it like it is", but if they were to do that they would be saying "sorry, your tax can't pay of education and stuff, it has to cover the banking mess we allowed to happen".

So, for all the huffing and puffing there just isn't a vast amount between the 3 bigger parties. Listening to endless debates, even the much-talked-about TV Leader debates, risks being a mild waste of time at best, but more likely will be a dangerously misleading distraction.

Brown has been sticking to the "choice between us doing X and tories doing Y" for years. It's got incredibly stale, God help him if that is the mainstay of his campaign.

"Vote for us, we're not them" is often a major cry during election time. As a rule, the larger such a cry, the more of a vacuum there is in the credibility of those saying it. Much of the Labour / Conservative rivalry is tribal rather than substantially political.

Whatever the outcome next spring it is almost inevitable that the incomming government will very soon be the most unpopular since Thatcher and quite possibly beyond.

We will pay taxes to cover the bankers while services are cut and the real economy struggles, regardless of hyped rollercoaster rallies in the speculative sector.

And this is all just if things don't get worse.

Like the EU elections earlier in the year, this once in a 5 year chance runs a big risk of being under-utilised as a reality check. The next 5 years will see unprecedented global problems with the economy, climate, public health, food and war. It's very hard to understate the significance for the species of the short period ahead. It could indeed be a revolutionary period, but not neccessarily in a good way.

As it is, it's very strange that Labour are unpopular as a result of their right wing policies (though the mainstream wrongly say they are "left") but the consequence will be another right wing government.

This is down to a voting system that leaves so many disconnected.

We essentially live under a cartel duopoly which Labour and Conservative have colluded in for many generations. Each knows that no matter how much they screw up they will be back sooner or later. When it comes to changing that system with some form of PR, Turkeys dont vote for Christmas.

This is why Labour went back on their promise to look in to it when they first got in. Roy Jenkins was commissioned to report on it, but Blair binned the report when he had his big majority. Now Labour are running into the buffers and some of them have oddly become excited about PR again. There's even another Labour promise to look at bringing it in if they get back in.

Every 5 years some soft progessives get very exited about idea of a hung parliament to force the issue. Yes, it might happen, but come back and laugh at me if I'm wrong - I think that to give it even a 25% chance is exagerating. Wishing for such an unlikely outcome every 5 years is just not enough to hang on to.

I'm not interested in PR because I'm in The Green Party, I deal with the system we have even though we suffer heavily by it. But despite some long established justifcations for the current system, none can negate the harshest of facts - that most votes don't count. Period.

This last week, Murdoch's Sun got the ball rolling and came out early for the other tory party. The response from different elements of Labour was very interesting. Some tried rather unconvincingly to shrug it off, others were angry. The general air was "they doth protest too much". If The Sun is so bad, what does it say about Labour that they received and courted The Sun's support for so long?

But if you think the media noise is bad now, just wait. Frankly I dread it and will focus on real world campaigns in Manchester rather than be taken in too much by establishment doublespeak.

Perhaps it is the result in a single seat, a win for Caroline Lucas in Brighton & Hove to become the first Green MP, that will do more to shake up politics than the blustering of the failed major partie and whichever of them acquires the poisoned chalice of government.