NADINE DORRIES: Nigel Farage gets what the BBC needs in a way the Tories NEVER did
When people ask why I defected to Reform, I will often cite my experience of working with the BBC.
Let me explain. When I was appointed to head up the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport in 2021, reform of the BBC was high on my agenda.
It was, I believed, an organisation driven by ideologies that were alien to the vast majority of licence fee-paying members of the public.
Nor could I get my head around the fact that we criminalise British citizens who refuse to pay the licence fee simply because they want to watch television. Nearly three-quarters of those prosecuted for non-payment are women. Many are single mothers or pensioners.
I was appalled, too, by the number of complaints being made against the BBC – going all the way back to Princess Diana’s Panorama interview with rogue reporter Martin Bashir in 1995. And yet I discovered in the year before my appointment just how few complaints made by viewers and listeners had been upheld.
I had first-hand experience of editorial mismanagement, too. Shortly after I became Culture Secretary, the BBC became mired in yet another misreporting scandal relating to an anti-Semitic attack on Jewish students on a private bus travelling along Oxford Street in November 2021.
Claims that an anti-Muslim slur initiated the fracas proved to be false, but it took the broadcaster eight weeks to correct the online news report. (Ofcom eventually found the BBC guilty of ‘significant editorial failings’.)
This was an institutional behemoth crying out for change. But what I discovered was that MPs in both main parties, Labour and Conservative, were more than happy to allow the BBC to continue to be run by a Left-wing, woke, diversity and inclusion-obsessed clique.
If our national broadcaster is ever to return to the principles of fair and impartial reporting, it will take a Reform government under Nigel Farage to make it happen, Nadine Dorries writes
The BBC is in turmoil after a leaked report found Panorama edited a speech by Donald Trump
There was zero appetite to make the BBC more accountable or to hold the Corporation’s feet to the fire when it came to impartial reporting. One of the reasons why was clear. If you criticise the BBC, expect its big-beast journalists – the likes of Nick Robinson – to come after you.
There is no end to the cowardice, self-delusion and mediocrity of MPs. When it came to challenging the BBC’s belief that it is above everyone and everything while spouting fine words to the contrary, those failings were at their most transparent.
So radical reform was not an option but what I could do was freeze the licence fee for two years and launch a review to explore the future funding of the BBC before its Royal Charter came up for renewal in 2027.
The backlash was ferocious. Backbench Tory MPs applied pressure by piling the complaints into No 10 to try to stop it happening. Some Cabinet colleagues were viscerally opposed, seeing any challenge to how the BBC operated or even any attempt to modernise it as a threat to its very existence.
Rishi Sunak was then Chancellor, and I was warned by the Treasury that the licence fee was Treasury policy and that it wasn’t my job as Culture Secretary to conduct a review into how the BBC was funded. When I tried to raise this with Sunak, he refused to even discuss it.
It made no sense. As a Cabinet member, I was held to account on an almost daily basis. Every word I said, every decision I took was rightly scrutinised. And yet here was the BBC, priding itself on its journalism that held politicians like me to account but obstructing scrutiny of its own decisions and behaviour and accountable to no one. Talk about double standards.
Little has changed since – except the crises the Beeb faces seem to come faster than ever. Which leads to the question: where do we go from here?
The BBC must embrace the digital revolution by becoming a subscription service, while the news division needs to be hived off and pared back to its core function – presenting factual news without woke filters. If other media organisations can do it, so should the BBC.
Today, when I speak to Nigel Farage about the BBC, he gets it. If our national broadcaster is ever to return to the principles of fair and impartial reporting, it will take a Reform government to make it happen. In the meantime, despite the resignations, expect more of the same.
An annoying (and modern) blight on the Cotswolds
My Cotswolds village has become something of a tourist magnet in recent years. True, locals don’t seem to mind and, as a relatively new incomer, nor do I. It’s good for the local economy and vibe of the village.
There has been one challenge, however: combine harvesters and tractors are unable to access fields on occasion because of the heavy traffic and parking in the High Street.
To solve the problem, the local estate has dug a track around the edge of two fields, which allows farm traffic to bypass the village.
So far, so sensible.
On Saturday I took the dogs out and walked along the new track, which is still a work in progress. As I ambled along enjoying the glorious autumnal sunshine, I was approached by a 60-something couple walking in the opposite direction. Their dress was what I would describe as modern-day hippy, and they were clearly ‘up from London’.
They asked me what was going on in the field and I explained.
‘A bit drastic, don’t you think?’ the woman said.
‘Not really,’ I replied, slightly taken aback by how much the sand track seemed to offend her.
Five minutes later, another similarly attired individual stopped me and posed the same question and I repeated the explanation. She, too, seemed less than impressed with this pragmatic response to a local issue.
That was when the penny dropped. I’d met neither woman before but I knew them: the smug, know-it-all, self-righteous type – middle-class or a little posher – whom you see at the pro-Gaza demonstrations in London, a beanie on her head and a poster in her hand and ‘Gays for Palestine’ emblazoned across her T-shirt.
Or maybe you’ll spot them, accompanied by their son Tarquin, throwing a bucket of paint over an Old Master in the name of Extinction Rebellion.
Yes, I’m guilty of stereotyping but they spoilt an otherwise blissful walk. Tourism in the Cotswolds might be overrated after all.
Stony-faced Harry looks like a lost soul
A moody Prince Harry arrives at Kris Jenner's 70th birthday party with Meghan in Los Angeles
Prince Harry’s thunderous expression as he and his wife arrive at Amazon boss Jeff Bezos’s $165 million Beverly Hills mansion for a bling-fest Kardashian party says it all.
He knows he shouldn’t be there. He knows that across the Pond, that same night, his family will have gathered for the most important event in the national calendar: the Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance. And here he is, a veteran of Afghanistan, rubbing shoulders with the likes of Kim K & Co and rapper Snoop Dogg.
In contrast, the smile on Meghan’s face tells us who wears the pants in this relationship. I doubt he had any choice.
Will we ever get the real Harry back? The one who threw his heart and soul into establishing the Invictus Games for wounded military personnel? One can only hope...
It’s the day every one of us is dreading – the second Reeves Budget on November 26 – and we should all be very afraid.
Last year she raised £40billion in taxes, borrowed £40 billion and then spent £100 billion more than budgeted for by the previous government. Now, she’s coming back for more and there’s no suggestion that she will cut public spending. She knows Labour MPs would see her off if she dared and she is out to save her own neck.
While she gets to keep her job (for now), others are losing theirs as unemployment rises.
When my dad died from a brain tumour, I watched powerless as my grieving mum walked into the arms of a manipulative monster who snapped her neck, leaving her paralysed