Moving Target

I have noticed in a couple of posters, in my view, quite correctly taking issue with the so called 'centre ground' in British politics. The 'centre ground' over which the Conservative, Labour and Lib Dems place themselves is quite clearly NOT the centre ground of political thought and expression.

This being the case, why is it every time I watch Question Time on BBC1 the same tired old political activists are in the audience hectoring the politicians with same old out of date viewpoints?

Was it always like this? Even in the days of Robin Day?

Britannist

It was a more interesting programme when the Late Sir Robin Day was the Chairman of the panel on Question Time. The audience for it now is much lower than in the days of Sir Robin.

The programme is biased to the left and to the pro-EU minority in this country. Whenever they ask for spokesmen/women from the 'main' parties it is always someone from the pro-EU wing of those parties who comes on (except in the case of the europhile Liberal Dims or Scottish Nationalists who have no anti-wing).

What I'm saying is that Kenneth Clarke (the europhile and failed Conservative leadership challenger) is much more likely to be on Question Time than Bill Cash, the strongly eurosceptic Conservative MP who has hardly ever been invited on (if at all).

Likewise with Labour - when has Ian Davidson, the Glaswegian MP who leads the eurosceptic/anti-EU wing of the parliamentary Labour Party appeared on Question Time? I don't think he's ever been on - the BBC prefer to put on air Labour eurofanatics like Patricia Hewitt or Charles Clarke (the discredited and strongly pro-euro former Labour Home Secretary who, I believe, is on Question Time this coming Thursday :evil: ).

kernow

I still watch QT, but it is amazing how pro EU the Panel and audience usually are and for me proof as to how pro EU the BBC is! On the rare times an anti EU panelist like "Heffer" or "Hichens" are on they are always outnumbered by the pro EU lot on the panel.

John Carter

Used to watch it. Then I got tired of morons in the audience saying the "Iraq" word every ten minutes. It got to be like a broken record.

ryansoton

I still watch it but i am becoming annoyed by the same people appearing month after month.
Instead of having pointless people on the show like Sandra Howard or the lady from Liberty who must have been on the show 3 times in the last 6 months QT should have members from the other parties.
I appreciate that the Lib Dems, Tories and Labour should have a rep on the show as they are the main parties in parliament but each show should have someone from either UKIP, English Democrats, Greens, Scot/Welsh nationlists or Respect.
Ill leave out the BNP as I dont think the BBC should air extremists views although I suppose they aired the guy who tried to shout down the ex commie in John Reid

brian pearson

The BBC would probably consider most of the views on these forums as extreme.

Britannist

Who cares what the ant-UKIP BBC thinks of this forum or other platforms for the anti-EU majority. We are forced by an anachronistic law to pay the smug, overstaffed, under-performing BBC a fortune every year - what they're raking in in licence fees (over £2 billion a year) is more than the total GDP of some developing nations. Time the BBC stood on their own two feet instead of scrounging off the rest of us. Get rid of the television licence poll tax.

The BBC - which is supposed to be British and on the side of this country (but isn't) - has a duty under broadcasting regulations to be impartial and representative of all political opinions. At the moment the BBC appears to think representing all political views means only those expressed in the pro-euro Guardian and europhile 'Independent'.

Sooner or laters, there should be court action against the BBC europhiles if they persist in ignoring or not providing fair coverage of the euroscepticn and anti-EU majority in our country.

brian pearson

Yeh. Agree with all that, but don't agree with the previous post about not having the BNP on QT. And if we allow the BBC to censor 'extreme views ' then most of ours would never be aired.

mkpdavies

I agree, let the scum on now an then and make sure some good questions are asked.

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Populist Lee

I'm afraid so.
Even in about 1982 I played a game with some of my colleagues for one edition.
That is, we wrote down in advance of the programme what the questions from the audience would be; and what the respective answers from the three guests would be. [Yes, only 3 in those days.]

Guess what? We were spot on every time!
Predictable since the day it started.

The very few times you could anticipate something different was when someone like Enoch Powell was a guest; but this was a rare event.