I genuinely cannot believe what I have just seen on the BBC national UK news. A report on the general election in Scotland in advance of tonight’s Scottish Leaders’ Debate. I know we have become used to the unfettered Tory bias of the BBC, but this was at a level of propaganda which has left me seriously disturbed.
In the 6 minute piece, four different BBC presenters told the viewer that the election in Scotland is dominated by the issue of a second independence referendum – which is not true, but is precisely the way that the Scottish Conservatives are trying to frame the debate in every single one of their leaflets and broadcast appearances.
They then had a piece by Sarah Smith from Kelso – a walk from the border with England and the second most Tory place in Scotland. Why choose somewhere so entirely unrepresentative? Then in Kelso they found an “independent” journalistic commentator to explain the situation to us. This “independent” journalist was the Conservative’s arch Conservative, Alex Massie of the Spectator, of Murdoch’s Times and often of the Daily Mail, possibly the most right wing man in Scotland.
Did the BBC introduce Massie as a Conservative, or at least as from the Spectator, known to be the Tory house magazine? No. They passed him off as an independent journalist. Did they balance him with another commentator who was not a raving Tory nutter? No. Did Massie’s contribution count against the time allocated to the Tories in the broadcast under election rules? No, he was “independent”. What did he tell us? Why he confirmed exactly what four different BBC presenters told us in the piece, that this election is all about the second Independence referendum. Exactly as the Conservatives say. Because nobody in Scotland ever thinks about anything else, obviously.
You are not going to believe this. Even as I type, at 18.24. a fifth BBC journalist has just told us tonight’s debate will be about “that fault line in Scottish politics, a second Independence referendum.”
This insistence on framing the entire debate in Tory terms, of trying to ensure that the metaphorical battle takes place only on Tory chosen ground, is disgusting. The second referendum has already been initiated by the Scottish Parliament after the SNP and Greens won a majority of both seats and popular vote in the last Holyrood elections. That is where the competence to initiate the referendum lies.
The BBC approach would at least have a certain honesty if they were saying that, as this election is, according to the BBC and the Tories, all about a second referendum, therefore if the SNP wins in Scotland there should be one. But that is not the terms in which they are framing it. What they have told us, in terms, is that should the SNP win less than 90% of the seats, that represents a rejection of the second referendum. Yes, that really is the BBC narrative, day in and day out, again and again and again, here in Scotland.
Just to complete the intellectual dishonesty of the snivelling hacks, the same people who characterise 35% opinion poll showings for Corbyn in England as total disgrace and failure, characterise 25% poll showings for Ruth Davidson in Scotland as the most sensational victory and triumph.
Of one thing I am sure. After Independence, the Imperial Broadcasting Corporation at Pacific Quay does not need to be reformed. It needs to be immediately closed down on day one, and every single employee needs to be handed their P45. Every single last one. Anybody who has worked in this obnoxious state propaganda organisation can have no part in building a new society.
Unless they have another vocation, like shovelling horseshit. I have never seen so many horses in Scotland as featured in the BBC report from Kelso. Tally-ho boys, what?!
May be it is time for an organised and wide (nationwide) petition to discontinue TV licence fees. This is being sold to us as in exchange to unbiased source of information. BUT is it now? They (BBC) are the ones who broken contract first, and yet it is still an offence not paying them. Why are we paying for 5-10 times over national average salaries to BBC journalists for feeding us the same propaganda we are receiving for free?
It is, of course, only an offence if one watches BBC shite in the first place.
(Hint: Your telly is a big part of the problem).
Both the SNP and Corbyn represent some kind of ‘national emergency’ to significant sections of the deep (corporate) state. The BBC response is largely a product of this hysteria. We can safely assume that there’s a pretty febrile atmosphere in corporate boardrooms and among state planners throughout the country. These people are the BBC’s real constituency, and the BBC will continue to articulate their consensus.
The BBC trust is utterly useless. Our only response is a simple one. Stop paying the license.
The Trust has gone Ozzy F, along with HSBC’s Rona Fairhead et al.
There is a new bunch called the BBC Board, under the chairmanship of David Clementi. Chosen by the Tories and the DCMS Sec of State Karen Bradley presumably.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/insidethebbc/managementstructure/seniormanagement
‘Sir David Cecil Clementi (born 25 February 1949) is an English business executive and a former Deputy Governor of the Bank of England. He is currently Chairman of the BBC.
Clementi holds a number of board positions including Chairman of International Payments business World First and Vice Chairman of Investment Manager Ruffer Group. He has held numerous other positions including Chairman of Prudential plc, one of Britain’s largest insurance companies, non-executive director on the board of governors of the Rio Tinto Group and until June 2015 was Chairman of Virgin Money, seeing the business through its IPO. In March 2008, he was announced as Warden of Winchester College and was Master of the Mercers Company.’ Wiki.
His biog on World First. foreign currency, adds a few more connections.
‘Sir David joined World First as senior adviser in 2006 and has been the chairman since 2011. He is also currently chairman of Kings Cross Central and has been confirmed as the new chairman of the BBC. His previous roles include chairman of Prudential plc, director of Rio Tinto plc and director of The Royal Opera House. In addition he was Deputy Governor of the Bank of England from 1997 to 2002 and was also chief executive of Kleinwort Benson. He is a graduate of Oxford University and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School. ‘
Grandfather was governor of Hong Kong.
If the SNP are the majority party then they should declare Independence,no ifs/buts/maybes,the Act of Union wasn,t a democratic decision and May is ruling on around 35% of the vote.
For the other countries of the world to recognise our independence we need to have utterly exhausted every other option short of a UDI AND there being a real and present danger to our institutions. Such as a proposal to shut down Holyrood or unilaterally change some vital aspect of our democracy.
The Catalans are inching closer to that territory. Their right to hold a referendum utterly denied, an advisory one ignored, and now prosecutions of politicians who enabled or at least did not stop it. Spain seems determined to drive the Catalans to a UDI and it may come sooner than we think such is the paucity of reporting of it in the British media. Only The National seems to keep any sort of eye on the situation.
Next step is probably to pass a referendum bill in Holyrood using the permission granted for the last one. That one is at worst arguable in court. Dare Westminster to take Holyrood to court to deny the democratic will of the people to self determination and likely drive many more people to Yes. Scots are thrawn, we don’t react well to being pushed around. Especially by patrician English types.
Then we can go to court ourselves. We can also try calling a national convention as Craig has advised.
So we have a number of things we have to exhaust before we have to go UDI.
One thing we should however never do though is rule out ever going there. It needs to be sat there in our constitutional arsenal. The nuclear option if you will that Westminster knows we have and knows we can use if pushed hard enough.
First class summing up Muscleguy.
Well, Craig, I stopped watching the beeb some years ago. It was a gradual process driven initially by the god damn awful dreadful lack of quality of it all, and then by the bias and [frankly] unreliability of it. After all, if they can’t accurately report what’s happening in Scotland then what reliance can you place on anything else they report? Oddly, it was QT I first stopped watching. Don’t watch any television now and don’t miss it at all. As for what to do with the Beeb? Cancel the TV Licence and let them sink or swim by their own devices. Unionists are in it for the money only. Cut off the money and, for some reason, they lose their interest in the Union.
Dear Craig, having followed you from way South of the border for some time, I now sit here in disbelief that you have only just become seriously disturbed at the bias in BBC reporting. The tone and in many cases the mis representation of the facts and truth are beyond 1984 and has to make one ask if the scripts these hacks are playing too get vetted by Lynton before they go out in the morning. These are the same hacks who keep telling that we the British represent the cornerstone of democracy and free speech.
Quite.
And they are not pro-Tory per se. They are pro-Establishment.
Shocking…or at least it would be if we hadn’t come to expect it! This was my take on the matter, which perhaps not surprisingly has become my most widely read article:
https://morefollows.wordpress.com/2017/05/12/making-a-mockery-of-bbc-journalism/
“The BBC’s idea of balance is to show Theresa May’s appearance in an almost-empty room talking to glum-looking guests, then Corbyn’s speech in close-up, hiding the huge crowds that have turned out to see him.”
Yea, part of the sickening seemingly inexorable right wing march of the whole country.
I don’t agree with Craig. I think these people have done so much harm simply loosing a job is no kind of just recompense. And inevitably many of them should (by systems they endorse) be in prison or worse. But nothing can undo the lives lost, ruined, blown up, cut to pieces or starved to death with this regimes help, at home and abroad. Of which they are a central part.
An informed opinion! And straight to the point.
a specially snide and sneery incredulity. describes it exactly. Could this be anything to do with the BBC’s perpetual funding paranoia, and its need to butter up the likely next government? Of course it could. There needs to be a full investigation of party political coercion of the state broadcaster. – but as that will subject party-supported management and ministers to unwlcome scrutiny, it won’t happen.
Another informed opinion, from Mark Damazer (former Controller of BBC Radio 4) He’s noticed that politicians (generally – this piece isn’t partisan) are routinely allowed to get away with spouting ‘numerical nonsense’
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/june2017/2017/05/age-lies-how-politicians-hide-behind-statistics
So let us try a thought experiment. Imagine (though we don’t really have to imagine) that the Health Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, comes into a studio to say, surprise, surprise, that more is being spent in real terms on the NHS than ever before. Imagine that he is told there will be no questions on anything else until he can answer, let’s say, two obvious supplementary questions: in the course of the past 60 years how often has his assertion not been true? (Answer, says the IFS: four times, one of which was 2011/12.) And what has been the growth in per capita NHS spend, in real terms, since 2009/10, compared to the previous 15 years or so? (Answer: 0.6 per cent, as opposed to 5.4 per cent.) Answering these would show that his boast is one that almost all of his predecessors could have made, and also that the Conservative-led coalition was less generous to the health service than the preceding Labour government. It would be absolutely fair for Jeremy Hunt to respond vigorously about the need to cut the deficit or even to make points about who was in government when the crash happened – but he could not be allowed to get away with statistical near-rubbish.
‘Chelsea Manning Free! Here Are Crimes She Revealed.’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4w2gC5VP4YI
“Our” allies.
Joanna Cherry has apologized to the food bank using nurse.
Election 2017: Apology for TV debate food bank nurse
1 hour ago
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-39997155
Proof, if it is needed, that there is management of the ‘people’s voices’ on the BBC.
All suspect – Question Time, Any Questions, Any Answers, The Big Questions, Vox pops in the street. We will never know the extent of it.
‘Ms Austin said she was unmarried and explained that she was invited to take part in the (leaders’) debate after being part of a Question Time audience when her question about nurses’ pay rises was not asked.’
Was not the Tories that strutted up to the mic and said we are going for Indy2. Was miss Crankie. It is now backfiring on her, ill timed. And her party will lose seat over it
The clue is in the name of the party SNP. Do I have to spell it out for you?
When I worked at BBC (’64 to ’91) the constant bleat was that we were all lefties – I hardly ever watch TV now so can’t comment. Interesting though…
I have never been aware of such bias from the newspaper industry and media, in particular the BBC. If a campaign nationwide was inniciated to stop paying their licence fee would they be able to take millions of people to court, the corporation would completely fail. That might not be a bad thing.
@ Vweeme May 22, 2017 at 00:46
‘…..I guess you did not get Georgraphy at school either..Germany was closer to UK Via English Channel! …’
Tony did not dispute that the England was closer to Germany than Scotland. http://kartemap.com/uk3/
In fact, Dover (to be exact a point very near Dover) was the nearest point of mainland Britain to Occupied France (Jersey, occupied by Germany, was a tad closer to Occupied France) and also to Germany.
Manston Aerodrome in Kent, marked on map page here: https://www.google.co.uk/maps/place/Manston,+Ramsgate/@50.7309965,-18.2292587,4z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x47d952c866d6a5e1:0x5b9c3edecd703329!8m2!3d51.345814!4d1.37035
was the nearest airfield to Occupied France, and was very frequently heavily bombed. Also both Britain and France had heavy howitzers that could fire across the English Channel.
I was born in a house in Flete Road ( http://www.spitfiremuseum.org.uk/location ) a mile from Manston Aerodrome, in February 1943.
Wrong. The competence to initiate another referendum vote rests unequivocally with the BRITISH Parliament at Westminster. The reality is that the majority in Scotland who DONT want to leave the United Kingdom is bigger than most majorities enjoyed in either the Scottish or the British Parliament by any government. If you find that unpalatable then I’ll NOT apologise for democracy. Why can’t you just accept the result??? its wasn’t in any doubt? it WAS free and fair. That’s how democracy works. . . Not by who has the most column inches, Or the loudest voice. . . But I think i’m correct in saying that Nicola S. was the one to frame this election as indref2 “front and centre” Is it any wonder the NO campaign feel they have to reorganise? The vote in the Scottish parliament is a bit like the one in the British one where MOST MPs DIDNT want to leave the EU, but the country CLEARLY did. . . Politicians are often at variance with the electorate.
A mainstay of the No campaign in 2014 was that a No vote was the only way to keep Scotland in the EU.
That hasn’t turned out to be true. A month before the EU vote a majority of members of the Scottish Parliament were returned on a promise to vote for a second referendum if Scotland faced being taken out the EU against our will. Scotland subsequently voted by a 24% majority to remain in Europe with a Remain majority in all 32 Scottish council areas.
As for this election it’s the unionist parties who have been constantly talking about indyref2, and not the pro-independence SNP and Greens.
Neither free or fair, your vote counts, But those who count the votes count more, The sight of private cars, vans unescorted to the count gave cause for concern, we saw on live TV the confusion of vote delivery, where did they come from, where had they been, why no escorts , the evident discrepancy of returns in postal votes, returns unheard of in any election the returns exceeding any known percentage anywhere. There was an investigation of the argyle and Bute vote , the people doing the work were blocked and delayed at every turn, as far as I know it’s still going on regardless,
If you think it was fair that’s fine, what’s the saying Governments do bad things for the best reasons, usually themselves.
Shut up. The NO support flagged so they lied to get a NO result in Scotland and came up with the VOW!!! They also broke rules by breaking the Edinburgh Agreement and called pensioners to scare them into voting NO. They also lied on the doorsteps telling the voters there was no cuts coming from Westmeiser and it was a downright lie!! Keep lying because this time people will be listening very carefully. ?
The first bomb to fall in Wick was on July 1st 1940. The bomb fell in Bank Row at the end of a summer afternoon. It was the first recorded daylight bombing of Britain in the Second World War.
The bomb fell during the school holidays when many children were out playing on the street in the Bank Row area. Because of the war the summer holidays in 1940 were extended prom June 18th and went right on to October 1st. There were fears about collecting children together and the Bank Row bomb highlighted the danger of this. The death of 15 people which included 8 children shocked Wick. The children killed were Frederick Blackstock (5) Isobel Bruce (7) James Flett(7) Kenneth MacGregor 8) sisters Elizabeth Miller (5) and Amelia Miller(9) Donald Thomson (16) and John Wares (5). The adults killed were were Robert Mackenzie Seaforth Highlanders (30) Mrs P Mactavish (44) Mrs Isobel Mackenzie (25) (father, son, daughter and daughter-in-law) Mrs Mary Steven (44), William Smith, merchant (63) and Donald Waters ,fish curer (50).
Bank Row is one of the oldest streets in Pulteneytown. It is one of the few streets in Pulteneytown not named after a member of the British Fisheries Society who built the town. Bank Row is situated beside the harbour and was ideal for the business of a busy herring port. Even in the valuation roll for the Burgh of Wick for 1937 – 1938 it shows that Bank Row still had 11 shops, one fish and chip restaurant, a Public Health clinic, 19 houses and seven stores.
A common misconception in the UK is that the ‘Dastardly Boche’ had initiated the ‘Blitz’ on British cities and towns:
‘Who Started the Bombing of Civilians in World War II?’:
http://www.westernspring.co.uk/who-started-the-bombing-of-civilians-in-world-war-ii/
‘….He pointed out that although the first bombing of cities had occurred when the Germans invaded Poland (the bombing of Warsaw), and then again in Norway and Holland, but, as he said, these were only limited campaigns in support of German ground forces.
The British bombers were designed to bomb cities, he said, while the “Teutonic mind” never even considered such a policy, and instead viewed an air force merely as a tool to “blast open” a path for attacking armies.
It was, Spaight said, left to the British to “realise the full potential” of saturation civilian bombing, and goes on to reveal that the decision to bomb civilians on a repeated, extensive and massive scale, completely independently of any ground-based military operations, was taken by Winston Churchill soon after he became Prime Minister in May 1940.
Hitler, Spaight fully admitted, opposed this tactic and actually refused to retaliate for over three months while the German cities were bombed, hoping, as the German leader said in a speech on September 4, 1940, that “Churchill would stop this nonsense.”
This belief that Churchill would stop the bombing is dismissed as “stupid” by Spaight, who went on to describe as “pacifists” and “socialists” those Britons who objected to the bombing of civilians.
Hitler then finally retaliated, and hence the “blitz.” But, as Spaight points out, in comparison to what had already been thrown at German cities by the Royal Air Force, and to what occurred in 1943 and 1944 (the bombing of Hamburg, Cologne and Munich—where, Spaight boasted, the fires could be seen 150 miles away), this “blitz” was actually minor.
The German air force, he pointed out, was never used for anything else until ordered to retaliate against the British campaign. As Spaight put it:
“Whatever Hitler wanted or did not want, he most assuredly did not want the mutual bombing to go on. He had not wanted it ever to begin. He wanted it, having begun, to be called off. There was ample evidence that he did not want the latter kind of bombing to become the practice. He had done his best to have it banned by international agreement.”….’
@ Paul Barbara May 22, 2017 at 20:14
‘….Inter-European wars are always terrible and are today rightly condemned by all rational-thinking people. It is however instructive to know that so much of the propaganda which is spread even today, about World War II, is false—because that knowledge provides a clue to understanding the propaganda masters of today, who are essentially the same as those of 1940.’
”Winston Churchill’s shocking use of chemical weapons’:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/shortcuts/2013/sep/01/winston-churchill-shocking-use-chemical-weapons
‘ecrecy was paramount. Britain’s imperial general staff knew there would be outrage if it became known that the government was intending to use its secret stockpile of chemical weapons. But Winston Churchill, then secretary of state for war, brushed aside their concerns. As a long-term advocate of chemical warfare, he was determined to use them against the Russian Bolsheviks. In the summer of 1919, 94 years before the devastating strike in Syria, Churchill planned and executed a sustained chemical attack on northern Russia.
The British were no strangers to the use of chemical weapons. During the third battle of Gaza in 1917, General Edmund Allenby had fired 10,000 cans of asphyxiating gas at enemy positions, to limited effect. But in the final months of the first world war, scientists at the governmental laboratories at Porton in Wiltshire developed a far more devastating weapon: the top secret “M Device”, an exploding shell containing a highly toxic gas called diphenylaminechloroarsine. The man in charge of developing it, Major General Charles Foulkes, called it “the most effective chemical weapon ever devised”.
Guardian Today: the headlines, the analysis, the debate – sent direct to you
Read more
Trials at Porton suggested that it was indeed a terrible new weapon. Uncontrollable vomiting, coughing up blood and instant, crippling fatigue were the most common reactions. The overall head of chemical warfare production, Sir Keith Price, was convinced its use would lead to the rapid collapse of the Bolshevik regime. “If you got home only once with the gas you would find no more Bolshies this side of Vologda.”The cabinet was hostile to the use of such weapons, much to Churchill’s irritation. He also wanted to use M Devices against the rebellious tribes of northern India. “I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes,” he declared in one secret memorandum. He criticised his colleagues for their “squeamishness”, declaring that “the objections of the India Office to the use of gas against natives are unreasonable. Gas is a more merciful weapon than [the] high explosive shell, and compels an enemy to accept a decision with less loss of life than any other agency of war.”…….’
And our highly-esteemed Winston Churchill also ordered their use against the Kurds……he was a very nasty piece of work.
He wanted war with Germany, though propaganda tries to mask this fact.
Just goes to show they don’t care if anyone pays the license fee up here, we are well and truly getting their perverse views, don’t watch the BBC no problem all the other broadcasters just follow the leader, don’t watch any TV , got that covered as well and don’t even think about the radio , Now with the new powers over internet control we are in danger of losing contact with the outside world, look how turkey took down twitter, the technical skills are there, it’s just the will, now how could a national crisis be engineered ? . It’s Just a matter of time. I believe that this will happen shortly, nothing major at first just bit by bit so we don’t notice to quickly .
Please complain , follow it all the way through . . . .https://informscotland.com/bbc-complaints-appeal-decision-ofcom/
If we can show that Ofcom does not work , then a judicial review can be mounted
You are confusing the news reporting of BBC Scotland with its overall functions, most of which are to do with education and entertainment. It is also worth remembering that most of those devising news narratives are mercenaries, working part-time for an emasculated BBC and filling in the rest of their pay-packets from the likes of Murdoch and the weird Barclay twins.
I have to say, I am very much and admirer of Craig Murray and wholeheartedly agree with the sentiments expressed in this analysis.
I have advocated that any TV licence fee should be given to Scotland’s colleges that offer Media courses who can produce tv programmes. With a maximum 5 year contract for all employees after training. The licence should not be used to keep people in permanent positions but rather be a full apprenticeship where they can show their skills to a worldwide audience. If after five years you cannot find a permanent position in commercial television then perhaps it is time to move on.
Does any non-commercial enterprise that is given money hand over fist really need to pay people over five million pounds a year, whether they are successful or not.
It would also be a lot harder for any government to force their own brand of politics onto a wide range of programme makers.
This General Election is about our place in Europe and protecting the poor and helpless in our society. BBC News should be closed down until they can be cleansed of the blatant Tory bias.
I think your analysis is dead right and your conclusion dead wrong. The root cause of the current problem is the BBC’s funding model: who pays the piper calls the tune. The BBC is totally dependent on the government and this precludes a principled and truthful stand such as the organisation once took on the Suez crisis.
The Tory bias of the BBC is not limited to Scotland. I live most of the time in Romania and was proud to stand in Bucharest with 100,000 others earlier this year to protest as the government tried to legalise corruption. This was one of the largest peaceful political uprisings in Europe. It was on the front page of the New York Times, CNN streamed the protests live, Al Jazeera covered it extensively, French and German audiences were well served with footage from AFP and dpa. The BBC hardly mentioned it, had no reporter of their own, used footage from AFP and then, when it was almost all over, ran an interview with Laura Codruta Kovesi, Romania’s anti-corruption prosecutor. Why was there so little and so poor BBC coverage (on several occasions simply getting the story wrong)? I suggest because it was an unsuitable narrative for the Brexiteers. Democracy was under threat and who was the strongest external voice for the Romanian people and the rule of law? The European Union and the European Commission, Frans Timmermans speaking very eloquently on the risks and the powers which could be brought to bear on the Romanian government, This is not what Tories want to hear: the EU is not about supporting democracy or the rule of law, fighting oppression and sustaining its members populations: it’s about overweening democracy and unwanted immigration.
Now the focus of anti-government demonstrations has moved to Hungary and Orban’s attempts to establish a dictatorship. Again, the European Union has stepped in with warnings about suspending Hungarian voting rights. Read all about it – Deutsche Welle, Reuters … well anywhere except the BBC where again it doesn’t fit the Brexit message.
Taking revenge on the BBC after independence is not the answer if we are to replace them with a state broadcaster with a Scottish accent. A free and critical media is essential in any new nation-building: Romania learned that lesson in the 1990s under Iliescu. A media beholden to the government sustains the politicians and betrays the nation. That is the point to which the BBC has fallen.
The only thing the man/woman in the street can do is share all that exposes the BBC as a Tory propaganda machine and bring up the topic during every work break. My personal fear is that there may be a swing in Scotland from the SNP to Labour to demonstrate the Scots disgust with the incumbent government and perhaps set back the possibility of independence.
Why do you pay for a licence? Seriously, the BBC audience is so far from yours. Save yourself the stress and stop funding them.
I was listening to Radio 6 the other day at work, could swear there was a left leaning underneath their apolitical facade.
We know, we know, we know … and it is getting worse and worse.
The question is, what are we going to do about it? I mean actually DO about it??
In Wales in the 60s and 70s Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg (the Welsh Language Society) took to non-violent law breaking to campaign for a Welsh language tv channel after all legal means had failed to produce a result. The campaign included sit-ins, interference with studios and transmitters, largely carried out by student activists, together with a more widespread campaign of refusal to pay the tv licence fee. This campaign resulted in a large number of court cases in Welsh of course, helping to promote equal status, and ultimately to the creation of S4C, the Welsh language tv channel.
I am not suggesting such tactics will help defeat the toxic tory propaganda machine that the BBC has become in Scotland, but every possible constitutional method including petitions, motions in Holyrood, lobbying, pursuing complaints and appeals etc. should be used to demand that the BBC are held to account and required to perform their Charter duties and obligations.