Tag Archives: journalism

BAD HACKS: Andrew Neil is a sewage snake | TheCritique Archives

Andrew Neil: his slant on sewage-related litter on Scottish beaches smacks of deliberate misinformation.

A few weeks ago, my curiosity was piqued by a tweet from right-wing broadcaster Andrew Neil, as follows:

It was an innocent question; I don’t know anything about tidal flows between England and Scotland (why should I?), and there really is an awful lot of ordure being pumped into English waters right now.

The response I received was astonishing – particularly in political terms. Example:

It turns out I was right to question this information; I was just mistaken about the basis for questioning it.

Thankfully we have Martin Odoni of The Critique Archives to put us straight.

Here he is:

Note the pains Neil goes to quite needlessly to stress that the authority responsible for overseeing sewer overflows is a nationalised utility, subtly encouraging readers to imagine that the problem is caused by ‘inefficient public industry.’ But also, look closely at his claim and see if you can spot where he might be fiddling the arithmetic.

The Times offers a similar spin on this in its headline, but look closer at the text, and you soon realise we are being deliberately misled.

Sewage-related debris made up 17.9 per cent of litter on beaches in Scotland, compared with an average of 8.9 per cent on beaches throughout the UK in 2022.

– The Times

What the MCS have actually found is that there is an eight-times-higher proportion of sewage-debris in the litter on Scottish beaches than in the litter on English or Welsh beaches. That would only mean there is eight times as much sewage on Scottish beaches as on English ones if there is exactly the same quantity of litter on Scottish beaches. The ‘eight-times-the-proportion’ figure does not substantiate the claim that there is eight times the total.

It seems the real difficulty that the MCS was trying to draw attention to is there is a lack of monitoring of sewage outlets in Scotland compared with the rest of the UK, so we do not actually know the accurate amount of sewage debris on Scottish beaches, or even of litter in general.

There does appear to be proportionally more litter on Scottish beaches (492 items per 100m) than on English beaches (309 per 100m), but that information only comes from volunteer clean-up operations and so is unscientific.

“Moreover,” Mr Odoni adds,

the English coastline is 2,748 miles long. The Scottish coastline is well over twice as long at 6,160 miles, due to the considerably greater ‘zig-zagging’ of Scottish beaches and the extensive peninsulae, which would substantially mitigate the bare amounts of litter involved.

This is not to say that Scotland doesn’t have a sewage-related litter problem:

On balance from what information there is, there probably is somewhat more sewage-debris on Scottish beaches than on English ones.

But This Writer can wholeheartedly join with Mr Odoni in suggesting:

The snake-ish attempt by Neil to give the impression that it is eight times higher, and that purely to smear nationalised companies, is a vintage example of how misleading his brand of ‘journalism’ is.

Source: Andrew Neil is a sewage snake | TheCritique Archives


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BBC accused of ‘client journalism’ as it tries to make Rishi Sunak acceptable to the public

SuperTory: this previous BBC attempt to make Rishi Sunak acceptable had just one thing right – the “£” sign on his chest, signifying that he exists for one thing alone: money.

Let’s get this straight: Tory chancellor Rishi Sunak is an out-of-touch money-grubber whose wife is richer than the Queen.

He has nothing in common with you.

But the BBC keeps trying to turn him into something acceptable – as if there was any such thing as a “cuddly Tory”.

Its latest attempt at a free party political broadcast for the Tories was broadcast today – Budget day – and received the roasting it deserved:

Steve Topple’s piece in The Canary* hit exactly the right notes:

BBC News‘s video was little more than a cuddly look at a man who, however you dress him up, is a Tory. He’s one who’s left some sick and disabled people in dire straits. Sunak is a man who’s ignored the plight of the so-called three million “excluded” people. Yet BBC News even went as far as to push the idea Sunak could one day be PM.

Client journalism” is where the government uses reporters for its own agenda. Peter Oborne wrote about this for openDemocracy. He noted an example where both BBC and ITV political editors Laura Kuenssberg and Robert Peston quoted an unnamed government source in 2019. Here the news they put out was, as Oborne said, “fake” with no basis in fact. But the two corporate journalists pushed it anyway.

This latest BBC video, with its upbeat music, rapid-fire delivery, and glossy production reeks of client journalism. What the public needs on Budget day is critical and unbiased analysis of Sunak and his policies. It doesn’t need yet more pro-government propaganda from the BBC posing as something informative.

Damn straight. Now try complaining to the BBC about it. You’ll get a load of hogwash about “balanced reporting”.

But this is nothing like that.

It’s unbalanced reporting – verging on insane.

Source: Here’s the BBC’s most insidious bit of Rishi Sunak propaganda yet | The Canary

And there’s another excellent take on this issue here: BBC, is this your idea of journalism? | The Critique Archives

*If you’re about to hit the ‘comment’ button to come out with a claim that “The Canary is unacceptable because…” then step away from the keyboard because you have been brainwashed.

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

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Peston’s client journalism: his fawning tweet about ‘saddened’ Johnson gets short shrift

Johnson and Starmer: political hack Robert Peston managed to get between them during PMQs with an ill-judged remark that has singled him out as a client journalist for the PM.

Sometimes you can tell how a nation feels by the way it reacts to the reporting of the news.

That’s what Robert Peston has been discovering after a particularly ill-advised tweet toadying to Boris Johnson. Here it is:

Johnson wasn’t saddened. He was annoyed that Labour leader Keir Starmer was asking pertinent questions about the failure of the Tory Test and Trace system and was desperate to deflect attention away from that failure.

We all saw it – those of us who were watching Prime Minister’s Questions. And some of us had a few sharp responses:

No – it’s client journalism. Peston was working in Johnson’s favour, trying to make the performing monkey PM look better than he is.

It’s a moment’s work that has been particularly damaging for Peston himself:

And it hasn’t done Johnson any favours either:

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

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