BBC’s Today guest editor accuses it of ‘biased preaching’: Author Charles Moore blasts Corporation over Brexit, climate change and ‘diversity doctrine’
- Charles Moore, who edited Saturday’s edition of the show, made accusations
- He faced ‘obstacles’ to getting science writer Lord Matthew Ridley onto the show
- Moore said BBC had become a ‘secular church’ which had ‘nationalised culture’
Charles Moore (pictured), who edited Saturday’s edition of the flagship show, accused the BBC of being ‘biased’
The row over the BBC’s ‘biased’ political coverage deepened yesterday after the guest editor of Radio 4’s Today programme argued that the Corporation’s news reporting reflected the prejudice of its managers.
Author Charles Moore also revealed during yesterday’s broadcast that he had struggled to secure an interview slot for a climate change sceptic because of the BBC’s opposition to critical reporting of the subject.
Mr Moore’s outburst came after a new survey revealed that more than two-thirds of the public think that the £154.50-a-year licence fee should be scrapped or substantially reformed.
The Mail on Sunday revealed earlier this month that Downing Street was drawing up plans to decriminalise failure to pay the fee – and had ordered Ministers to boycott Today in the wake of complaints about its General Election coverage.
Speaking on the programme yesterday, Mr Moore said the BBC had become a secular church which had nationalised culture and needed to be ‘disestablished’. He said: ‘What I am objecting to is preaching.
The BBC has decided to be a secular church and it preaches and tells us what we ought to think about things. So it tells us we shouldn’t support Brexit and we should accept climate change alarmism and we have to all kowtow to the doctrines of diversity.
The BBC has been accused of being biased on topics such as climate change and Brexit by its own Radio 4 guest editor (file image)
‘The difficulty I have had trying to get all this stuff about climate change on to this programme, even though I am the guest editor… The obstacles come in every single time because of rulings and bureaucracy and the fact that Roger Harrabin, the environment editor, is so biased.’
Mr Moore, a biographer of Margaret Thatcher, added: ‘I think the BBC news coverage does reflect the politics and prejudice of the people who run it and this is wrong and this is what I’m objecting to.
‘We are a divided country in terms of our news consumption because the BBC has an artificial privilege which it abuses to put forward particular views’.
The BBC has faced intense criticism over alleged bias in its Election coverage, which included presenter Andrew Neil (pictured) delivering an on-air monologue criticising Boris Johnson for failing to agree to be interviewed by him
The BBC has faced intense criticism over alleged bias in its Election coverage, which included presenter Andrew Neil delivering an on-air monologue criticising Boris Johnson for failing to agree to be interviewed by him.
Tory strategists say the Corporation failed to properly report the swing in support from Labour to the Tories along the Red Wall in the Midlands and the North which swept Mr Johnson to victory on a tide of support for Brexit because ‘it speaks to a pro-Remain metropolitan bubble in Islington, not the real world represented by Wakefield and Workington’.
Mr Johnson has said the licence fee, which generates more than £3.8 billion for the BBC, would be put under review. He said: ‘You have to ask yourself whether that kind of approach to funding a TV media organisation still makes sense in the long term.’
Senior figures at the BBC are furious – and worried – about what they describe as trumped-up claims designed to break the Corporation’s independence.
Although the licence fee is guaranteed until 2027, decriminalisation of non-payment can be introduced immediately – wiping hundreds of millions of pounds off its revenue.
Downing Street expects the fee to be replaced eventually by a Netflix-style subscription model.