Iniquitous BBC Over State Spending Cuts

[Teddy Bear]

It would appear that the government cuts the BBC continually claims are happening - are not.

Let me say it again. State spending is not being cut. And it's iniquitous of the BBC to claim otherwise

By Stephen Glover

During hours of coverage of the cuts announced earlier by George Osborne, they were represented by the BBC as draconian

Go out into the street and ask 100 people whether this Government has cut public expenditure since it assumed office in May 2010. I can almost guarantee that more than 95 of them would look at you as though you were bonkers.

Cuts? Of course there have been cuts! Everything not bolted to the floor has been taken away. The Coalition proudly informs us that it has reduced expenditure in order to clear up the mess that Labour left behind. Labour accuses the Chancellor of unpardonable savagery.

And week in, week out, the BBC describes the horrendous effects of Government cuts. Yesterday, it presented George Osborne’s Spending Review for 2015-16 in the same apocalyptic terms.
Hysteria

The trouble is — and perhaps you should sit down if you are not already doing so — public expenditure has barely been cut since 2010, and the Chancellor’s plans unveiled yesterday envisage a further cut by 2015-16 so fractional that it hardly registers.

Perhaps you don’t believe me. Why should you when the BBC, with all its vast resources and battalions of clever journalists, so convincingly paints a picture of a Government that has cut spending to the bone?

Of course, I appreciate that the budgets of many departments have been cut, in some cases drastically. For example, between 2010 and 2015 the Home Office budget is expected to fall by nearly a quarter in real terms — i.e. discounting inflation — while that of the Foreign Office will be down by nearly a half.

But notwithstanding the Government’s boasting, the Opposition’s hysteria and the BBC’s reporting, overall public expenditure in 2015 in real terms will be almost exactly where it stood in 2010 after a decade of wild, uncontrolled bingeing under New Labour.
Whose fault is it that almost everyone in Britain is wrongly convinced that overall public spending has been savaged? The main culprit is the BBC, which is enjoined by its charter to tell the public the truth

Whose fault is it that almost everyone in Britain is wrongly convinced that overall public spending has been savaged? The main culprit is the BBC, which is enjoined by its charter to tell the public the truth

Here are the figures. In 2009-2010 (Labour’s last year in power), public expenditure was £671 billion. In 2015-16, according to the Chancellor’s figures yesterday, it will be £745 billion. Adjusted for inflation, this represents a real cut of around one per cent. In effect, spending has been held level. It hasn’t been reduced.

The explanation is that while many departments have been pruned, sometimes painfully, spending on the NHS, schools, pensions and international aid has gone up while interest payments on our ever-mounting national debt have also risen. These increases almost exactly balance the cuts.

Meanwhile, because we are borrowing vast sums to help maintain this amount of public expenditure, our debt is expected to soar from £1,000 billion in 2010 to £1,500 billion in 2015, an increase of 50 per cent over the lifetime of this Parliament.

This is my question. Whose fault is it that almost everyone in Britain is wrongly convinced that overall public spending has been savaged? Obviously, the Government and the Opposition are to blame for misrepresenting the position out of differing motives. But few of us look to politicians for enlightenment.

No, the main culprit is the BBC, which is enjoined by its charter to tell the public the truth. The truth is that overall spending has not been reduced, but you never hear this from the Corporation’s army of ‘experts’ and analysts.

I didn’t hear it yesterday during hours of coverage of the cuts announced earlier by George Osborne, which were represented by the BBC as draconian, even though they will amount to a mere one and a half per cent of projected Government spending in 2015-16.

Last night’s Six O’Clock News on BBC1 set the tone with excited talk of axes falling, a clampdown on benefits (really?) and ‘cuts described by economists as unprecedented’. Nowhere was it pointed out that at the end of it all the Coalition will be spending almost exactly what it did when it took office.

Maybe in some forgotten corner of the World Service some unsupervised journalist has blurted out the true facts but, if so, I wasn’t listening. I haven’t heard Stephanie Flanders, the BBC’s delightful economics editor, or Robert Peston, its brainy business editor, or Paul Mason, Newsnight’s doom-laden economics guru, tell their listeners that, despite all the brouhaha, Government spending is flat.

Oh, I do recall that a year or so ago Ms Flanders said during a BBC radio bulletin that ‘some Tory Right-wing MPs maintain public expenditure hasn’t been cut’ — as though they were acknowledged head-bangers, to be classified with ‘flat-earthers’ and nutters who believe Elvis Presley is still alive.

Of course, some newspapers such as The Guardian are also disinclined to tell their readers what is really going on, but there are important differences. Unlike newspapers, the BBC is required to be neutral. And its reach is enormously greater not only than the low-selling Guardian but also the largest-selling tabloid.

According to independent research in a study last year, the many outlets of the BBC together account for almost half of people’s daily news consumption. That is more than two-and-a-half times the reach of the next biggest media owner, the bugbear of the Left, Rupert Murdoch.

I submit that, if nine people out of ten believe that public spending has been slashed, it is in large measure the consequence of the BBC’s refusal to explain the true position, or to draw any distinction between many departmental cuts, which have been significant, and the general picture, which is unchanged.

This is surely a gross betrayal of the BBC’s public service remit. Lord Reith, its inspirational founder, declared that its duty was to ‘educate, inform, entertain’. It has fallen down badly on the first two aspects of its mission so far as public spending is concerned. Democracy has not been well served.
Twisted

Mark Thompson, director-general from 2004 until 2012, conceded towards the end of his tenure that the Corporation had been guilty of ‘massive’ Left-wing bias in the past. He also admitted that the BBC had been ‘historically rather weak and rather nervous’ in its coverage of immigration and Europe.

Perhaps some future director-general will concede that in misrepresenting the true nature of the cuts, the Corporation has twisted the truth. But it will then be too late to make amends and to put right what damage may have been caused.

The problem is that the BBC is itself part of the public sector and many of its journalists have little or no commercial sense. More than that, there seems to be a widespread conformist, lazy mindset that usually veers to the Left.

Needless to say, my point is not that there haven’t been painful cuts in many areas. Obviously, there have. But at the end of it all we will only be back to where we were at the end of the spend-spend-spend New Labour years.

This will almost certainly turn out to have been a terrible error. What is already clear is that we live in a crazy world in which Government, Opposition and the BBC tell us that public expenditure has been slashed — and nearly all of us unquestioningly believe them.

[Teddy Bear]

The BBC continue their campaign against any type of welfare cuts, showing how they are proud to stand up for the lower classes.
Their hypocrisy is evident very quickly if any family or single parent fails to pay their licence fee however, then a £1000 fine, or prison term, is no skin of their nose.

Richard Littlejohn noticed this recent example of the BBC agenda:

Meet the BBC's poster girl for welfare 'cuts'

By Richard Littlejohn

She sounded African, but I couldn’t swear to it. We were only told that her name was Rebecca and she lived somewhere in London.

Rebecca was wheeled out by the BBC as a victim of the latest ‘savage cuts’ in the welfare budget, which came into force yesterday.

The plight of this poor woman was considered by the producers of Radio 4’s Today programme to be the most important story in the world.

She was given the prime 8.10am slot after the news on the BBC’s flagship show to plead her case.

This is the part of the schedule traditionally reserved for interviews with the big-hitters of the political world.

Yesterday it was the Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith’s turn on the ducking stool, but not before Rebecca had her chance to denounce the cruelty of the Government’s cap on benefits.

She complained that Duncan Smith’s decision to cap welfare payments at £26,000 a year equivalent to the after-tax income of an average working family — would cost her £98 a week and she wouldn’t be able to afford to pay her current rent.

Rebecca said that she came to Britain for a better life but after having children she couldn’t find work.

Being on benefits was not her choice, she insisted. ‘I do things in my community, I was in my training, I finish my training. Now if they want us to go back to job, where is the job?’

It was put to Rebecca that she could always move out of London to somewhere cheaper

Apparently, this isn’t an option because it would mean moving away from her ‘community’.

‘I think moving out of my community, my community will be missing me. I give them my time and they give me back as well. If they move me out I will start from zero.

‘I’m a choir leader, a Sunday school teacher, I cook for omelettes people.’

At least, I think she said ‘omelettes people’. I’ve listened to it half a dozen times on iPlayer and it certainly sounds like ‘omelettes people’. Conceivably, I suppose, it could be ‘homeless people’.

Difficult to tell, since her accent is so strong.

As I said, I’m assuming she’s African. We weren’t told precisely which ‘community’ she belongs to.

This was just one of a number of questions which were left hanging in the air. For instance, when did Rebecca come to Britain? Where, exactly, did she come from? Is she an asylum seeker, or an economic migrant? On what grounds was she given the right to settle here?

Did she have any children before she came to Britain or were they born here? How many children does she have? Two, three, ten? Are the children still at school or are they of working age?

Is Rebecca married? If so, where is her husband and what does he do for a living, if anything? If not, do all the children have the same father? Does the father (or fathers) contribute to the upkeep of the family?

London is a big city. Where, precisely, does she live? Is her home in Central London or one of the outer suburbs? Is it a one-bedroom flat or a £2 million townhouse? How much is her rent and which council pays the bill? How much does she receive every week in benefits?

If the welfare cap is ‘costing’ her £98 a week, that would suggest she gets around £31,000 a year from the taxpayer. That wasn’t explained, either.

Has Rebecca ever worked since she came to Britain, or has she always been on welfare? She says that she has finished her training, but what kind of job has she been trained to perform? How many jobs has she applied for? How many interviews has she attended?

Has she been offered work, only to decide that she is better off on benefits than in paid employment?

Clearly she is not without skills and would appear to be a churchgoer. We do know that she is a choir leader, a Sunday school teacher and cooks for the ‘omelettes people’.

But that’s about all we know. No age, no surname, no address, no nationality. Is she a British citizen?

Where did the BBC find this woman and why did they think it was necessary to tell us so little about her?

My guess is that Rebecca was conjured up from central casting by a researcher with one of the myriad Left-wing ‘anti-cuts’ groups on speed dial.

She was specially selected to prove that the Tories aren’t just heartless, they’re racist, too.

Even by the BBC’s standards this was a disgraceful piece of so-called journalism. It was pure anti-government propaganda.

John Humphrys is a proper journalist and a fine presenter. But using this woman as a cudgel to batter Duncan Smith was outrageous. Humphrys should have had nothing to do with it.

The Work and Pensions Secretary handled himself admirably, patiently explaining that no one should be entitled to receive more in benefits than they would if they were working and taking home the average wage.

He also reiterated that it was wrong to expect taxpayers to pick up the bill for expensive accommodation in Central London. No doubt most people who work in London would love to live in Kensington or Mayfair, but they have to commute daily from more affordable areas.

These are sensible, humane policies that command the support of the vast majority of voters, but not the Tory-haters who control the BBC’s news and current affairs output.

Duncan Smith was fully justified in accusing the BBC of making a ‘politically motivated’ attack.

Last week the BBC published an expensive self-serving report which admitted distorting coverage of immigration and Europe — but only in the past. Bizarrely, it cleared itself of ‘liberal’ bias.

In the wake of yesterday’s ‘impartial’ treatment of welfare reform and the scandalous alleged interview with Rebecca, which broke every rule of basic journalism, that report is exposed as a sick joke on all of us who are forced by law to pay the licence fee to feed the BBC’s relentless Left-wing propaganda juggernaut.

[Teddy Bear]

Following the above 'interview', there was another with Ian Duncan Smith (clip available here for next 6 days) who apparently had no qualms chewing out the BBC presenters for their unabashed bias.

Ephraim Hardcastle has more:

It's a start-the-day pleasure to hear Beeb presenters being kicked up their bien pensant backsides by IDS

By Ephraim Hardcastle

Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith rebuked Radio 4’s John Humphrys while discussing the government’s new welfare cap, saying: ‘John, this is absurd. What you’re doing – as always happens on the BBC – is seeking out lots of little cases from people who are politically motivated to say [the policy] is wrong.’

IDS has also accused BBC economics editor Stephanie Flanders of ‘peeing all over’ British business and pixie-like presenter Evan Davis’s contributions of being ‘a joke’.

It’s a start-the-day pleasure to hear them being kicked up their bien pensant backsides by IDS.

[Teddy Bear]

Here's a more detailed account of the IDS interview with John Humphrys:

IDS vs BBC: Work and Pensions Secretary blasts Corporation for 'politically-motivated' criticism of his benefits shake-up

• Iain Duncan Smith clashes with Today presenter John Humphrys
  
• Claims BBC uses 'little cases' to claim entire welfare programme is wrong
  
• From today benefits will be capped at £26,000-a-year

By Matt Chorley, Mailonline Political Editor

Cabinet minister Iain Duncan Smith today accused the BBC of launching a ‘politically-motivated’ attack on government plans to cap benefits at £26,000.

In an extraordinary on-air blast, the Work and Pensions Secretary accused the Corporation of using ‘lots of little cases’ to claim that limiting welfare payments would not get people back to work.

The confrontation live on Radio 4’s Today programme marks a significant escalation in the political row between Mr Duncan Smith and the BBC over reforms to the benefits system.
Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith accused the BBC of trying to undermine his welfare reforms
BBC Radio 4 presenter John Humphrys accused the minister of having 'beliefs' which were not borne out by the facts

From today the maximum amount of benefits a family can claim will be capped at £26,000 a year – a figure equal to a pre-tax salary of more than £34,000.

A poll today reveals that almost three-quarters of the public back the cap, with two-thirds saying it will help get people on benefits back into work.

Mr Duncan Smith was grilled by BBC presenter John Humphrys, after the Today programme aired an interview with one benefits claimant who said she did not want to leave her home in London to find work.

As the debate heated up, Mr Duncan Smith insisted many working people who commute long distances every day.

He added: ‘The reality is there are plenty of families out there working and paying their taxes who will be asking this question: “Why are we arguing about this, why having a debate as to whether or not somebody should be earning more than they are on welfare payments not working?”’
'What you are doing, as always happens in the BBC, is seeking out lots of little cases from people who are politically motivated to say this is wrong'

Mr Humphrys intervened to argue: ‘But that’s not the point I am putting to you.’

Mr Duncan Smith then tore into the BBC’s attempts to undermine his reforms. He hit back: ‘No, cos what you are doing as always happens in the BBC is seeking out lots of little cases from people who are politically motivated to say this is wrong.’

Mr Humphrys said: ‘There are facts and beliefs and you can believe whatever you like.’

The minister responded: ‘The facts we have got, the fact is that people will not be earning more than average earnings sitting out of work unless they are in the exempt categories.

‘The way to resolve that is to go back to work, to earn your money so that as a result of that you no longer are capped. This is the incentive to take the right choices, it’s fair to taxpayers.’

Under the benefits cap, couples and lone parents will not receive more than £500 a week under the new cap, with single people limited to £350 a week.

The coalition argues it is fair on people who do work and pay taxes that those on state-funded benefits do not receive more than the average working family.

An Ipsos Mori poll commissioned by the Department for Work and Pensions found that just 11 per cent of the public think the benefits system is working effectively.

Some 59 per cent said they wanted politicians to do more to cut Britain’s welfare bill. A total of 74 per cent said they supported the benefits cap.

However, during today’s radio clash Mr Humphrys insisted: ‘We are arguing because it isn’t working. Nobody argues with the principle, that people who are capable of working, they should work.

‘The question is whether your scheme is going to do what it sets out to do, and the evidence such as it is - admittedly little so far - seems to suggest it doesn’t work.’

Mr Duncan Smith, who repeatedly interrupted to insist his reforms are working, responded: ‘I believe we are right.

‘That what we are seeing, and this is the view of lots of people working in Jobcentres.

‘That they are getting people who were notified of the cap, their belief – this is advisers, they talk to me., I have been out on the ground, I have seen it myself, I talk to people actually in the Jobcentres – our belief generally is that they are going to seek work where they might not have sought work.’

Relations between the senior Tory and the BBC deteriorated in April after he was ambushed on air over whether he was challenged over whether he could live on £53-a-week by market trader David Bennett.
But questions were later raised about the true level of Mr Bennett's income.

Mr Duncan Smith has also heavily criticised the BBC's use of the phrase 'bedroom tax' to describe changes to housing benefit.

The government says it is ending the 'spare room subsidy' for people receiving taxpayer support for rooms they do not need.

But the Corporation took to using Labour's 'bedroom tax' slogan, which Mr Duncan Smith said was a 'disgrace'.

However, charities criticised the introduction of the benefits cap. Matthew Reed, chief executive of the Children's Society, accused the Government of trying to use a 'blunt instrument' to solve a complex problem.

He added: 'The debate around this cap has focused solely on workless adults, but the reality is that children are seven times more likely than adults to lose out.

'140,000 children, compared to 60,000 adults, will pay the price as parents have less to spend on food, clothing and rent.

'We fully support efforts to make work pay. But it is not right to do this by putting more children on the breadline. Instead, the Government should do more to help families by tackling the sky high rents in some parts of the UK and making childcare affordable.'

[Teddy Bear]

When the BBC follows its own agenda, it simply ignores any findings that shows it has been completely wrong. This is evidenced by a recent poll about the impact of cuts.

Cuts, but most people think public services are as good or better, finds BBC poll: Tories accuse corporation of failing to promote survey after positive results

• Corporation accused of focusing too heavily on negative impact of cuts
  
• ICM survey revealed 6 out of 10 people think services are better than 2008
  
• Spending watchdog says growth not hampered by austerity drive
  Tory minister Greg Barker criticises BBC coverage of climate change

By James Chapman

A majority of voters say the quality of public services has been maintained or improved – despite government cuts.

A survey commissioned by the BBC showed that most voters believe schools, bus services, parks, libraries and bin collections have improved in the past five years, even as budgets have been reduced.

Overall, six out of ten people think public services have maintained or improved their quality.
The Tories welcomed the poll’s findings, but accused the BBC of failing to give its own poll due prominence in its news bulletins.

Conservative Party chairman Grant Shapps said the corporation had been among the first to scaremonger about the impact of the Government’s austerity measures to reduce Britain’s budget deficit, and accused it of downplaying its own findings that voters do not agree.

‘Their survey obviously didn’t produce the results they expected. It didn’t fit their agenda. So they buried it way down their broadcast list and made it tough to find on their website,’ Mr Shapps said.

‘They were the first to talk doom when we took these measures to stop Britain going bust.


Better: In most areas only around on in five people think services have got worse int he last five years


Quality: The survey revealed that satisfaction was highest among the people who actually use the services in question

A fifth of people think care for the elderly has got worse, while a third believe the standard of Britain’s hospitals has declined, even though the Coalition has protected the NHS budget.

Professor Tony Travers, of the London School of Economics, said the findings would be used by the Treasury to demonstrate that cuts do not necessarily lead to poorer services. He added: ‘Ministers are likely to use this poll to argue for further cuts.’

Local government minister Brandon Lewis said: ‘This survey shows that in many areas such as rubbish collections, schools and libraries, services and value for money are improving, illustrating how councils can both deliver sensible savings and protect the frontline.’

A BBC spokesman said: ‘We’re surprised by any claim we haven’t reasonably covered the finding of the ICM report into public services.

‘This has been reported widely across the BBC, including on BBC Breakfast, the Today programme, 5live, BBC News Channel, and the News at One. It is also currently in the running orders for the evening bulletins.’

They should put the same energy into explaining what’s actually happened. As this government made difficult cuts to prevent this country from going bust, the BBC led their news with any survey suggesting Armageddon would follow.

‘The fact is, instead of listening to the daily scare stories of the last few years, families recognised that crucial savings needed to be made, waste has been cut, efficiency injected and services actually improved – that’s a story that deserves proper coverage across all sides of the media.’

At Prime Minister’s Questions, David Cameron mocked the BBC’s grudging report of its poll, saying he thought he had ‘died and gone to heaven’ when he heard it.

The ICM poll of 1,031 people did identify some areas of concern. People are fed up with potholes, with two thirds of people saying the standard of roads has worsened.