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(not satire – it’s the BBC!)
I thought BBC correspondents were supposed to report facts and news, not defend government policy or privatised services from criticism by the public.
If that’s the case, then why was the BBC’s transport correspondent – Richard Westcott – today defending the much criticised price hikes by railway companies:
What Richard said was personal opinion and politically partisan comment – not news.
But it isn’t even true.
The British taxpayer now pays more in subsidies to the private rail companies – despite massive fare price hikes for passengers – than it did when the railways were state owned and passenger fares much cheaper.
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Pride's Purge 
Errm… I don’t believe you honestly thought that BBC correspondents were honest and unbiased for a very long time, Thomas.
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Don’t be so surprised. A lot of BBC journalists (who often go on to better-paid P&R jobs with dodgy marketing/lobbying companies) have come from variious private schools.
I know, from my experience as a news editor at the BBC in Leicester, many ‘journalism’ graduates are not interested in journalism; what they have their eyes on are the jobs ‘upstairs’.
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Pingback: Biased BBC reporter defends rail companies on price hikes | Alternative News Network
The latest statistics, Tom, which take some thinking about
(Which the beeb reporter obviously couldn’t be bothered doing)
http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/mro/news-release/travel-to-work/census-reveals-details-of-how-we-travel-to-work-in-england-and-wales.html
And yes, ‘public transport’ has seen huge increases in subsidies from the tax payer, accompanied by ridiculous fare hikes, which have undoubtedly driven people away from ‘public transport. As have cuts to services by ‘shareholders’ trying to maximise profits.
Whilst ‘the statistics’ will not show the effects of the ‘under-occupation penalty’ either
And there are also anomalies in there, for instance, it is easy to believe that nearly 40% of the people who work on the Isles of Scilly walk to their place of employment, but hardly credible that nearly 50% of those who work in the City of London do so, unless they walk from a station served by……public transport….
Lazy churnalism or mendacity?
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Reblogged this on sdbast.
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Reblogged this on markcatlin3695's Blog.
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Reblogged this on Beastrabban’s Weblog and commented:
As the good Mr Pride himself points out, this claim by the Beeb’s Richard Westcott is very definitely untrue. The private rail companies are receiving far more in subsidies than they were when the rail network was nationalised as British Rail, and the service is poorer too. I can remember talking to former British rail maintenance engineers, who were angry at the buck passing and denial of responsibility by the various rail companies after several major train accidents.
It’s worth reading R. Wood’s comment for the perspective he brings on this story as a former news editor for the Corporation in Leicester. In his experience, most of the journalism graduates really aren’t interested in journalism. They’re really interested in jobs in management. They are also frequently privately educated, and go on to PR jobs with lobbying or marketing companies.
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Thanks. Excellent. But can you correct “BBC corspondents”. Cheers.
[Done]-TOM
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http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-30652098
This is a most comprehensive break down of the fare increases
That reporter said in simple terms it was getting passrngers to cough up not tax payers
But the article gets opinion from RMT union and shows the level of increase its quite detailed article
Maybe you read a different one
I also saw the grauniad article about prince andrew being implicated in under age sex case
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Reblogged this on nearlydead.
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Interesting graph with that BBC report. It shows that before the mid 1990s – when British Rail was still nationalised – rail fares also went up, above the rate of general inflation, in many of the years. So, if this is anything to go on, unlike the myth endlessly repeated by pro-renationalisation people, renationalisation would not necessarily mean there wouldn’t be big increases in fares.
The left-wing argument seems to be that the fact that a service is privatised, and that costs are high and rising for that service, proves privatisation causes price rises. When it comes to the example of the energy companies, for instance – prices reduced substantially after privatisation, and only started to rise alongside a big rise in wholesale prices after 2005.
The railways aren’t exactly an excellent example of privatisation, anyway. Government interference is huge, and the railways themselves and Network Rails are still state-owned. Many on the right have argued more competition is needed – as is seen on the East coast main line.
It also shows that only 3% of rail fares are taken as company profits – so left-wing arguments that profit-hungry capitalists are ripping off railway users by creaming off a load of profits are not true.
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And buses are run on behalf of
customers and that they dont cut services to save money and cut costs on maintenance too oh no why would they oh yeah they do.
And if pro renationalisation of railways is so wrong then why is it so widely supported ?
its not just costs it ownership
And the ability to have a say in their running and not left to shareholders
You dont get this democracy stuff do you ?
privatise the planet brigade never do,
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so left-wing arguments that profit-hungry capitalists are ripping off railway users by creaming off a load of profits are not true.
Then pray tell me why are they in business and privatised if its not to make huge profits
What are private railways then ?
a charity ?
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ANOTHER untrue and misleading statement from the BBC. Regardless of your political point of view you SHOULD be able to trust the news from the BBC. Unfortunately there is obviously an agenda and the BBC is little more than a mouthpiece for the state, becoming embarrassingly like Soviet-era news..
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As Thatcher reduced subsidies that’s not surprising.
We tried having the infrastructure in the private sector – remember what happened to RailTrack?
I’m not sure how handing it over to Stagecoach/Virgin results in more competition – there are now fewer operators than before.
How convienient that you ignore the ROSCOs. Which are a convenient way to extract profits from the railways disguised as a cost to the TOCs
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First time i ever complained to BBC about impartiality was when during protests BBC news anchor woman kept suggesting that UKuncut was smashing up Fortnum and Masons store much to the bewilderment of the outside broadcast reporter who could only see proteters inside sitting around and not wrecking the place but the anchorwoman who had mistaken UKuncut for
the black clad street protesters
smashing windows
Even more bizarrley was the Faily Hate with their picture vs caption competition
A photo of quiet seated protestors with a caption claiming they were wrecking the place and threatening customers and hilariously adding a photo of of window washers claiming they were ” repairing the damage “
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