Why I Exposed Anti-Trump Bias At The BBC

29:30Francis Foster:You know, I've done a lot of stuff on the BBC. So I don't think it's a universal thing, but I definitely think there'll be some reluctance. And, you know, it was actually Rod Little who said to me once, he said, oh, you are now on the BBC's Dial-A-Cunt list. which is which is you know you get five people one of them has a moderately centrist opinion but you know we're joking around i i think it's important to also be be fair here for example you know your your point about the joe biden graphic yes i can totally see from an editorial perspective how you would also be accused of bias if you did present joe biden in an overtly kind of decline focused way, right?

30:17Absolutely. And there's a story around that as well, that talking about the left-right bias, and anybody can see it from any angle, there was a bit of a hoo-ha about Corbyn, Jeremy Corbyn. A graphic went out with Corbyn wearing a hat. He used to walk around with that sort of Beatles hat.

30:45And the BBC were accused of making the hat bigger. And there was a whole inquiry because Corbyn would get on, you know, the BBC is biased, they're biased against me. And it was a news night thing, graphic, and they had to prove, you know, they had to do a side-by-side, they had to prove to the Board of Governors that they hadn't manipulated this image. So they are. And as I said, I don't know why somebody rejected my graphic. Maybe it's because he had his hand on his mouth. Maybe they wanted, you know, the three. I think it was a three header. I don't know. But it might have been, you know, we want him to be looking out of screen right.

31:29Or I don't know. But and this is the thing about trying to second guess people. You can't read people's minds. Yes.

31:36Francis Foster:The point I was going to make, though, is you say, well, you know, lots of people on the left think the BBC is right wing and whatever. A lot of people say that. I actually think it's a little bit more nuanced than that. In that the people on the left who think the BBC is right wing tend to be on the extremes of the left. They are far, far progressive way out there people. Not really. My uncle and aunt were saying it last night. Really? Well, maybe my theory is not true. But what I was going to say is, and look, people might disagree with this, is whereas the people who think the BBC has a left-leaning bias are kind of anyone who is in the center and onwards.

32:15Francis Foster:Yes. And one of the arguments I would put forward in defense of that theory is that, or at least in defense of the theory that the BBC, where it leans, it leans mostly to the left. is look at what's happened since the presenters have left. Once the presenters leave, you find out what the actual beliefs are. And look, Andrew Neal clearly sent a right. Yeah. But look at Emily Maitlis. Look at Lewis Goodall. I mean, look, John Sopple, who's another one. Like, all of these people are very, very much on the left. And they were not shy. I mean, the one thing you would say about Andrew Neal during his time at the BBC is that he skewered everybody equally.

32:58Francis Foster:Everybody respected Andrew Neil, not for his views that aligned with their views, but for his neutrality and his principles and his doggedness in pursuing them. But when you talk about other people, they were implementing their worldview while they were at the BBC and they were respected not for their neutrality, but they were loved for the fact that they were sticking it to Trump and they were sticking it to this and they were sticking it to that. That's, I think, the difference. Yeah, I think the thing about neutrality was very interesting after the Panorama story broke. And then my Newsnight revelation came a few days after, and the head of news resigned.

33:44And she called it an error. and it's and i think that's the difference is you can make mistakes but you can't make that kind of mistake you cannot be and as you say that i think even on the today program and i can't remember the chap's name who presents that but even he there was no apology there was no you know we we fucked up big time here you know this should never have gone out this is an obvious case of bias, it was a mistake. Oh, we made an error. And the thing is, is from what I saw from the people that I were around were pretty much seemed to be of that ilk that they are, you know, nobody's going to rock the boat.

34:31Nobody's going to, like around the whole, you know, Joe Rogan, Ivermectin thing that you, that opened my eyes to a media landscape. where people are pushing, I know it's such a cliche, pushing a narrative. And you get the feeling that within the BBC, they can't see beyond, you know, their own, as I said, their own bubble. And it not only goes, it's not only in news and current affairs, that this, you know, the whole ideology, that you get scripts in EastEnders, which are sort of pushing a narrative, that you get Doctor Who, where you're having non-binary aliens and a very camp Doctor Who. And you realize that it's not the organization that it's purported to be.

35:29There are people within the BBC who I admire and met and met in passing. and so let's say Frank Gardner is the security guy. But anyway, I met Frank Gardner in the cafeteria one morning and I'd just seen him on. There's a massive jumbotron as you go into the reception at the BBC. I'm sure you've seen it. And I'd just seen him in the morning as I came in for my morning shift or in the morning and I met him in the... And I have a great deal of affection for that guy. I mean, who can't have affection for a guy who was blown up in Saudi Arabia by Al-Qaeda? You know, you would expect that guy to be the...

36:18But then, you know, we have affection for the BBC. And I think that the worry is, how long is that affection going to last? How many mistakes can they make before people say, hang on a minute, this isn't the... How many people are going to see fuck-ups on news, social engineering on kids' programs and entertainment before they say, hang on a minute, this is not worth the license fee? And I think it was, is it 100 ,000 people last year stopped paying their license fee? I read that it was 300 ,000. 300 ,000. either refused or stopped paying extra. I'm not here to bomb the BBC and prevent them. I would like them to get their act in order, but how long can they ask people for money in this pluralistic media landscape that you guys are getting people like Netanyahu on your show and he probably won't go on the BBC.

37:31It's because you know she's not going to get truth or failure. A fair hearing. He's probably going to be clipped. And I find that very interesting. How long can you effectively run a state-run media organization where you get and effectively tax people to own a color TV, and you're putting out mistruths, you're putting out lies, and you're putting out entertainment that people are saying, hang on a minute, I just wanted to see a Time Lord traveling around. I don't want to see non-binary aliens.

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39:20Francis Foster:Click the link in the description or go to pure-gold.co slash trigger to get your free copy of the investor guide. That's pure-gold.co slash trigger. Take control of your financial future today. It's quite a profound point. I guess my question is this. Part of the criticism of the BBC has always been, look, the reason the BBC is in the mess it's in is because it employs a lot of people from the same type of background. They tend to be very middle class. They tend to be university educated, probably Redbrick, probably Oxbridge. And as a result of that, you get the same type of people, you get the same type of opinion.

39:59This isn't representative of the average person in the UK. How much do these type of people, how much does Emily Maitlis have in common with someone from Middlesbrough, for instance, in a council estate? Do you think that is at the nub of this problem? I think so. And I saw that with... Occasionally they would send a producer up in a car somewhere. And I thought that they weren't... Somewhere dreadful. Go meet the plebs. Don't stay too long. You might catch something. And I don't think that they were doing that enough. And I think you're absolutely right. There was a particular type of person.

40:41But there were people willing to do proper investigative journalism, like you had Hannah Barnes, who did the trans story and the, what was that clinic called? The Tavistock. The Tavistock, and going to the Tavistock. So there are people still wanting to put out really important stories, but there are a lot of people, as you say, who are of that ilk, as you say. They're university educators, you have to be fairly bright to work there, and they all have that same kind of left wing-ish. And I think that it goes deeper, that the left see themselves as the good guys. And that, you know, like the Guardian, we are the good guys and you're the Nazis, stuff like that.

41:38So, yes, you're right. I think they need to get out more. I think they need to hire people.

41:46It's that whole question, isn't it? It's not diversity of skin color. It's diversity of thought. because I don't understand and maybe people do have these discussions and they're having them behind closed doors. Why are they not looking at the numbers of people not renewing their license, of people not coming back to the BBC, declining viewing figures and quite frankly, bricking it going, we're all going to be out of a job here if we don't sort ourselves out. I think there's a certain arrogance about the BBC. There's a certain arrogance about people that they are the gold standard. And that's sort of, I'm sure you two watched TV in the 1990s and you had Paxman on, you know, Paxo on Newsnight.

42:38You had brilliant comedy, whether it was Only Fools and Horses. And we all have an affection for it. And that's why it's sort of, I think, clinging on. but they are constantly eroding that affection. And I thought what was interesting was in the news article about the whole panorama thing, it said the BBC is still the most trusted news source. And I thought, Google that. Where is that coming in? Is that true? How long can that remain that they are the most trusted source if they keep doing stuff like this? and how long are they going to realize that? I can't remember when you said 300 ,000, it's like a massive amount of money that they're missing out.

43:25It's almost like a billion, isn't it, or something? You know, if you keep losing a billion a year, you know, where is that organization going to be in five years, 10 years? And why aren't they doing something about it? And I think this is the struggle at the moment, and I don't know the politics within all the higher-ups. I can't remember what they call the... So you've got the chairman and you've got the trustees, as in what they call it? Board of Trustees. What are they saying to each other in that room? Are they saying, for God's sake, get it together? We need to get some right-wing people.

44:00We need to have other viewpoints.

44:03Francis Foster:But this is why I think the point about diversity of background is actually so important. And Francis makes a very good point, as he always does, about the working class being underrepresented. Thank you. But I actually, I think it's not even just about class. Sometimes it's as simple as geography. I remember making this point at some point while I was on the BBC about the fact that, well, diversity of skin colour is really important because we have to reflect our community. And even if you accept that as a premise, the problem is that all of these people live in big cities, which are very diverse ethnically.

44:42Francis Foster:And I made the point, well, what if you're watching a BBC program in Hastings? Yeah. Are you still representing your local community? Because, you know, I was just in Krobrough filming protests against an... Asylum hotel? A military base that is going to potentially be used for that. Krobrough, through no fall of its own, a very welcoming place, is 96 % white. Now, if I'm watching the BBC in Krobrough that is made by people who want to represent their local community, which is inner city London, does that represent me? Am I watching a program that reflects my community, the values of my community, the backgrounds of the people in my community?

45:24Francis Foster:So sending someone on an expedition to Krobrough for a couple of hours isn't enough to give you the perspective of what it's like to be living in one of those communities. And that's why it's really actually, I think, important that the BBC is not allowed to do what it has done, which has become an elitist club for people with one particular worldview. In a way that Rod Little, who I mentioned earlier, who was the editor of the Today program, I think, or was it Newsnight? No, I think it was Today. Yeah. Would never in a million years be allowed within a barge pole of the BBC. Yeah. Right. Oh, absolutely.

46:03Francis Foster:That is what's happened. And that's why it has become so closed off to differences of opinion. So if they get me or Rod or Matt Goodwin or someone on question time every now and again, I think that's good and important. But I actually think unless you deal with the staffing issue, which Francis brings up, you're always going to have this problem where you look at people who don't have your politics, who don't have your worldview as some hostile foreign force that must be appeased instead of half the country whose views really have to be included and represented in a fair and balanced way. And the other thing that they are in is they're very much in the Westminster bubble because, you know, and they're all, lots of the political correspondents have got, you know, people that they can talk to within the political parties on pretty much on speed dial and i think it is that westminster you know london bubble and when they would go to other places i remember they went to cardiff so you're taking a whole load of bbc people to another bbc location another bubble So one bubble to another.

47:14And, you know, oh, we're being diverse in our location. And they did, I remember they also did a, like a town hall, almost like a question time type thing. But how are they vetting the people? Yeah, it is absolutely, there is this, they are living in, and even the edifice of the BBC, you know, this sort of palatial building. thing you can't help that obviously but it gives you this sort of it's almost it's almost like the

47:45Francis Foster:castle of mordor or something to me that's a little bit extreme i actually think it should be the other way around when you go into the bbc you should be stunned into the significance of the thing that you're working in yeah and therefore the principles to which that organization adheres should be burnt into your mind as the North Star by which you're operating so that you can never doctor a clip of a guy you happen not to like, both as an individual who did that and as the institution that oversaw that, because you have a greater purpose. And that greater purpose is objective reporting of the truth and setting the standard.

48:26Francis Foster:This is why I feel so passionate. Sorry that I'm ranting, but I do. My grandfather, living in Soviet Russia, right, he freed his mind by listening to BBC World Service. The BBC has been an incredibly important institution. And, you know, a lot of the conversation after the story broke was, oh, these people who want to destroy the BBC, they're using it as a weapon. No, what we're saying is the BBC should be what it's supposed to be. And then we would be the first people to celebrate it. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, and the fact is you're saying you should walk in and you should say, you know, I need to uphold my values.

49:03I need to have values. And outside the BBC is a statue of George Orwell. And it's as if the truth means anything, or I can't, I'll mangle the quote. But if something means anything, it's the ability to tell people the truth.

49:21Francis Foster:If freedom of speech means anything, it means the right to tell people what they don't want to hear. Exactly. And I think that the BBC are afraid of that. And I also think as well, it's not that they don't, they're afraid of telling people what they don't want to hear. It seems to me that they're scared of the staff almost. I think so. And I think that if you were to, you're in a bubble. And if you would, and as I said, there was a producer who would throw hand grenades in the editorial meeting. And he was seen as a bit of a sort of live wire and, you know, he was seen as a contrarian. But you need people like that.

50:01But you also need left and right. Of course. You need somebody. And this is what I remember you saying about your cousins from Venezuela whispering. Yeah. That's what we used to do at the BBC was we'd be sort of whispering. You would pick your allies. You knew who was on the graphic design team, who was on the left and who was on the right, just through their reactions to various stories. And we'd be whispering, because you don't want to be heard. You don't want to give yourself away that you are possibly counting. You know, you're doing a story about somebody and you're thinking, is this true?

50:39You know, what are they saying about this guy? Do you think that the BBC as an institution can be saved? I'm not the person to ask, but since I'm your guest, it can be saved, but I think it's going to have to choose a different model. I genuinely think that the days of the license fee are over. I think that it's going to have to become a what's Netflix? that's a subscription it's going to have to become a subscription model I think if you want the BBC you're going to have to pay for it and they're going to have to massively slim down and they're going to have to change their remit they can't be everything to all people they're going to have to choose are you going to be an entertainment channel?

51:33are you going to be a news channel? They're trying to do too many things. Their remit is too broad. I don't want to see them die. I genuinely don't want to see them. Nobody does, because we all have this affection for auntie. And it was the voice that we trusted. I'm not sure you can ever get back that trust if you tell lies.

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52:34Francis Foster:We proudly promote Hillsdale's courses time and again, and for good reason. They're thoughtful, beautifully made, and provide a world-class education completely free. So if you want to understand how American freedom began and why those lessons still matter today, this is the series to watch. Go to hillsdale.edu slash trigger to enroll for free. That's hillsdale.edu slash trigger and learn how America's story really began. I think part of the challenge that BBC faces is that you've employed all of these people who are fiercely ideological, who, let's be honest, don't really care about the truth as long as they get their message out and they smear, stop, or do their best to try and get someone elected.

53:19I mean, what do you do when you have a whole cohort of people working in your organisation like that? Well, I think the thing is, what is interesting is it's not like you go in and there's everybody's wearing, you know, Palestinian flags. You know, it's not so easy to spot. It's not a sort of rabid, like when I went to St. Martin's, you had a sort of rabid National Union of Students. It's not like you're walking into that. You're walking into very pleasant people talking, but you are talking to the North London set, the Islington set. You are with those people. And it's very, very hard. How do you make sure you have an ideological mix within an organization?

54:05How do you, you know, do you have to have your own struggle sessions within the BBC so that you open people's minds. But do you, or do you police it much more? And you have like the hand grenade thrower who says, let's do a right-wing story. Let's, you know, how do you balance? So you have like guests like yourself more often the cunts on speed. The short answer is I don't know.

54:34Francis Foster:But that's what Francis was saying. This is why it starts with leadership because if the head of the organization says, what we are about is a mix of opinions and every editorial meeting should be fierce debate about how to cover a particular story, that's how you get balance. You don't get balance by having... People won't realize this. We have fierce arguments about how to cover certain things in trigonometry. And that's just between me and Francis. And they're not arguments that are nasty. their arguments about what the right approach is. And the right approach is found through the bringing of different perspectives together.

55:15Francis Foster:Those challenges, those two things being challenged against each other, other voices coming in as well. That's how you get some attempt to get to the truth. Whereas if you have an ideology, if you have a worldview that you're trying to project, that's a whole different thing. And look, trigonometry could be incredibly biased if we chose to, and we made more money doing it. But the BBC doesn't have that luxury. The BBC is a publicly funded organization where I hope you're wrong. I'm not saying you are necessarily wrong, but I hope you're wrong, is I think the moment the BBC ceases to be publicly funded, it will cease, it will lose the ability to be an attempt to reach an objective coverage of news because that business model in the highly polarized world that we now live in, I don't think that really works anymore.

56:06Francis Foster:And so I do think it should be publicly funded. But in order to be a publicly funded news organization in the 21st century, you have to go up a level of integrity. You have to go up a level of objectivity. You have to go up a level of neutrality if you want to survive. And I hope they do that. Absolutely. I mean, and they've made these strange attempts like BBC Verify. And, you know. It didn't quite work out, let's be honest. The tragedy for me for the BBC is that it still has this opportunity to be the gold bearer. It has the opportunity to assume the mantle of high quality journalism that nobody else can do.

56:52Nobody else can do it in America because they've got their own declining views and they're so partisan, there's no way back. and we're going the same way over here. And it's almost like seeing this hero of yours who you had right the way through your childhood and your early youth, and you just want to shake him and go, there's still time. There's still time. If you do objective fact-based reporting, you will be one of the few people, organisations that can actually still do it. But don't you think that you two and other people like you are the beneficiaries of this because the BBC is so biased that you can have views outside of...

57:35No, I don't agree.

57:37Francis Foster:I think that, look, of course, for us to be able to say, look, the mainstream media is not covering this story, we'll cover it, that's beneficial. But the BBC doesn't have to compete with us. The BBC does not have to compete with a podcast. What the BBC could do is be the platform that everybody goes to and goes, okay, here are the facts as they've been reported. Now we get to argue about our opinions. And Emily Maitlis and Lewis Goodall can have their opinions. We can have our opinions. People who are on the right can have their opinions. That's how it should be if the BBC was willing to act in the role that it actually has.

58:19Francis Foster:To say nothing of the fact, by the way, look, one of the things that's going to happen, we've just come from America and we already see this happening. The mainstream is going to try and start bringing, Brett Cooper is a good example. She's a right-wing presenter formerly of the Daily Wire. Now she has a slot on Fox News every now and again. The mainstream media is going to start bringing people from our world into that. And I guarantee you the BBC is not going to do that. I guarantee you. They're not going to bring in, you know, I don't know. I'm trying to think of Russell Brand. Well, Russell Brand has got his issues, which makes things more difficult.

58:58Francis Foster:But I'm trying to think of a I was trying to think of a they're not they might bring Gary Gary's economics. Right. To do a documentary. But they're not going to bring me and Francis on to do a documentary. And this is the problem. Right. Because it's it's a lack of balance in the approach. If they fix that, we would celebrate the BBC. people in the middle like us would celebrate it. Some people on the right would abandon. And I can tell you, on the right in this country, if you speak to people, there is no appetite for the BBC to survive in the way that we have it. And if they just did their job, people are dying now for objective journalism.

59:36Francis Foster:People are crying out for it. But I also think that the messaging within drama as well. Yes. I think the messaging across the board. I mean, I used to love Radio 4. Yeah. And you can't listen to it without being... I mean, I remember switching on and there was a drama about a gay Muslim. Now, I'm sure there are gay Muslims, but it was... They're probably not that vocal, though. No, they're probably not that vocal. There's so many dark jokes. I know, I was going to say. My mind went there. Yeah, so I was listening to one. The last time I listened, I listened to the money program, what do you call it?

1:00:20The Woman's Hour. And then this drama is when I switched off. But Woman's Hour is somebody saying, you need to get angry. This woman's saying, you need to scream. And I was thinking, my God, you know, this show has changed so much. and I'm not sure whether you two do this but I now watch BBC Four. It's the BBC, and I know that's very old fart. You're watching old stuff, but you watch that and you think, my God, how the mighty have fallen. And I think that you need to do something. You need to police the news. You need to have somebody who is right-wing and is unashamed and is proud to be able to say that.

1:01:09And I think the thing is, is in editorial meetings, after a couple of times, I stopped putting my hand up, not because I wanted to give stories, but I thought, well, there's no bloody point. I know you're just a graphic designer. You're not a, you're not a, but your opinion on things and your idea of things is so far from what they're saying. I'm not even going to bother. I'm not going to be listened to. So you need to have, you need to have different editorial voices in news and current affairs. You also need an entertainment. You need to actually have somebody reading through the scripts and say, what's this got to do with space aliens?

1:01:48You know, what's this, you know, were there really black people who are Roman centurions who came to the UK? Is this a proper, should we be teaching this? There should be actual questions. And because the BBC farms out a lot of stuff to independent production companies, like October Films, who was on that? Who on the BBC was on that? There's a lot of people, senior people within the BBC, correspondents, and they come back. And this is, I'm doing the story on this. I didn't know the machinations of how stories appeared out of the ether. But you'd have a correspondent saying, I'm going to do this story, and you see them writing it.

1:02:28Where do they get their stories from? Who's checking them? Who's saying, is this correct? In the Hannah Barnes, did she have somebody mentoring her? I don't know. Saying, this is what we need to say. There were obviously editorial meetings. They'd have editorial meetings and discuss their shows. But apart from that guy that I said was the hand grenade man, there were very few different opinions. And you need to do that across the board. You need to do that in entertainment. You need to do that in sort of light programming. You need to do that for the one show, for Strictly Come Dancing, everything.

1:03:08And I think it's a monumental task for them to turn the ship around. And I think as well, look, let's also be fair to the BBC. They're facing this major challenge which every big organisation is facing, which is the politicisation of everything, and in particular young people. And I think we need to get back to a culture of, you know what? You have your religion, you have your politics. If you identify as a fish from Friday to Sunday evening, identify as a fish. I don't care. When you come into work, you do your job. Just do your job. And I saw it in teaching. People started to bring their politics into teaching.

1:03:50I'm going, why are you teaching the kids about Brexit when they can't even write their own name and they're eight years old? Good, yes. I think you need to be the doorman on the BBC. See, this is a classist thing, because I make a point I've got a self-monitor accent. I'm the doorman. You should be the cleaner, mate. Yeah. You know what you'd be good at, mate? Cleaning the bogs. Why don't you do that?

1:04:13Francis Foster:On that happy note, David, we appreciate you coming on, and thank you for helping the story to come out the way it has. It's really important that people like you speak up when organisations that we all love and want to succeed go off the rails. So thanks for coming on. Thank you. We're going to ask you some questions from our supporters that they've submitted in a second. But before we do, what's the one thing we're not talking about that we should be? Before David answers a final question, at the end of the interview, make sure to head over to our sub stack. The link is in the description where you'll be able to see this.

1:04:46Francis Foster:Was there anyone at the BBC that you could tell about your concerns about what was going on? Is the BBC doing any similar antics with other right-wing leaders? Will the person or persons who actually did the Trump edits ever be sacked or identified? Okay, this might be a bit of a curveball, but I think you should be producing comedy and drama. You two. I think the trigonometry, you should set up a division. I think you should crowdfund original content, original written drama comedy, and start putting, you're doing this, which is great. You're in this sphere, but people need to be producing stuff where there isn't the ideological weight of someone like the BBC, where you can cast the people that you want for the stories that you want.

1:05:41And like your podcast, it might grow slowly. There'll be lots of challenges ahead. But I think that you need to be starting, people like trigonometry and other people need to be making drama, start by making short films, start trying to get features made, get people in, who unfund this stuff and take it on the road, because you're gonna have difficulties getting it shown at mainstream TV, et cetera. But we need in this country a groundswell of independent journalism, independent drama, independent advertising even. I've got friends who work in film and drama and also in advertising. And some of the lunacy that we see and news and current affairs is all there and advertising and drama.

1:06:38So I think that it's, I see it as an opportunity. I think that you guys have got a great opportunity. You've got a wonderful, you know, you've got a growing audience. And if you were to ask them, we're going to make a horror film. We're going to make a series of short horror films. Does anybody want to get involved financially? We'll package it all up. I think that you guys are the future of independent media. and I think you need to be, I think you need to be, what's the right word? Exploiting that a bit more.

1:07:09Francis Foster:All right. We will be exploiting everything. We are called exploitative by many people, so we're going to lean into it. David, thank you so much for coming on. Head on over to triggerpod.co.uk where we're going to ask some of your questions to David. Does the BBC intentionally publish false or unverified information about Israel? If it does, why?

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