Tory fury as BBC sends hecklers to bait Howard

[seriousstan]

The BBC was last night plunged into a damaging general election row after it admitted equipping three hecklers with microphones and sending them into a campaign meeting addressed by Michael Howard, the Conservative leader.

The Tories have made an official protest after the hecklers, who were given the microphones by producers, were caught at a party event in the North West last week. Guy Black, the party's head of communications, wrote in a letter to Helen Boaden, the BBC's director of news, that the hecklers began shouting slogans that were "distracting and clearly hostile to the Conservative Party".

These included "Michael Howard is a liar", "You can't trust the Tories" and "You can only trust Tony Blair".

Mr Black's strongly-worded letter accused the BBC of staging the event "to generate a false news story and dramatise coverage. . . intended to embarrass or ridicule the leader of the Conservative Party". The letter said that BBC staff were guilty of "serious misconduct". At least one of the hecklers was seen again at a Tory event in the North East, Mr Black added.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;sessionid=4M4KYZ0WHU2CFQFIQMFSM5WAVCBQ0JVC?xml=/news/2005/04/24/nhow24.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/04/24/ixportaltop.html&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=14627

[wakeme2008]

1. Gee,,,, Blair is reading from Bush's media play book

I am SHOCKED....

[Maple]

2. Why would the BBC do this?

They don't like Blair...given him a hard time, and been whomped for it. They owe him nothing.

[T_i_B]

7. Because this is the Tories...

...who are even worse! Indeed I do often wonder if the Tory party is the only reason for voting Labour left!

[lister666]

13. It Seems To Me That....

....unless the BBC can prove that they were planning to use the
same tactics against Mr Blair and Mr Kennedy a resonable person
can assume that,in this election,the BBC wants somebody other than Mr Howard to prevail.

An attitude like that,IMO,belongs on the op-ed page,not the front
page.

[newyawker99]

16. Hi lister666!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[leftchick]

3. This is bizarre

can anyone from the UK enlighten me here?

[w4rma]

4. This is the Telegraph, which isn't a trustworthy source.

I'd ignore this until I saw this printed in another more reputable source.

[leftchick]

6. That was my first thought

I know it is murdoch owned. The details disturb me and I agree and am wondering if any other news source is reporting this.

[T_i_B]

9. Actually no

Murdoch owns the Times, the News of the World and the Sun.

The Torygraph is actually more RW then the Murdoch press, which is backing Blair this election!

[leftchick]

10. thank you for the clarification!

I get so confused by all that Murdoch owns. The Torygraph! lol!

[DoYouEverWonder]

12. Conrad Black used to own the Telegraph

and Richard Perle was (is?) on their Board of Directors. Nuff said.

[Sloth269]

8. Story from BBC

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4477901.stm

[newyawker99]

17. Hi Sloth269!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[MrPrax]

5. Bleedin' Unfair!!

The tactic is BOUND to backfire--so why do it?

As bad as someone in this day and age not 'nesting' their lengthy URL in a hypertext, so browsers don't have to scroll!!

Like So...But it is Subscribed!

[struggle4progress]

11. The headline suggests something about the story: it's an "agitate ...

... the rightwing base" piece," isn't it?

[Placebo]

14. Bad move by the BBC...

just makes them look biased and, well...yeah. Never good to have it seem like the news reporters are becoming the news makers.

[entanglement]

15. much ado about nothing n/t

[Save The World]

18. How do you figure this is nothing?

It's a governmrnt funded organization (the BBC) trying to influence a national election. That hardly seems like nothing.

[muriel_volestrangler]

19. Wait and see what the programme's like

showing tonight.

"We provided microphones in order to be able to hear what the hecklers said, but we didn't provide any amplification and we certainly did not disrupt the meeting.

"They did not disrupt, nor were they hostile to Mr Howard or the Conservative party."

He said the heckling had been "light hearted" and the comments "mild" and "jocular".

He also stressed the show featured Liberal Democrat and Labour meetings , and said viewers of the programme would be "astonished" at the level of fuss over it.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4483337.stm