:00:04. > :00:08.This week coverage of the Duchess of Cambridge was a pregnancy. The
:00:08. > :00:15.programme was recorded before news of the death of bonus involved in
:00:15. > :00:21.the hoax phone call to the Duchess of Cambridge. -- and less. Hello
:00:21. > :00:26.and welcome to Newswatch. The Duchess of Cambridge is pregnant
:00:26. > :00:31.and this news dominated the headlines for several days. Was the
:00:31. > :00:39.coverage wanted? And the Autumn Statement was a key announcement
:00:39. > :00:42.for the Chancellor. But did he get a fair hearing's and was BBC
:00:42. > :00:49.reporting fair and clear about which companies were in the right
:00:49. > :00:53.and in the wrong on taxation? The statement on Monday from St James's
:00:53. > :00:59.Palace was simple, the Duchess of Cambridge was expecting a baby.
:00:59. > :01:04.Next came the deluge of coverage. BBC correspondents and the world
:01:04. > :01:09.media set up camp outside a London hospital she was taken to.
:01:09. > :01:14.Good evening and welcome to the BBC news and six. The Duke and Duchess
:01:14. > :01:18.of Cambridge are expecting their first child. The announcement came
:01:18. > :01:22.this afternoon after Kate was admitted to hospital with acute
:01:22. > :01:27.morning sickness. A child will be third in line to
:01:27. > :01:31.the throne irrespective of whether it is a boy or girl. She paused on
:01:31. > :01:36.the steps to let photographers take their pictures. I took the
:01:36. > :01:40.opportunity of asking how she was feeling. She nodded and smiled and
:01:40. > :01:45.said, much better. While many who felt coverage of the
:01:45. > :01:50.royal pregnancy was excessive and given undue prominence. One viewer
:01:50. > :01:56.from London said stop this ridiculous coverage. The nation is
:01:56. > :02:01.delighted to but the coverage is just over the top. And another it
:02:01. > :02:07.complained, coverage of the royal pregnancy on BBC Breakfast this
:02:07. > :02:12.morning was disproportionately long and also discussed in reforming. Do
:02:12. > :02:17.we need to pay for a live broadcast outside the hospital to be told no
:02:17. > :02:25.more information than we already knew?
:02:25. > :02:30.Well Andrew Bowdler and Lesley Newton joins us with the controller
:02:30. > :02:36.of the BBC news channel, Sam Taylor. What we are concerns about the
:02:36. > :02:41.coverage? Well I think everyone is happy that their potentially going
:02:41. > :02:45.to have a child. Everyone commiserate with the Duchess
:02:45. > :02:50.because of her it will NOS. But that is all I think the BBC needed
:02:50. > :03:00.to say. There are a lot of other major issues facing this country at
:03:00. > :03:02.
:03:02. > :03:08.the moment from child poverty, for elderly care. Healthcare, education.
:03:08. > :03:13.And as we heard on the news this morning, there has been an
:03:13. > :03:19.earthquake in Japan. So you concern was about proportion of? Yes, I
:03:19. > :03:23.think the fact that they mentioned this particular condition, I will
:03:23. > :03:28.not try to pronounce it, I think that was a good thing because a lot
:03:28. > :03:33.of people then came out of the woodwork and said I have had that.
:03:33. > :03:38.And thank you for bringing it to people's attention. But I do not
:03:38. > :03:43.think so much of the big stuff that carried on and the people outside
:03:43. > :03:48.the hospital and everything else like that, was necessary. Lesley,
:03:48. > :03:53.of what did you think? I agreed with much of what Andrew has said
:03:53. > :03:59.but it is all about balance. My first reaction when I heard the
:03:59. > :04:05.news on the radio was, here we go again. I knew that it was going to
:04:05. > :04:09.be virtually non-stop. And only one side of the story from then on in.
:04:09. > :04:13.Yesterday on the radio there was an announcement that Noel Gallagher
:04:13. > :04:20.was going to be working at the Albert Hall with the teenage Cancer
:04:20. > :04:25.Trust. And he was asked if he had a message for the royal couple. I
:04:25. > :04:32.could feel no link there. So you feel there is a danger that
:04:32. > :04:37.celebrity coverage is being used? Every tenuous link. Everything will
:04:37. > :04:43.be geared towards this now. And you have concerns about the fact that
:04:43. > :04:47.the Duchess herself is less than 12 weeks pregnant? As a woman and a
:04:47. > :04:55.human being it is a difficult time for them. They are a young couple
:04:55. > :05:01.who are as worried as everyone else. I think that we have to keep things
:05:01. > :05:07.in proportion but also give them their privacy. So it was too early
:05:07. > :05:12.and left a bad taste in my mouth. It fell to that creepy. Well the
:05:12. > :05:16.creepy thing, people tend not to talk about pregnancy until 12 weeks.
:05:16. > :05:21.There's always a risk and concerned that something might go wrong. Did
:05:21. > :05:26.you have any concerns about the possibility of intrusion and tone
:05:26. > :05:30.in this story? You're absolutely right. And at that very time we
:05:30. > :05:34.were asking St James's Palace for more information because it quickly
:05:35. > :05:39.became clear that this was before 12 weeks. But the Palace had
:05:39. > :05:44.decided to put the information out there because of the fact that
:05:44. > :05:48.medical treatment was taking place. That enabled us to be very clear
:05:48. > :05:53.about the circumstances. On one level there is no sense of us try
:05:53. > :05:58.to force information that was not there. And I would just say in that
:05:58. > :06:03.sense there were two is that living things. I appreciate that stories
:06:03. > :06:07.divide audiences. And on Wall stories a group of people think we
:06:07. > :06:13.cover them too much. But not only did we have the medical component
:06:13. > :06:18.to the story but also an active and moving discussion at the same time
:06:18. > :06:21.about the accession to the throne. One of the issues is proportion. I
:06:21. > :06:26.looked at the first couple of boroughs of news channel coverage
:06:26. > :06:32.and it was a good hour before you got a story about the Starbucks tax
:06:32. > :06:38.thing. Or about elderly care. And the only foreign story in two hours
:06:38. > :06:42.of coverage was a short one about Israeli settlements. Is that a fair
:06:42. > :06:47.balance of coverage given that we knew nothing more than that she was
:06:47. > :06:50.ill and was going to have a baby? The job of the news channel is to
:06:51. > :06:54.produce breaking news and develop good news for the audience. And the
:06:54. > :06:58.treatment for this story was no different to any other. Would you
:06:58. > :07:07.have done it anything differently about the proportionate and nature
:07:07. > :07:13.of the coverage and questions that you asked? Probably by about an
:07:13. > :07:18.hour the following morning we would have taken it off the lead story
:07:18. > :07:28.about an hour earlier. But then we found its natural place a few hours
:07:28. > :07:31.
:07:31. > :07:35.later. Well keep your comments coming in.
:07:35. > :07:39.Contact details coming up later. The other big story of the week was
:07:39. > :07:43.the autumn statement from the Chancellor. In the true spirit of
:07:43. > :07:47.George Osborne's called for further posterity's some of you counted the
:07:47. > :07:53.cost we came to how far the BBC should go in pursuit of aerial
:07:53. > :07:58.shots of Westminster. One viewer asked was there any need for the
:07:58. > :08:03.helicopter shots of a man in a grey suit getting into the car? How much
:08:03. > :08:07.did that cost? Another viewer agreed, why was it necessary to
:08:07. > :08:12.have deployed a film group in a helicopter? What purpose did it
:08:12. > :08:17.serve and what cost? Then there was the substance of the statement to
:08:17. > :08:25.be reported on and a round of the radio and television interviews for
:08:25. > :08:30.George Osborne. Some of you felt he had a rough ride. A question coming
:08:30. > :08:35.in, how has the recession affected you personally? That is one that
:08:35. > :08:41.bugs people. This notion that we're all in it together. Has anything
:08:41. > :08:49.changed in Europe lifestyle? Has anything gone? Have you felt it in
:08:49. > :08:54.any tangible way? I took a pay cut and froze my pay on taking this job
:08:54. > :08:59.to take up from the previous Labour Chancellor. That was in order to
:08:59. > :09:03.show that politicians will not get away with it. But understand that
:09:03. > :09:09.people on lower incomes are having a tough time. There is a challenge
:09:09. > :09:14.with the cost of living for many families. Well one viewer was not
:09:14. > :09:17.happy with that interview. If ever there was a spiteful question, this
:09:17. > :09:23.was. Why have a go at him personally when he is just doing
:09:23. > :09:28.his job? Another folk the balance of coverage was wrong. I get fed up
:09:28. > :09:32.with the BBC stress in the cuts and austerity programme which has to be
:09:32. > :09:36.followed to get the country back to a credible position. Another said,
:09:36. > :09:40.coverage is weighted towards the fact that George Osborne has not
:09:40. > :09:45.been able to meet his projected targets. The inference being that
:09:45. > :09:49.he is a miserable failure. And the tax affairs now of Amazon,
:09:49. > :09:54.Starbucks and Google had been in the news. Starbucks under pressure
:09:54. > :10:01.after revelations about how they avoided paying corporation tax, has
:10:01. > :10:06.now announced it will pay more UK tax. Some of you don't reports were
:10:06. > :10:12.unfair. One viewer asked one will anyone realise the problem is with
:10:12. > :10:15.the laws passed by MPs and not with these companies. And another
:10:15. > :10:21.pointed out that many companies have a significant turnover but
:10:21. > :10:26.make no profit and so do not have to pay corporation tax. Another
:10:26. > :10:30.said the coverage from Newsnight was superficial and hopes that,
:10:30. > :10:37.Newsnight has not lost its self confidence to tackle these
:10:37. > :10:46.challenging issues. It did not contain any new information. And
:10:46. > :10:50.finally, a classic story. This was running on the BBC news channel, a
:10:50. > :10:56.New Zealand charity that has taught rescue dogs to drive. One viewer
:10:56. > :11:01.was not happy. How ridiculous to give airtime to driving docks. Stop
:11:01. > :11:05.wasting money. That is all they have time for this week. Thank you