:00:02. > :00:07.you very much indeed. Time now for Newswatch with Samir
:00:07. > :00:14.Ahmed and this week, immigration from Europe comes under the
:00:14. > :00:21.spotlight. Welcome to Newswatch. On the
:00:21. > :00:29.programme: come on, Andy! Why should news bulletins have to move because
:00:29. > :00:37.of a tennis match? The Rolling Stones, the tents, the
:00:37. > :00:42.wellies, but should BBC News had gone to Glastonbury? And has BBC
:00:42. > :00:48.coverage of immigration from Europe demonstrated a liberal bias?
:00:48. > :00:52.The biggest story of the week has been the crisis in Egypt, where huge
:00:52. > :01:00.protests against the government led to President Morsi being ousted and
:01:00. > :01:10.replaced but how should that litter call our people be described -- how
:01:10. > :01:25.
:01:25. > :01:29.should the political upheaval be festivals are in full swing and so
:01:29. > :01:35.is Murray-mania. Along with the latter comes the annual round of
:01:35. > :01:39.complaints about the scheduling of Wimbledon, with Andy Murray's
:01:39. > :01:49.quarterfinal comeback supplanting the local news bulletins and moving
:01:49. > :02:05.
:02:05. > :02:11.Glastonbury, also gave rise to objections. Judging by this phone
:02:11. > :02:18.call from Mike Morgan, he is not a fan. Why was it necessary in the
:02:18. > :02:23.news programme to have repeated references for what passes for a
:02:23. > :02:27.music festival, and to actually send a reporter and a camera team looking
:02:28. > :02:37.at people jumping up and down in puddles and making inane comments?
:02:38. > :02:38.
:02:38. > :03:24.Apology for the loss of subtitles for 46 seconds
:03:24. > :03:31.This is not what I expect from the way the breadth of public opinion on
:03:31. > :03:36.the thorny topic of immigration, the European Union and religion? That is
:03:36. > :03:44.the question the BBC Trust set out to answer in a review published on
:03:44. > :03:51.Wednesday. All these Eastern European 's are coming in. It was
:03:51. > :03:55.the defining point of the last general election. Gordon Brown's
:03:55. > :03:58.description of Gillian Duffy as that bigoted woman showed that the
:03:58. > :04:08.political class did not get the strength of public feeling about
:04:08. > :04:10.
:04:10. > :04:16.immigration. This week's -- Helen Boaden agrees, saying she found a
:04:16. > :04:21.deep liberal bias in immigration coverage when she took up her post
:04:21. > :04:26.in 2004. Mark Thompson said in 2010 that the BBC had been guilty of a
:04:26. > :04:36.massive bias to the left. On Europe, some viewers have told us they still
:04:36. > :04:37.
:04:37. > :05:19.Apology for the loss of subtitles for 46 seconds
:05:19. > :05:24.Kingdom Independence party and the way the BBC reported it may suggest
:05:24. > :05:29.that sceptical views on immigration and the EU are now taken more
:05:29. > :05:33.seriously and a report from the BBC Trust praises the broad and
:05:33. > :05:43.impressive range of opinions currently broadcast, but the talk of
:05:43. > :05:51.
:05:51. > :05:58.bias still resonates with some he used to run ITV and two conducted
:05:58. > :06:03.that assessment of impartiality in BBC output. -- and who conducted.
:06:03. > :06:09.How has this liberal bias come about? I did not say there was a
:06:09. > :06:14.liberal bias in the BBC, it was the BBC head of news. The BBC has a
:06:14. > :06:18.tendency to follow the news agenda as driven by Westminster
:06:18. > :06:23.politicians. Politicians have historically been reluctant to talk
:06:23. > :06:27.about immigration and Europe. What I think the BBC has failed to do is to
:06:27. > :06:32.use its own initiative to go out into the community where these
:06:32. > :06:35.issues were being discussed and sometimes where mainstream
:06:35. > :06:41.politicians are not reflecting views that are widely held in that
:06:41. > :06:44.community they will be expressed through a naughty party. That is
:06:44. > :06:51.what is happening with UKIP. None of the main parties were ready
:06:51. > :06:56.representing their viewpoint held in some communities. UKIP has come
:06:56. > :07:03.forward quite suddenly. Journalists generally have recognised that, in
:07:03. > :07:07.many cases, late. And perhaps they have overcompensated. Some people
:07:07. > :07:12.look at news organisations say in America where there is much stronger
:07:12. > :07:15.opinion. There is also concerned that some of it is a lot of
:07:15. > :07:21.shouting, it is aggressive, and it could be harmful to the public
:07:21. > :07:27.discourse. I am not in favour of a lot of shouting and heat just for
:07:27. > :07:33.the sake of it. A good entertaining news and current affairs programme
:07:33. > :07:38.is mixture of heat and light and mostly light, but what I am trying
:07:38. > :07:43.to say is it is an important service that the BBC can provide for our
:07:43. > :07:48.democracy. For us to be able to hear and understand a wide range of
:07:48. > :07:53.viewpoints, some of which we will not find palatable. Every time the
:07:53. > :07:58.BBC does this, sections of the press and politicians say, outrageous,
:07:58. > :08:03.terrible, to give the oxygen of publicity to this. But history tells
:08:03. > :08:12.us we do end up speaking to these people but sometimes it takes ten
:08:12. > :08:17.years. We would not broadcast the IRA in 1998. 20 years later, Martin
:08:17. > :08:23.McGuinness is a deputy minister. I am interested that ordinary public
:08:23. > :08:26.opinion is not being reflected in news coverage. To what extent should
:08:26. > :08:33.the BBC be reflecting public opinion, including controversial
:08:33. > :08:39.opinion, and how far is it just a duty to inform? An example is
:08:39. > :08:46.climate change scepticism. You say we need to reflect dissent. That is
:08:46. > :08:50.an interesting one. That is a long discussion. You keep on hearing
:08:50. > :08:56.people say that climate change is a settled science. There is no such
:08:56. > :09:01.thing. We are questioning the sensible 's of science the whole
:09:01. > :09:07.time. It is not the job of the BBC to close down this debate. While
:09:07. > :09:12.there are respectable arguments by people like the former Chancellor of
:09:12. > :09:20.the exchequer Nigel Lawson, we should be hearing those voices.
:09:20. > :09:25.there is the issue of the liberal bias, what should the BBC be doing
:09:25. > :09:30.about it? Does bringing in someone from the Guardian reflect the
:09:30. > :09:40.problem? What matters is what is on the air. A number of things can be
:09:40. > :09:44.done to safeguard regularly on a routine. Things I suggested, things
:09:44. > :09:50.like appointing somebody whose job it will be to be in overall charge
:09:50. > :09:55.of that story and as part of their daily discipline to ask themselves,
:09:55. > :10:00.what are the voices on this story that we should have heard that we
:10:00. > :10:06.have not heard? Things like stand back moments. We get so involved in
:10:06. > :10:09.the unfolding story, to stand back for a minute and say, are we asking
:10:10. > :10:16.the questions that the public is asking? There are a number of things
:10:16. > :10:22.like that that could really make a difference. Thank you. A particular
:10:22. > :10:25.bugbear we are told about is the tendency of some reporters to wave
:10:25. > :10:35.their hands about. One viewer identified what he saw
:10:35. > :10:37.
:10:37. > :10:42.was a prime example on Monday's aware of the public backlash they
:10:43. > :10:48.risk if they go ahead with this pay rise, there may be nothing they can
:10:48. > :10:52.do about it precisely because MPs have chosen to hand decisions over
:10:53. > :11:02.their pay to this independent body. Jim Lee accorded the robotic hand
:11:03. > :11:16.
:11:16. > :11:23.your comments this week. If you want to share your opinions or even