31/05/2014 Newswatch

Hello, welcome to Newswatch. Last week's elections brought a UKIP

political earthquake to Britain, or did they? And if they did, was the

BBC partly responsible? We respond to charges that UKIP's success was

overhyped and discuss questioning of Nigel Farage during the election

campaign. As the results of the English local

elections and those for the European Parliament came in, one man's

smiling face dominated our television screens. Much of the talk

was about UKIP and Nigel Farage as it had been during the election

campaign. The UN did not take... Even when he was speaking to one set

of cameras, UKIP leader had to do their questions thrown at him by a

nearby Nick Robinson. People wanted to complain about this at the time,

as they did about questions about employing his German life as a

secretary. `` wife. Nobody else can do that job. No British person? You

do not think anyone is capable of doing that job? And again when the

same at Mac discussed concerns about a group of Romanians living in next

door. Nigerians? No. Irish? These were the concerns some felt.

Despite or perhaps because of the scrutiny Nigel Farage and his party

were put under, they did well in last week's local elections. But how

well? The BBC have talked about the search and massive increases, huge

successes, UKIP are the story of the day. Do you support that in context?

Look at the result. It demonstrable fourth`place. Try and reconcile that

with BBC coverage. It does not make sense. With the European election

results coming in on Sunday night, it was clear that here UKIP had

won. Sought some viewers, the BBC had played a part in this victory.

The BBC's political editor, Nick Robinson, joins us now. Let us start

with the election campaign, with your interviews with Nigel Farage

too personal, the aggressive? I do not think they were too personal or

aggressive. I did take a view that Nigel Farage was likely to be at the

centre of this election campaign, that it was widely predicted by all

parties that UKIP could win the European elections and that Nigel

Farage had done a lot of clips for news programmes, usually with a pint

in hand and a smile on his face, usually inviting him to comment on

others rather than being interrogated on his own position. I

thought it was right to do that. It is clear that Nigel Farage does

divide viewers. But on the English local elections, the charges the BBC

exaggerated how successful they would be. They only got 116 seats

compared to more than 2000 from Labour. They do not control any

councils and their share of the vote went down. I think Labour supporters

got deeply frustrated that they had made many games, the worst games and

councils in votes. We did report that, but it is worth remembering

that the results got much better into Friday than they were overnight

Thursday night and into Friday morning. The picture come Friday

night was much better and healthier for labour than it had been the

night before and at the time people were switching on their radios or

televisions. The point we were making, again and again, was to

report the facts, you always got all the coverage. But we are there to

add analysis and interpretation. The truth is, the people who study

elections, whether it is Professor John Curtis, the head of you go in

the studio, all agreed that these results were not good enough for

labour to be confident of winning the next election. They only had a

lead of 1% over the Conservatives. They were not as good as other

positions had done in a similar time. UKIP had made a breakthrough.

There were no longer just a European party. They were finding a basic in

councils. They were establishing themselves as the fourth party of

English politics. They went to do it in British politics in European

elections. We were right to point that out. Let us talk about the

parliamentary elections. UKIP did Windows. Many say that the BBC's

coverage made it a self fulfilling prophecy. I know there is that

feeling, but I think it is wrong. The big rise in UKIP's poll ratings

happened before Nigel Farage was getting onto the television day in

and day out. They had already been a search. UKIP had a record`breaking

performance at the local council elections last May. You cannot make

that link between recent coverage and his performance. We got the same

complaints over last year's local elections. Many feel that the BBC

has been building up UKIP for a year. What the BBC has to do is try

and give effect coverage to politicians. The way this is done is

by studying how parties have performed in the past, how many

seats they have got, how they did in the general elections, how their

current polities are going. Decisions on what made by me or my

editors, but a chief political adviser whose job is to advise the

BBC trust to mix a judgement, who gets roughly what share of coverage.

His decision, which was echoed entirely by Channel 4 and sky, was

that UKIP should get equal coverage to the big three parties in the

European elections. It was a national vote. They performed very

well in 2009. They were performing in the opinion polls in a way that

suggested they may come first. A decision was taken that being fair

and balanced meant giving UKIP the same level of coverage as the

Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal Democrats. BBC News analysis

resented both Europe and local boats at a Westminster died to help people

might vote in general elections. There was very little on issues

reported in the local European Parliament. That is surely failing

to do the job. There is a downside about that, but it is not all the

coverage. If you listen to radio stations or watch TV news or read

online, you will see stories about Sheffield Council or stories about

any other council reported in terms of that. It simply is not realistic

that a national level we can do that. We do see through a prism of

what it means for a general election. There is a long history of

local elections being a pretty good guide as to what will happen. In

European Parliament, that is a fair criticism. There was certainly

coverage around, but it is a fair criticism that we need to constantly

think about how to explain to people what exactly a member of the

European Parliament does and what the differences are between people

who are representing one party and represented another.

Just time for a couple of other items. The statement's question Time

certainly did that. The panel included Piers Morgan and it was put

that the party should not be too pleased with its election

performance. All your present to me is the best of a bad bunch. If I am

somewhere and there were four really ugly girls, I am thinking, that is

all you are. That is all you are to us.

Finally, some more positive feedback. Singer and producer Corel

Williams was interviewed on Thursday's Breakfast. This video was

inspired. It might have ended so well, but

most viewers applauded the enthusiasm and bravery. This e`mail

was typical. Do let us know what makes you happy

or unhappy. That is all for this week. Tell us your views. We are

also on Twitter. If you ever missed a programme on television, you can

catch up with it on the website. We will be back to heal thoughts next

week. `` Carey or thoughts. A dry and bright weekend looms large

for most of us after what has been a grey and soggy week. It has actually

been a mild