06/05/2016 Newswatch

Hello and welcome to Newswatch with me, Samira Ahmed.

This week... Wild celebrations in Leicester on Monday night as they

win the premiership with the rest of the country very happy as well. Were

the BBC correct to reflect this with extensive coverage?

First, the BBC pulled out all the stops as normal for its coverage of

Thursday night's elections across the UK. BBC One ran its election

2016 programme throughout the night and BBC News reported extensively on

Friday the results of votes for the Parliament of Scotland and the

assemblies of Wales and Northern Ireland. Nigel greeted this

enthusiastically on Friday night. The graphics! Jeremy Vine unveiled

the computerised box of tricks as usual. Let's have a look at the map

again. Take it all in. We will show you the results in the key wards.

800 of them. This shows movement since last year, 2015. Labour had a

poor results... Reaction was divided on Twitter. -- result.

On Friday morning, the emphasis was put on one results. -- one set of

results. Election results are still coming in

over the weekend so if you have some reaction to the reports you see we

may feature it next week. Earlier this week, Monday's late news

bulletin on BBC One lead with news on what some people in the English

Midlands greeted with joy. By the kicked off 24 hours of coverage

which infuriated many watchers. Leicester City defied the odds to

win the Premier League. APPLAUSE. Delirious fans celebrate

as the club written off at the start of the season wins the title for the

first time in its history. It is a dream. Adrian come through! The

dream went on throughout Tuesday on television. -- A dream come true.

There were features on the impact on bookmakers in Leicester City

upsetting the odds, the financial benefits for the club, and

interviews with Claudio Ranieri. He still passes by every two or three

years. Is old friends have a get together and we go to get something

to eat. It was still the lead story at ten o'clock that night. Dan Roan

is in Leicester tonight with the latest. 24 hours... By then, had the

BBC milked the story dry? Was it right to make the most of a rare

good news story? I am joined by an editor and others who have contacted

us after watching the coverage. What was your reason for complaining? I

was watching the one o'clock news and the first item was the Leicester

City victory. It is tremendous for them! But I felt that ten minutes of

that at the start of the news was a bit much. And then as a sideline the

disaster in Syria was mentioned. More and more recently with

celebrity steps and one thing or the other, apart from being on the news,

it is nearly a documentary. -- deaths. Just a mention on the news

is fine and save the documentary for another time. It is

disproportionate, isn't it? It wasn't a surprise. We had known for

days they were going to win. It was a surprise at the start of the

season. 5000-1. It was an extraordinary story, a great story,

so many elements in it and so much to go into, such a surprise, local

angles as well, global angles, financial angles, cultural

angles... It was absolutely a story that transcended football and

sport. For the people I spoke to it is a story that captured

imaginations. There was loads to get into. But it was almost a

documentary. Ten minutes! Still the lead 24 hours later? There was a lot

going on that day. There was a lot to get into and analyse. From what

we can judge the audiences were enjoying it. The website figures

were strong that they. And Syria is an important ongoing story we have

covered consistently in-depth. -- that day. A unique moment in news,

Mark. Eight rare feel good story. It was great. -- a rare. But 24 hours!

It lost its significance. If it was a newspaper I would wrap my chips in

it. It was presenters in front of crowds of people and you couldn't

hear them. It really ran out of news. I think it is about you

needing to understand what is significant for viewers. Syria,

Brexit, the presidential elections, a whole range of things. They became

insignificant compared to this story. 24 hours later... I think

there were developments that they. Claudio Ranieri, the manager, spoke

for the first time. The city in celebration. The players back in

celebration. I think it is right. But isn't it indulgent? I think it

was right that we analysed the story. It was an extraordinary

event. There wasn't much to analyse. Everyone is saying is

saying isn't it amazing! Even the Prime Minister tweeted, he got the

club right, thank God, that it just became repetitious. They had a great

scoop on the IS documents on Sky... It is waiting chasing. -- rating

chasing. It was about how did they achieve this. Back to Joan. As well

as that, for you this was another story about football and the English

Premier League at that. I am not a football fan but I love the sport

and I watch snooker wall-to-wall. But ten minutes in a half-hour

bulletin! And sending a reporter to speak to the manager's friends from

his childhood? News, I don't think so. Specifically, this coverage from

Rome. That was a key part of the story. An manager who has previously

been unsuccessful in other clubs... -- a. Is that normal? We always send

reporters to see friends of important figures. It covers the

context of this story. And I genuinely think this is a story that

people will remember for years to come and we will be talking about it

for years to come. You can't say that about many stories. It was

entertainment. It wasn't news. It was ratings chasing. A final word.

It went on and on, including with celebrities, if they die, mention

it, but a mini documentary in a half-hour bulletin is wrong.

Schedule a mini documentary for another time. Is an issue about how

much goes on a bulletin as to a post to what is on the website. -- There

is an. -- as opposed. What is in a name? You may have read that the

government of the Czech Republic is renaming the country to Czechia. It

raises the question of how the BBC should name other countries. For

instance, a new military regime in 1989 decided are much should

henceforth be known as Myanmar and not many people agreed. -- Burma.

And this person noted that sometimes the BBC uses anglicised versions of

place names and sometimes it doesn't. The Italians call their

country Italia, they call Roma Rome. We call them differently. That has

to be consistency. Either we adopt their names for all cities, towns

and countries, or we continue to use the familiar English names that we

all move and understand. The current pick and mix system is confusing,

illogical, and just plain wrong. I suppose it means, looking forward,

we will have news reports from Mosca, Athena, and so on instead of

the more familiar Moscow and Athens. Please, please, can we go

back to the familiar English names? Thank you for all your comments this

week. You too, could put your point across on a future edition of

NewsWatch. These are the details. -- you, too,. You can find us on

Twitter or have a look at our website. You can search for and

watch discussions we have previously shown on the programme on line. But

for now, we will say goodbye. You tend what more next week. -- You

can.