02/03/2018 Newswatch


02/03/2018

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LineFromTo

Now it's time for Newswatch,

with Samira Ahmed.

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This week, has BBC News gone over

the top in reporting this

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Hello and welcome to Newswatch

with me, Samira Ahmed.

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Too much airtime,

too much fear and not

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enough on other big news -

did the BBC goe snowblind over

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this week's weather?

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And were BBC on-air staff put

in danger on endless

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outside, live broadcasts?

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One story this week has dominated

television news output

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and the Newswatch inbox too,

so we will be focusing on this

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programme is what has

been widely dubbed as -

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well, let's hear the phrase

used by BBC presenters.

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Now, it's been billed

as The Beast from the East,

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a freezing weather front sweeping

in from Russia this week.

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Are you ready for

The Beast from the East?

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Weather blowing in from Russia

is set to make parts of the UK

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colder than the Arctic.

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The blast of bitterly cold weather

over the last couple of days

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has come from Siberia.

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The Beast from the East,

as it's been called.

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But should the BBC have given that

nickname further currency?

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No, thought a number

of viewers, including Mike.

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The Beast from the East -

why have the BBC adopted this

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trashy, tabloid headline

for the recent weather?

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Surely the BBC news is above such

a ridiculous description?

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More and more, we seem to be

lowering journalistic standards

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in order to entertain

and maintain viewer figures.

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And Ian tweeted along

similar lines...

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And that charge of hysteria was made

more widely, for instance,

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by a viewer called Linda...

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And Gill agreed...

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Another issue of concern

was the wisdom of sending reporters

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and camera crews out to face

the elements around the country.

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The weather today is brutal.

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There's freezing temperatures

across pretty much the whole

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of Scotland, and when the wind

blows, it feels much

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colder than that.

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It's pretty brutal here

at the moment, I have to say.

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We've had blizzard conditions,

subzero temperatures,

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winds of around 40mph.

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It's -8 at the moment.

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What this illustrates is how little

snow is needed to cause a problem.

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There's hardly any on the surface

here, but it has frozen up and got

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slippery and caused chaos

on this road this morning.

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Danny Savage, and before him,

Lorna Gordon and Ben Brown

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earning their crust there.

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But Danny was one of a number

of people to pose this question...

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Why do we continue to humiliate our

weather forecasters and reporters

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by subjecting them to outside

broadcasts in such terrible weather?

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Recently, during the infamous

Beast from the East,

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the reporters were standing outside

in all conditions, covered in snow.

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Sometimes in treacherous conditions,

standing next to the road

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or even in the road,

where there was traffic

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trying to pass.

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They quite easily could have been

knocked over by cars skidding.

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It makes no sense to me

why they have to be out

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in that sort of weather,

when it's quite easy,

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like myself here, as you can see,

you can see the snow behind me,

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but I'm still indoors,

reporting this to you.

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Others questioned whether the BBC

News's interest in weather had

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something to do with geography?

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Willie from Carlisle

at it like this...

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But the main complaint this week

was about the shear quantity

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coverage of the weather.

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Andrew was one of those who thought

the BBC went well over the top.

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It was Samuel Johnson who said,

when it two Englishmen meet,

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the first thing they do is talk

about the weather.

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But I think we do take it

to extremes of the amount

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of coverage we've had

in the last couple of days.

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Every ten minutes,

with a five-minute warning

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about the apocalyptic

snowfall coming up.

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One good thing about this is that it

has taken Brexit off

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of the main news for a time.

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Oh, no, I tell a lie -

as I look now I can see they're

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talking about Brexit on the TV.

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So you can't have

everything in one go.

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Yes, Brexit certainly featured

on BBC news this week, as did Syria.

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But Paul pointed out

that the extensive weather coverage

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meant less time given

to that unfolding crisis.

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You may have noticed it's been

snowing in the UK, there's been

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a lot about it the news.

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I've been prompted to contact

Newswatch because I watched the

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BBC 6pm news on Tuesday,

I think it was, and we went

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through the entire show without once

mentioning the huge,

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emerging humanitarian disaster

that is Eastern Ghouta in Syria.

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There was lots of footage

of children playing in the snow,

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of reporters standing by motorways

with abandoned vehicles and lorries

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trapped in snowdrifts.

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But while children are playing

and tobogganing in the UK,

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they are playing in bunkers

and underground in Syria.

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Plenty to talk about there

with the controller

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of BBC news channels, thank

you for coming on Newswatch.

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No-one is saying that

snow wasn't a big story,

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them in the grand scheme of things,

there's a strong concern it came

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at the cost of a lot of serious news

coverage that should have had

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more prominence on air?

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I think when you look

at this scale and severity

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of the disruption seen this week,

you can see why we gave the snow

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story the prominence we have.

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In fact, much of that

are still ongoing.

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The fact is we have had two

red weather warnings

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from the Met Office -

red means risk to life -

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two on the same day in different

parts of the country,

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speaks, I think, to

the scale of the weather

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disruption that was coming.

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Disruption to public services,

to transport services -

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we have had seen people being stuck

on motorways and trains overnight

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and that's in spite

of all the warnings given.

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So we approached the story saying,

we know it's going to disrupt

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peoples lives, we ought to warn

of that and report what happens.

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That's what we have done this week.

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In terms reporting what happens,

the viewers were saying that public

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interest would have been adequately

served with less sheer

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numbers of minutes.

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More than ten minutes

of the top of the 6pm,

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three days in row, Tuesday,

Wednesday and Thursday.

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One of the viewers there referring

to the fact that Syria did not get

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a mention on Tuesday,

he felt, properly?

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Another way of looking

at the figures is how large

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the viewing figures for the story

have been either on the television

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or digital platforms.

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We know on Thursday night,

almost 9 million people

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watched their regional

bulletin around England.

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We know the story has been widely

read on line with traffic

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up 20% on many days.

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Four of the top ten stories on any

given day being the snow story.

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We know the viewing figures

to the BBC News Channel had been

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consistently high all week.

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Therefore, audience interest

in the story is there.

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As for other stories, I could point

to a considerable coverage of Brexit

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throughout the week.

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With regards to Syria,

Jeremy Bowen spoke about Syria

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on Sunday's 10pm news

and hopes for a ceasefire.

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Eastern Ghouta was the lead

story on the Radio 4

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bulletins on Tuesday morning,

it continued to feature

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throughout our coverage

throughout the week,

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and Jeremy Bowen is in Damascus now.

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So I think we have managed

to balance the snow story

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with all the other major news events

that have been going on.

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Another issue that many viewers

raised was that BBC News only really

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got interested in giving

the sonow a lot of coverage

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when it hit the southeast?

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I don't think that's true.

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Actually, we were warning people

throughout the weekend

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this event was coming.

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I think it started in the southeast,

but we were also able to say,

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on Wednesday night, for example,

when there was particularly severe

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disruption in Scotland and northern

and eastern England,

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that's where the bulletin

coverage began, in those

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parts of the country.

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And it's interesting to note that

today, Glasgow has reported

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the snowfall they have had in that

part of the world was the worst

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ever at the airport.

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I think that speaks

to the scale of the disruption.

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So the fact that Glasgow was top

of the coverage on Wednesday

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evening was appropriate,

I think.

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Some viewers felt that,

even though there were amber and red

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warnings from the Met Office,

that most of the population wasn't

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in any danger at all, and perhaps

the BBC over hyped the fear?

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We have to report the severe weather

warnings when they come.

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And when you have two red

warnings in the same day,

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I think the last red warning we had

for snow was five years ago,

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here we had two on the same

day, we have agreement

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with the Met Office that we will

report those things.

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We report them from the point

of view of what the potential

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disruption will be and then

from what has actually happened.

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People who have either been

trapped in their cars

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overnight or on trains,

as we discussed earlier.

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I think what we've done

there is report both proportionally

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the potential danger

to people and the consequence

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of what's happened.

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The phrase The Beast from the East -

too tabloid, overdramatic?

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Well, we didn't coin the phrase

Beast from the East.

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You've used it, a lot.

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We've used it when it

seemed appropriate.

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It hasn't tended to be used

in our actual weather forecasts,

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from a meterological standpoint.

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It's helpful in one regard,

in that it tells people this

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is a significant weather

event that is coming.

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It also tells them where it's

coming from, from Siberia.

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And we were able to tell people

that this was not just

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going to be snow or ice,

it's going to be the wind

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and extreme cold.

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I think one of the features

of this week has been how

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cold it has been and,

on our new digital products,

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our website and app,

we are a able to give people

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a feels-like feature,

which tells people what the weather

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conditions are going to be.

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Was it really necessary

or a sensible use of licence-fee

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payers' money to send armies

of crews out to do all those lives,

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often in white-out conditions?

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I'm not sure it was armies.

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We worked very closely

with our colleagues around

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the nations of the UK

and the English regions to make sure

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those deployments are proportional.

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Actually, there's been

an awful lot to report on.

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We've sent people out where we think

there's story to cover.

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Actually, some of those people have

been in traffic jams themselves,

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they are perfectly well-equipped

and trained, they are

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with colleagues who can

make sure they are safe.

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We take their safety

extremely seriously,

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so I think some of the work

those people have done

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has been pretty hard,

pretty plucky and very impressive.

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On safety, a lot of viewers

complained in particular

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about Sian Lloyd being made to stand

what looked quite precariously close

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to speeding lorries,

and it might even have been possible

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she was standing in the road -

there were abandoned cars

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behind her, it was hard to tell.

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People are concerned that

perhaps staff are being put

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in danger unnecessarily?

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I'd like to reassure people

that is not the case.

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We take their safety

extremely seriously.

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As I say, from the point of view

of how well they are equipped,

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so they're suitably warm.

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Also they have colleagues

with them to make sure

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they are safe at all times.

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They are all highly trained

and we have very strict

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protocols around that,

so I hope I can reassure

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people on that one.

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Thank you so much.

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Thank you for all your

comments this week.

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If you want to share your opinions

on BBC News and current affairs

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or even appear on the programme,

you can contact us on...

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Do have a look at our

website for previous interviews,

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the address is...

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That's all from us, we'll be back

to hear your views on BBC news

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coverage again next week.

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Goodbye.

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