Harmless Sky

In April, the BBC told me that my complaint about the out-of-context splicing of phrases from President Obama’s inaugural speech in a Newsnight report by Susan Watts would be considered by the Editorial Complaints Unit. They have now replied at some length: Read the rest of this entry »

It’s now nearly three months since Susan Watts’ extraordinary report for Newsnight about President Obama’s inaugural speech. After jumping through a multitude of hoops (here, here, and here) as part of the BBC complaints process, I have finally received a letter from the Editorial Complaints Unit with some kind of substantive content. This is what they have to say:

I’m writing to notify you that your complaint about Susan Watts’ report for Newsnight on the environmental challenges faced by President Obama is being entertained by this unit. I would also like to sincerely apologise for the delay in doing so as a result of having mislaid your letter.

To ensure that we have a correct understanding of the basis for your complaint, the BBC’S complaints procedure requires that, at this stage, we set out the main points of complaint as we understand them, and the elements of the Editorial Guidelines that we believe to be most relevant to them. In this instance we understand your complaint to be that the editing of excerpts from President Obama’s inaugural speech in this report distorted their intended meaning. The relevant section of the guidelines is that on Accuracy which says, in a section headed Misleading Audiences:

We should not distort known facts, present invented material as fact or knowingly do anything to mislead our audiences. We may need to label material to avoid doing so.

If you have any comments on this summary of your complaint and the relevant guidelines, please let us have them by 22 April so that we can take them into consideration in the course of our investigation, the outcome of which we’ll aim to let you know by 6 May.

For information, the full Editorial Guidelines can be found at http://www.bbc.co.uk/guidelines/editorialguidelines/

And the BBC’s complaints process is explained at http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/handle.shtml

Yours sincerely

Complaints Manager

Editorial Complaints Unit

There is something positively Dickensian about the use of the word ‘entertain’ in the first paragraph, but as the last paragraph refers to an impending ‘investigation’, we seem to be on roughly the right track at last. What comes in the middle is a little more worrying. Read the rest of this entry »

At the end of last month, Newsnight returned to the delicate subject of what President Obama said - or did not say - about science in his inaugural speech. For anyone new to this topic see: BBC Newsnight - Warming up President Obama’s inaugural speech?Here’s what happened in the most recent episode which was broadcasted on 26^th March 2009:

Lead-in from Emily Maitlis, the programme presenter: In his policies, George Bush never disguised the fact that he put God many rungs higher than science. So how will life change now there is a US president who believes passionately in the subject. In a wide ranging interview, Harold Varmus, a Nobel Prize winning cancer specialist charged with the task of restoring science to its rightful place talks to our Science Editor Susan Watts.

Ms Watts’ report started with a sound bite from the inaugural speech, part of which will be familiar to many Harmless Sky readers:

President Obama: We’ll restore science to its rightful place, and wield technologies wonders to raise health care’s quality and lower its cost.

The last time we heard, ‘We’ll restore science to its rightful place ….’ on Newsnight, the rest of the sentence seemed to be, ‘[and] roll back the spectre of a warming planet’. Unless you happened to have a very good memory, or had just read a transcript of the speech, you would have thought that was exactly what the president had said. Not at all the same thing as the complete sentence accurately quoted above. But where climate science is concerned, can we expect the BBC to concern itself about a trivial matter like misquotation provided that the message is ‘correct’? Using the same seven-word phrase twice in little over a month in such very different contexts leaves one a little breathless.

Evidently Newsnight were not prepared to risk repeating the so-called ‘montage’ that they used in their original coverage of the inaugural speech, in spite of claiming that there was nothing wrong with it.

This is Susan Watts’ introduction to her interview with Professor Varmus: Read the rest of this entry »

Back in August last year, I reported that I had made an application to the BBC under the Freedom of Information Act for the names of the ‘best scientific experts’ who attended their climate change seminar in January 2006. It’s time for an update.My original request was made on 20^th July 2007, and on 21^st  August 2007 the BBC replied. I was told that the information that I required was held ‘for the purpose of journalism, art or literature’ and therefor they were not obliged to disclose it under the terms of the legislation.As this seemed to be stretching a very well used loophole just a little too far, I then wrote to the Information Commissioner’s Office, on 5^th of September 2007, asking them to require the BBC to comply with the Freedom of Information Act. The ICO is the watchdog charged with ensuring that public authorities not only comply with the legislation, but do so promptly.

During the next eleven months I received two identical letters from the ICO explaining that they were very busy and unable to start investigating my complaint. A request for them to do so immediately was ignored.

Eventually, at the end of July 2008 - over a year after I had written to the BBC - I was told that the case had at last been allocated for investigation, and a letter had been sent to the BBC asking them to explain why they had rejected my request for information about the seminar. It looked as though progress was being made at last.

During the next six months, I received a succession of emails from the Senior Complaints Officer who was dealing with the case. Most of them looked like this: Read the rest of this entry »

Following on from my last post about the problems of making a complaint to the BBC about Susan Watt’s report on President Obama’s inauguration speech on Newsnight, time continued to slip by.Given the way in which my response to Mr Graham’s message had been mangled when I tried to send it via the BBC Complaints website, I hardly expected it receive a reply. So I searched around for some way of moving things on.Eventually I found that the BBC has a Complaints Coordinator, and I sent him the following message:

A month ago I attempted to make a complaint to the BBC concerning
Susan Watts´ report on President Obama´s inaugural speech, broadcast
by Newsnight on 20th January 2009. The extraordinary progress of this
matter through the BBC´s complaint system is reported on my blog
here:

http://ccgi.newbery1.plus.com/blog/?p=157

http://ccgi.newbery1.plus.com/blog/?p=158

Would you please provide me with contact details of someone who can
help resolve this matter without further waste of time and
embarrassment to the BBC. All I want to do is respond to the message
that I received form Mr Graham of BBC Complaints and move on to the
next stage in the complaints procedure.

I would be grateful for your help.

I pressed the send button at 12:55 on Monday 23^rd  February and just eight minutes later, at  13:03, the following reply had reached my mailbox: Read the rest of this entry »

As I said in Part 1 of this post, by the time that Dave of the BBC Trust had confirmed that my complaint had been forwarded to BBC Management I had received an initial response from them. Given that they had received the documentation on 9^th February and they replied on the 11^th February, this was pretty quick. But as I have said previously, their attempt to justify what was broadcast in Susan Watts’ report for Newsnight on 20^th January was totally implausible:Thank you for your email regarding ‘Newsnight’ which was broadcast on 20^th January.

Your correspondence has been forwarded by the Trust Unit to BBC Information for a reply on behalf of the BBC’s Executive as it concerns matters which are the responsibility of the Executive, rather than the Trust, in the first instance. This department, BBC Information, has a wealth of knowledge about BBC programmes and policies and is experienced in the workings of the Corporation and so is authorised to reply on behalf of the BBC’s Executive.

I understand you felt that Susan Watts’ report on Barack Obama’s plans for the environment edited clips of his inauguration address in a way that was misleading.

This was one part of a 50 minute programme exploring the start of the Obama presidency from various angles. ‘Newsnight’ edited sections of the speech to reflect the elements in it that referred to science as a way to give people an impression or montage of what President Obama said about science in his inauguration speech.

This was signposted to audiences with fades between each point. It in no way altered the meaning or misrepresented what the President was saying. the report then went on to explore the challenges facing the President in this area.

I appreciate that you had serious concerns about the editing of the speech and I have registered your complaint on our audience log. This is the internal report of audience feedback which we compile daily for the ‘Newsnight’ production team and all programme makers within the BBC, and also their senior management. It ensures that your points, and all other comments we receive, are circulated and considered across the corporation.

Thank you again for taking the time to contact us.

Regards

Barry Graham
BBC Complaints

Even ignoring the complacent and condescending tone, this seemed a pretty low level response so I resigned myself to moving on to a higher level of management where a more objective view might be found, and decisions taken. So I emailed the following response to Mr Graham:

Read the rest of this entry »

On 22^nd January 2009 I emailed a complaint to the BBC Trust with the following brief covering note which ended:

I would be grateful if you would acknowledge receipt of this document
without delay.

22/01/2009

As I had heard nothing from them a couple of days later, I thought that I had better just check up. Emailing messages with attachments can be a tricky business:

I emailed a complaint on Thursday 22nd Jan 2009 concerning Susan
Watts’ 20th Jan report on President Obama’s inaugural speech for
Newsnight. This was in the form of an MS Word attachment.

I specifically asked for confirmation that this message, and the
complaint attached, had been received. Will you now  please confirm
that it was received.

26/01/2009

That produced the confirmation that I had originally asked for:

I can confirm that we have received your email, and will respond within
10 working days.

26/01/2009

Rather than asking why it had taken two emails to obtain a one-sentence response, I thought that I had better be diplomatic, so I replied:

Many thanks for letting me know.

26/01/2009

It would seem unkind to personalise the problems that followed, so lets call the person who I was dealing with Dave, with the genuine job title Correspondence Adviser, BBC Trust Unit.

On the 30^th January, just eight days after I had sent in my complaint, I received the following email from Dave: Read the rest of this entry »

I have received the following message from BBC Information in response to my complaint about a ‘sound bite’ compiled from president Obama’s inaugural speech. This was used in a Newsnight report by Susan Watts:

Thank you for your email regarding ‘Newsnight’ which was broadcast on 20^th January.

Your correspondence has been forwarded by the Trust Unit to BBC Information for a reply on behalf of the BBC’s Executive as it concerns matters which are the responsibility of the Executive, rather than the Trust, in the first instance. This department, BBC Information, has a wealth of knowledge about BBC programmes and policies and is experienced in the workings of the Corporation and so is authorised to reply on behalf of the BBC’s Executive.

I understand you felt that Susan Watts’ report on Barack Obama’s plans for the environment edited clips of his inauguration address in a way that was misleading.

This was one part of a 50 minute programme exploring the start of the Obama presidency from various angles. ‘Newsnight’ edited sections of the speech to reflect the elements in it that referred to science as a way to give people an impression or montage of what President Obama said about science in his inauguration speech.

This was signposted to audiences with fades between each point. It in no way altered the meaning or misrepresented what the President was saying. the report then went on to explore the challenges facing the President in this area.

I appreciate that you had serious concerns about the editing of the speech and I have registered your complaint on our audience log. This is the internal report of audience feedback which we compile daily for the ‘Newsnight’ production team and all programme makers within the BBC, and also their senior management. It ensures that your points, and all other comments we receive, are circulated and considered across the corporation.

Thank you again for taking the time to contact us.

Regards

The BBC seem to be relying on two assertions: that the ‘montage’ was ‘signposted’ by fades and that their compilation in no way misrepresented what President Obama said in his speech. There is no attempt to substantiate either of these claims.

No fair-minded person listening to the programme could possibly perceive the ‘sound bite’ as anything other than a continuous excerpt from the speech. Read the rest of this entry »

I have received a response to my complaint about Susan Watts’ Newsnight report on President Obama’s inaugural speech. This is what the BBC Trust say:

Thank you for your email of 22 January to the BBC Trust regarding aNewsnight report by Susan Watts. I am responding on the Trust’s behalf; I work in the Trust Unit which provides advice and support to the BBC Trust.

I have noted your comments for the information of the Trust. I should explain however that the role of the BBC Trust as set out in the BBC’s Royal Charter is distinct from that of the BBC’s management and it has no role in day to day editorial matters. The Trust’s role is to set the overall framework, the BBC’s Editorial Guidelines, which set out the values and standards that all BBC output should meet. Responsibility for the BBC’s editorial content within these Editorial Guidelines rests ultimately with the Director-General, as Editor-in-Chief.

There is a BBC complaints process in place to deal with instances where audiences feel that there has been a breach of these Guidelines. This requires that complaints must be dealt with in the first instance by the BBC’s management; the Trust’s role in this process is to consider appeals from complainants should they be dissatisfied with the response that they have received from the BBC’s management. Full details of the\complaints process can be found at  http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/

As the Trust cannot involve itself in your complaint at this stage, I am forwarding your email to BBC Information for an initial response on behalf of BBC management.

I hope this is helpful.

Yours sincerely

It has taken over a week to reach this momentous decision. The complaint that I sent to the BBC Trust can be found here.

In spite of what the BBC Trust say, the agreement that they entered into with the government in July 2006 leaves no doubt that it is they who have final responsibility for accuracy and impartiality in news and current affairs output, not the Director-General.

I hope to receive a proper response to my complaint before too long.

Rhonda Roland Shearer and Danielle Elliot of stinkyjournalism.org have greatly expanded their coverage of what someone has referred to as  ‘splicegate’.

As well as a very well informed and thoughtful exploration of the ethical issues involved in the editing of quotes, they have been in touch with the BBC’s Press Office.  The statement that they received seems to explain everything to the BBC’s entire satisfaction, but I doubt whether many people who have watched the video will be convinced.

This was one part of a 50 min programme exploring the start of the Obama presidency from various angles. We edited sections of the speech to reflect the elements in it that referred to Science as a way to give people an impression or montage of what Obama said about science in his inauguration speech. This was signposted to audiences with fades between each point. It in no way altered the meaning or misrepresented what the President was saying. The piece then went on to explore the challenges facing the president in this area.

They have also heard from Peter Rippon, the editor of Newsnight, and there is much more. Over on the other side of the Atlantic journalistic ethics seem to be taken pretty seriously. The Stinky Journalism team asked four experts on the subject, one of them an ex-BBC employee, to give their opinions on whether Newsnight’s conduct was acceptable. Their responses are interesting, to say the least.

I strongly recommend that anyone who wants to understand the issues that are at stake to have a good look at Rhonda and Danielle’s post.

Bishop Hill has also filed some typically shrewd observations under the title Ethicists criticise BBC .

If the BBC wants to justify the editing of the Obama quote, then they will have to come up with far more convincing explanations than the ones that have appeared so far. The sooner that the BBC Trustees provide an official response to my complaint the better for all concerned, I think.

The BBC press release that announced the appointment of Peter Rippon  last autumn had this to say:

BBC’s Deputy Director of News, Stephen Mitchell, said: “Peter Rippon is an outstanding editor with significant experience and a reputation for innovation with his current stable of programmes from The World At One, PM and Broadcasting House.

“Newsnight is one of our most important programmes and I am convinced that under Peter’s leadership its reputation will be taken to new heights.”

Press release

Newsnight is, in my opinion, an excellent programme, but that does not mean that it is infallible.  The present furore on the internet could easily be abated by a correction and an apology. Trying to defend the indefensible will only prolong the agony and do further harm to the BBC’s reputation.