One never expects much from BBC local news programmes, indeed they are best avoided, but Emily Witless, sorry Maitlis, provided an exemplary show of even handedness when interviewing a representative of the Muslim Safety Forum on Tuesday's programme. The Forum's representative was interrupted and hectored as he tried to explain some of the problems involved in persuading young Muslims to trust the police and join its ranks.
The Paxman-Essler technique is clearly becoming a standard part of the BBC's presenter toolkit and one can only assume that it is now mandatory within Beeb training programmes. Giving interviewees a tough ride and probing their arguments is one thing, talking them down and deriding their positions - an approach which suggests that the interviewer occupies a position that has a legitimacy the interviewee lacks - is quite another. Maitlis' interview subject was unable to advance his views, moderate though they were, without Maitlis continually interrupting.
BBC London has always been the home of poor interview technique, its reporters frequently substituting ill-informed posturing for objective reporting. There is a tendency in local reporting to frequently overegg matters in an attempt to create a story where there is none. Although there are exceptions many BBC London reporters default to this mode.
Terrorism, the state killing of innocent members of the public, and the concerns of our communities should be dealt with by a public broadcaster in a balanced fashion and with as much objectivity as is possible. That's not what is going on at BBC London.
2 comments:
Emily Witless is dreadful, a brazenly right wing snob who makes no effort to hide her tedious Sloaney prejudices. Did you see her attempting to interview Galloway the morning after the election? It was appalling, worse than Paxman's hatchet job. Glad to see I'm not the only one who can't stand the sight of her.
Glad I didn't see the Galloway interview. I might have had to break my television set. The trouble with regional programming is two-fold. Because they use it as a training ground you often get the most useless interviewing. For some reason, although they do have a few good radio hosts on non-political stuff - people like Charlie Gillet and Robert Elms - the news reporting is real toy town stuff. Then there's the problem that they are the self=appointed voices of 'ordinary Londoners'. For that read right wing, pig ignorant Londoners. It gives idiots like Maitlis and the even more noxious John Gaunt (fortunately now heading back for the midlands) carte blanche to parade their idiot views as common currency.
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