Latest / The Fourcast / BBC crisis: right-wing coup or bias crackdown?

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BBC crisis: right-wing coup or bias crackdown? · The Fourcast

• 0:00
  It's a pretty bad crisis. The BBC is now headless.
• 0:03
  It's been decapitated. The motive of some of the
• 0:06
  people, not all of the people, some of the people attacking the
• 0:08
  BBC, it has in the last week been completely hysterical.
• 0:12
  So they're they're seizing on this because they basically
• 0:14
  don't think the BBC should exist.
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  Because the BBC, rightly so, holds itself up to those very
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  high editorial standards. It's all the more shocking when
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  some of the issues in this Prescott letter are bought to
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  the 4th. Hello and welcome to the
• 0:32
  forecast. The BBC is in meltdown.
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  Both the director general and the head of news have quit in
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  the same weekend after a leaked memo accused the corporation of
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  systemic political bias. The flashpoint was an edit of
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  Donald Trump's speech ahead of the January 6th riots.
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  And the president is now piled in threatening a billion dollar
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  lawsuit. So what's really going on?
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  Was this a right wing coup against public service
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  broadcasting as some have suggested, or the consequence of
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  genuine bias inside the BBC or a bad mistake, badly handled?
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  And could this crisis now reshape the future of impartial
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  news not just at the BBC but across British public service
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  broadcasting? With me, the political editor of
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  the Sunday Telegraph, Camilla Turner, and the editor of
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  Prospect magazine, Alan Rusbridger.
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  Alan first of all, I mean, how big a crisis for the BBC?
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  What is this? It's a pretty bad crisis.
• 1:24
  The BBC is now headless. It's been decapitated at a time
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  when it is coming into a very crucial period of renegotiating
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  the charter. For some reason BBC charter has
• 1:36
  to be renewed every 10 years. Unlike other royal charters,
• 1:40
  it's got to agree a funding formula for the future and we're
• 1:46
  we're sort of 3 1/2 years off from a general election where a
• 1:49
  populist right could get in. And the the lesson from around
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  the world is populist right wing governments tend to try and
• 1:57
  capture the media and they certainly don't have much time
• 2:02
  for public service broadcasting. But as as more details come out,
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  it does seem as though the BBC has shot itself in the foot
• 2:08
  pretty badly. I mean, this was an obvious
• 2:10
  mistake in the edits that was defended by BBC News executives
• 2:14
  months ago, only now for them to admit it was wrong.
• 2:20
  You you obviously know more than I do it.
• 2:23
  It was a bad mistake. I don't know when it was first
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  pointed out or to what extent it was defended by BBC executives
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  when the Telegraph came out with their story last week.
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  It would have been better to admit that mistake, to correct
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  it and in my view, to put the Panorama program back up.
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  If you watch the rest of the Panorama program, it's
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  absolutely fine, nothing wrong with it at all.
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  But according to Nick Robinson today, the BBC board itself
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  prevented the news executives from apologizing in the way that
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  they would have liked to. So do you think there is
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  something bigger going on about the structural governance and
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  the people in power in the BBC and the pressures outside who
• 3:11
  are trying to bring it down? Well, the BBC, it's a statement
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  of fact to say that it's got many, many enemies.
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  People on ideological or commercial grounds would gladly
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  see it dead, and that includes Rupert Murdoch and his newspaper
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  staple, the governance of the BBC.
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  It sounds very nerdy, but, but you have to get into it.
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  It's got a board of directors, five of whom are appointed by
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  the government, including the chair.
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  When I looked at the the the board most recently, I could
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  only find 3 people who'd only who'd ever had a recent
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  experience of, of practice in journalism.
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  And that makes a little committee, the editorial
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  Standards and Guidelines committee, a very powerful
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  committee. And that to my mind is a
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  complete mess. It's got 5 people on it, three
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  of whom are insiders, two of whom are outsiders.
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  Of the outsiders, until recently only one had any experience of
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  journalism and that was a political appointee, it was Sir
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  Robbie, Sir Sir Robbie Gibb. He he, he doesn't make any
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  pretence of impartiality. He was until fairly recently a
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  Conservative Party spin doctor. And so the BBC has got itself
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  into this extraordinary position, one of the great news
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  organisations in the world of having this tiny little
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  committee in which there was until recently only one
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  independent arbiter, and we're expected to take his word as
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  gospel. As gospel as as to what
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  constitutes impartiality or bias.
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  I mean, Robbie Gibb says that he was impartial when he was ABBC
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  producer, then he went into politics and now his job at the
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  BBC is again to defend impartiality.
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  You're saying that's not really possible?
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  Well, he he would say that. I note that when he tried to
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  stop someone else getting a job in the BBC News department, he
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  wasn't prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt that they,
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  like him, could apparently put his, their their views, leave
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  them at the door. The trouble about these
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  arguments about impartiality is right wing people tend to think
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  the BBC is too left wing. Lots of left wing people think
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  the BBC is too right wing and that extends to Israel, trans
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  issues, etcetera, etcetera. And it's rather fruitless to
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  have a lot of people chipping in saying that in their view the
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  BBC is biased. And I would include Sir Robbie
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  Gibbon that the the the one body that is charged officially with
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  deciding whether the BBC is in battle or not is Ofcom.
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  And if you go back and read their reports, as I have done
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  over the years, I think I'm right in saying I'm not sure
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  I've read the most recent one in every year.
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  They've given the BBCA pretty clean bill of health in terms of
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  impartiality. Camilla, let me bring you in.
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  I mean, isn't the Telegraph jumping a quite quite away,
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  going from an obvious error of editing in that panorama to
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  accusations of institutional bias?
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  Well, I think the revelations we had from the Telegraph starting
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  off last week with that Panorama documentary, the the editing of
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  Trump's speech and then going on on on to the other days of, of
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  last week. We also touched on the issues
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  that the the BBC board had been made aware of to do with BBC
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  Arabic, to do with reporting of trans issues, to do with
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  reporting of the Israel Gaza war.
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  So. I think these are all just
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  opinions. They're not, I mean, they, they
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  happen to be Michael Prescott's opinions of those things.
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  They're not open and shut in the way that the Panorama is.
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  Opinions were very much backed up by fact that he cites in his
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  In his letter he talks about these UMM contributors who had
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  been advised on to BBC Arabic dozens and dozens of times
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  despite UMM expressing very UMM, in some cases outwardly
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  anti-Semitic views, praising October the 7th UMM.
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  These are the sorts of contributors that any media
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  organization might think twice before UMM inviting onto their
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  shows, let alone the BBC which we are told UMM holds up the
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  highest possible standards UMM in its reporting.
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  So I think the reason why we've ended this week with Tim Davey
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  himself resigning, as well as the BB CS head of news, is just
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  because these issues in the leaked letter were quite so
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  serious. Had it just been someone's
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  opinion or something that was kind of arguable either way we
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  probably wouldn't be in the situation we are now, with the
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  BBC in complete crisis and it's top executives resigning over
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  it. Well, I mean, in fact, the BBC
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  chairman has said that there was nothing in the Prescott's letter
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  that was was telling them anything new and that the only,
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  the only issue that they've really capitulated on is the
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  editing of that one clip in Panorama.
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  All those other things were issues that the BBC was looking
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  into. And they disagree or, you know,
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  or agree with the the broad criticism to differing levels.
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  I mean, what I'm saying is we've gone from a mistake to a a vast
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  accusation against a whole organization employing more than
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  20,000 people, towering them with this, with this claim of
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  institutional bias. What?
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  What do you mean by that? Well, I think the institutional
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  bias is something for the BBC to look at itself really.
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  But what is it I think? Well, if you can, if you look at
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  the certain areas that the press got letter touched on, there was
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  the Trump documentary and then reporting around Trump, there
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  was the Israel Gaza war, there was BBC Arabic, there was
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  reporting around trans issues. These are quite a few different
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  controversial areas, of course, for any media organization to be
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  reporting on. But for the BBC to get things
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  right and to report without fear or favour, to report without
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  bias, to report in a way that doesn't seem like they've been
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  captured by anyone side or other.
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  It's just of the utmost importance.
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  And I think it's because the BBC, rightly so, holds itself up
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  to those very high editorial standards.
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  It's it's all the more shocking when some of the issues in this
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  Prescott letter are brought to the fore.
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  And I think also the fact that this letter had gone to the BBC
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  Trust many months ago and the reason for its leak was because
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  it was felt that none of these issues had been properly
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  addressed. There was nothing had been done
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  about the documentary and none of these issues, umm had had
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  been addressed in a way that those who were upset about them
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  felt were satisfactory. And I think the reason why we've
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  ended this week with Trump threatening to sue the BBC with
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  Tim Davies resignation is not only the BBC's handling of these
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  these issues, but because these issues go to the very core of of
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  what the BBC should be doing. And I think it's it's right that
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  they are looked at properly and that the BBC looks itself at
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  whether there are broader institutional problems that need
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  to be addressed here. Alan, how do you get to a point
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  of impartiality in a world where, you know, people in
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  Camilla's organization accuse the BBC of anti right wing bias
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  and anti Israel bias and anti Trump bias and people on the
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  left, as you say, accuse the BBC of being too pro Israel, too pro
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  conservative, of giving Nigel Farage too much airtime.
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  I mean, is there such a thing now as impartiality that
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  everyone would recognize? Yeah, that's a really good
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  question. And I don't know what the answer
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  is. I, I don't know what body you
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  could have that would satisfy everybody that the BBC is always
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  going to be straight down the middle on everything.
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  I mean, on Israel, Gaza, there was a report about two or three
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  months ago from a perfectly respectable monitoring group
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  that claimed the BBC was biased towards Israel.
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  That didn't get much airtime because it goes against the
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  conventional narrative of the BBC.
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  So again, it slightly depends where you're starting with.
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  I just think the BBC's governance arrangements, if
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  you've got a Board of Governors who are mainly business leaders,
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  hedge fund managers, private equity people and so forth.
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  And somebody has got to reach decisions about whether the BBC
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  is, is meeting its own standards.
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  The the current arrangements aren't, aren't very good for
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  that. I think in, in, in days past
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  there was a board full of people imbued in BBC values who could
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  take reasoned decisions on that. And I, I go back to the, the,
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  the problem that if you've got a, a tiny committee with a
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  government appointee on it who is clearly making a lot of the
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  running in all this, then that that seems to be a sub optimal
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  way of deciding anything to do with these, these highly
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  contentious issues. So you think we need to go into
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  a whole new review of how the BBC is governed?
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  I, I think that should be on the list of things that that that
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  should be sorted out. I mean, I, I think it's common
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  ground between, you know, all, all, all sides, both the
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  attackers and the, and the defenders of the BBC that things
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  aren't working very well at the moment.
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  And that would be my, my 2 penny worth that anybody coming to do
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  that job. Brackets.
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  Who on earth is this person that is, I think it has to be a
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  journalist. I think Tim Davy was at a
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  disadvantage because he, he didn't have a journalistic
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  background. But who is this tough, impartial
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  journalist with a real spine who can also simultaneously run a £6
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  billion corporation and who's going to have their back?
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  And if you've if, if, when they turn around and look at the
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  board and the board is arguing about whether they're, they're
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  free to issue the kind of defence they want to issue, then
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  it's a very unsatisfactory position all round.
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  Camilla I mean, it's obviously in the Telegraph's commercial
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  interest that the BBC be diminished and other commercial
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  news websites like like yours because you will, you will
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  benefit. Is, is that part of the story
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  here? I mean, is, you know, how, how
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  upfront is the Telegraph about what it really wants for the
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  BBC? I'm not sure that's interesting
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  point. I'm not sure how much that plays
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  into things because what people come to the BBC for is of course
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  it's news. But and I think the BBC can't
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  really do like opinion and, you know, kind of op eds and
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  commentary, which is does kind of occupy a slightly different
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  space. Obviously the BBC is a
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  broadcaster, the Telegraph is a newspaper.
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  So I'm not sure how much our audiences are directly in
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  conflict. We do both provide the news that
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  is correct. But I think this story isn't
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  really about one media organization trying to criticise
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  another. It's, it's much bigger than
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  that. The BBC is our our public
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  service broadcaster here in the UK.
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  It's taxpayer funded, everyone who pays their licence fee, it
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  goes to the BBCI think what this Prescott letter has showed us is
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  that there are certain instances and certain areas where there
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  are serious concerns that have been brought to the BB CS Board
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  and felt by some to have not been properly addressed and
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  therefore put out into the public domain.
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  I don't think this is a kind of intermedia discussion here.
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  It's it's about what license fee payers should expect from the
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  BBC and what the public should expect from the BBC and I think
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  if it's falling short of that, there are questions to be
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  answered. But do you accept that everybody
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  needs to feel that the BBC is fair, not just Telegraph
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  readers, so Guardian readers and trans activists and Green voters
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  and, you know, every and reform voters and everybody needs to
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  have some level of trust in that broadcaster.
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  And that's a pretty tall order right now.
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  Absolutely. And there are there's criticism
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  of the BBC from from all quarters, from the right, from
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  the left. I listened to Sonia Soda earlier
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  this week or on the weekend, you know, a prominent journalist
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  from the left talking about her issues with the BBC's coverage
• 15:50
  of of trans reporting. These are complex issues that
• 15:53
  are difficult to get right. But that doesn't mean that the
• 15:56
  BBC shouldn't be held up to those very high standards that
• 15:59
  the public and the licence fee payers should expect.
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  And yes, of course there are difference of opinions on on how
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  to go about reporting these things from across the political
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  spectrum, but I think that's not really an excuse to to not get
• 16:13
  it right. Right, but how much of A tragedy
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  do you think it would be if the BBC was fatally damaged?
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  I think the BBC is a hugely important organization.
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  It's part of our kind of national public life.
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  It's it's, it's got a deep history.
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  It, it does really important work.
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  I'm a, I'm a huge fan. I listen to Radio 4 all the
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  time. I watch a lot of its programmes.
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  I think it's has has a really important part to play in public
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  life. But I think it does need to get
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  things right. And when serious concerns are
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  raised about its coverage, there aren't just a one off.
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  These are concerns that have been going on for quite some
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  time and aired in different areas.
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  This Prescott letter I think brings them to the fore in quite
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  a a shocking way. And I think that's why it's had
• 16:56
  the impact that it has with Tim Davies resignation, with Trump
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  threatening to sue the BBC. It's having a big ripple effect
• 17:05
  now. But that's because these aren't
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  just issues that are in isolation.
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  This isn't the first time we've heard of them.
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  These are ongoing concerns people have around the BB CS
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  coverage in certain areas and I think it's in the BB CS interest
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  to to get it right. People do respect the BBC and
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  listen to them and think of them as a kind of beacon of high
• 17:28
  quality journalism. And so it's all the more
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  important that when they are criticised, they they address it
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  head on and and try to do their best to to look at where they
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  can do things differently. Alan what One of the BB CS
• 17:40
  biggest and consistent problems is the way it handles problems
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  and complaints in that it it is always very slow.
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  It tends to kick things into the long grass and have reviews and
• 17:50
  hope that things will go away. I think somebody called it sort
• 17:54
  of playing dead when there when there's a when there's a
• 17:58
  problem. I mean, is that, is that what
• 18:01
  one of the reasons they got into this mess?
• 18:04
  Well, it clearly hasn't been brilliant at the last week.
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  I agree with that. And I think that's a little
• 18:09
  unfair. The BBC knows that it's under a
• 18:14
  huge scrutiny all the time and we can all think of many times
• 18:21
  where the BBC has been placed under the spotlight, sometimes a
• 18:25
  judicial or quasi judicial spotlight.
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  And the BBCI think is far more transparent in its operations
• 18:33
  than than many of its critics are.
• 18:38
  So but it clearly hasn't handled this one well.
• 18:42
  I mean, I think the problem with some of the criticism, clearly
• 18:47
  there were some concrete things that Michael Prescott raised.
• 18:51
  Samir Shah says that some of those have already been
• 18:54
  addressed so that they're, they're slightly historic.
• 18:57
  But you can tell the motive of some of the people, not all of
• 19:02
  the people, some of the people attacking the BBC has in the
• 19:06
  last week been completely hysterical.
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  So they're they're seizing on this because they basically
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  don't think the BBC should exist.
• 19:14
  Yeah. And some of the criticism and
• 19:16
  and commentary is, is just nakedly been people
• 19:22
  opportunistically trying to attack an organization that if
• 19:25
  we did have a sense of proportion, we would have to
• 19:28
  acknowledge, acknowledge is easily the the most trusted by
• 19:32
  by by huge margin the most trusted certainly against
• 19:35
  newspapers, news news provider in this country.
• 19:39
  A big piece in Columbia Journalism Review that came out
• 19:42
  only about a week ago saying that it's now the second most
• 19:45
  trusted news organization in the US behind The Weather Channel,
• 19:49
  believe it or not. So nobody should be citing
• 19:53
  Donald Trump and his attack on the BBC as evidence that
• 19:56
  anything is wrong with the BBC. Of course, Donald Trump,
• 19:59
  whenever he sees a credible news organization, he tries to
• 20:02
  discredit it, sue it, and pursue it.
• 20:07
  And and generally rubbish it. So Donald Trump taking trying to
• 20:13
  take revenge against the BBC, however justified in terms of
• 20:18
  the mistake, should count for nothing.
• 20:20
  As should his press secretary telling Brits that they should
• 20:23
  be watching GB News rather than the BBC.
• 20:25
  This stuff is laughable. Right.
• 20:27
  But I mean, the, the, the Trump threat does change things,
• 20:30
  doesn't it? In that, I mean, first of all,
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  if the BBC is pushed into settling the way a lot of
• 20:36
  American channels have with Donald Trump, this is license
• 20:40
  fee payers money. And it could be 10s of millions
• 20:44
  of of pounds. But also the in order to settle
• 20:48
  the admissions that the Trump team seem to be demanding in
• 20:52
  their initial letter to the BBC go way beyond what the BBC could
• 20:57
  possibly admit because the Trump team were alleging this is this
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  is sort of deliberate defamation, deliberate
• 21:05
  misrepresentation, when the BB CS position is it was a mistake.
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  Well, they, they shouldn't settle.
• 21:13
  We've, we've seen Trump suing the New York Times, one of the
• 21:17
  greatest news organisers, news organisations, the world.
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  He's suing the Wall Street Journal for a billion dollars.
• 21:22
  He's sued ABC, he's sued CBS, he's, he's even suing the
• 21:26
  Pulitzer Prize committee for giving a Pulitzer Prize to
• 21:29
  someone he doesn't like. I mean, this is vexatious
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  nonsense and the BBC should stand firm.
• 21:36
  There's, there's a, there's a doctrine in, in America called
• 21:39
  New York Times versus Sullivan, which holds that if you're,
• 21:43
  you're criticizing or writing about a public figure, unless
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  you can show actual malice, there's the words actual malice,
• 21:51
  then you have a complete defence.
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  And even this Supreme Court has not overturned that.
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  So I very much hope the BBC will say this was an honest error.
• 22:03
  There's no evidence of actual malice.
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  And they could be. They could take the lead in
• 22:09
  showing some spine and taking on this Donald Trump assault on the
• 22:13
  press, which none of us, from The Telegraph to the Guardian to
• 22:16
  whoever to Channel 4 News, should welcome.
• 22:20
  Camila, what do you think about that?
• 22:23
  Well, I think the yeah, obviously it's a, it is a
• 22:26
  difficult position to put the BBC into it.
• 22:28
  And as Alan Rusberger just said, Donald Trump does have form of
• 22:33
  suing or threatening to sue media organisations in the past
• 22:36
  when they've sort of rubbed him up the wrong way for whatever
• 22:40
  reason. I mean, I think if we just go
• 22:42
  back to journalistic basics here on that Panorama documentary in
• 22:46
  particular, clearly editing or splicing someone's remarks such
• 22:51
  that the meaning is materially different from what they meant
• 22:55
  to say. Had the full quotation been
• 22:57
  included. That is, you know that there is
• 23:01
  a case to answer for, for that kind of editing and that kind of
• 23:04
  selective quoting. And I think on on that point
• 23:09
  particularly, it's, it's a difficult defence from the BBC.
• 23:13
  They they might say, yes, this was a mistake, but then why
• 23:15
  didn't they correct it when press got first through it to
• 23:18
  that to the attention of the board?
• 23:20
  So there is. The question is sort of what
• 23:21
  happens in law, isn't it? I mean, you know, if you know
• 23:25
  it. Of course, Trump isn't
• 23:27
  attempting to sue in Britain, he's attempting to sue in
• 23:30
  America. And, and, and the sort of the
• 23:32
  pattern when he's suing American channels is that the threat of
• 23:36
  tying them up in legal knots and wasting millions of dollars in
• 23:40
  legal fees and the threat of disclosure of documents means
• 23:44
  that they end up settling. The BBC could be pushed into
• 23:46
  that here as well. I mean you, you don't want to
• 23:48
  see license payers money surely going to Donald Trump and his
• 23:52
  lawyers. But this is the glory of the BBC
• 23:55
  and you're making the case for the BBC here because the reason
• 23:58
  that these organisations have tended to settle with Trump is
• 24:03
  because the owners need favours from Trump.
• 24:06
  It's usually because they are trying to take over another
• 24:09
  media corporation, although they want a favour on on in terms of
• 24:13
  mergers and acquisitions. The BBC has no dog in any of
• 24:18
  those races. It it's owned by a, by a public
• 24:22
  institution, it has no reason to settle.
• 24:25
  And as, as I've tried to explain, the New York Times
• 24:30
  versus Sullivan doctrine is exactly meant for this
• 24:33
  situation. I mean, what turned on this
• 24:37
  editing? Clearly the editing was a
• 24:39
  mistake, but I don't think surely no one is making the case
• 24:44
  that Donald Trump wasn't inciting the crowd on that
• 24:49
  January the 6th because then we're rewriting the whole of
• 24:52
  history. The congressional hearing that
• 24:55
  looked into that decided that he was.
• 24:57
  The Senate decided with 7 Republicans voting with the
• 25:01
  Democrats that they that he was. The only court that has come to
• 25:05
  a ruling on it decided that he was.
• 25:08
  So yes, it was a bad and stupid error and has opened up the BBC
• 25:12
  to attack but it it but I think Donald Trump would have a a job
• 25:17
  persuading people that he was completely innocent in what he
• 25:21
  did on January the 6th. Yes, I mean Kim, the
• 25:23
  Congressional committee after I don't think it used, I don't
• 25:26
  think it concluded on the word insight, but it did say, you
• 25:29
  know, aiding or betting what what happened and it was a
• 25:33
  pretty conclusive result. Yes, that's right.
• 25:38
  And I think it just comes back to that issue of, you know, you
• 25:40
  write an article and then your top line gets kind of ramped up
• 25:43
  by the editor to a point that it doesn't really make sense
• 25:46
  anymore. And you say, we don't need to,
• 25:49
  you know, make this more extreme than it's already is.
• 25:51
  It's, it's already shocking. You know, you don't need to make
• 25:54
  an edit to to make it kind of worse than it is.
• 25:58
  If you look at the the basic error made in that Panorama
• 26:02
  documentary, it was just a bad edit.
• 26:04
  And it's quite hard to to argue anything else.
• 26:08
  Camille What? What do you want for the future
• 26:10
  of the BBC? I think what what I want and
• 26:14
  what any kind of licence fee payer taxpayer would want is
• 26:18
  ABBC that is able to uphold the good that the best possible
• 26:23
  editorial standards to to report on what are difficult issues.
• 26:28
  But without being biased in in one way or another.
• 26:31
  And to have a news operation that functions in a way that
• 26:37
  where where kind of clear standards are set for
• 26:40
  journalists to follow. So that the public and the
• 26:44
  viewers are are watching or reading or listening to the BB
• 26:47
  CS output in a way that they can rightly feel confident that
• 26:50
  they're getting the best possible information in a just
• 26:54
  kind of straight, straight down the road sort of way.
• 26:57
  With no kind of interest group or, or no worry that it's been
• 27:02
  captured by one side or another. Just that it's good impartial
• 27:08
  reporting, which is I think what everyone would expect to see.
• 27:12
  Yeah, and, and do you acknowledge Alan's earlier point
• 27:14
  that the BBC is the most trusted broadcaster?
• 27:18
  Yeah. I mean, if that's if that's what
• 27:20
  the sort of surveys and and what the news are saying, then yeah,
• 27:24
  there. There are two notable surveys
• 27:26
  that go on most years done by Ofcom and the Reuters Institute,
• 27:31
  and they generally put the BBC out there at the top and Channel
• 27:37
  4 is usually very closely behind.
• 27:39
  And we argue over whether we we are most trusted or they are
• 27:43
  most trusted because they have slightly more people who
• 27:45
  distrust them and we have fewer. But but I think that's what the
• 27:50
  numbers say. I think it's great that the UK
• 27:52
  has this incredible tradition of, of public service
• 27:56
  broadcasting that not just in the UK, but I think around the
• 27:59
  world, people look to the UK as having good sources of, of
• 28:03
  information that can be trusted. If you compare us to other
• 28:06
  countries around the world where there's much more state
• 28:08
  interference of, of media, you know, we're incredibly lucky to
• 28:12
  live in a country where we have, um, really strong traditions of
• 28:17
  both broadcasting and print journalism that can really
• 28:20
  report properly and hold the government to account.
• 28:22
  But I think given the BB CS particular set up that it's
• 28:28
  anyone who wants to watch television has to pay the BBC
• 28:31
  licence fee. I think when there are questions
• 28:34
  over its impartiality, I think it needs to look at these very
• 28:37
  carefully, not just kind of hide under the table, pretend it's
• 28:40
  not happening, ignore concerns. They need to address these head
• 28:43
  on because it's great that it's so trusted and it needs to
• 28:46
  continually, every day earn that trust and make sure it's doing
• 28:50
  the best job it possibly can. We'll leave it there.
• 28:53
  Thank you very much indeed. Camilla Turner, Alan Rusbridger,
• 28:56
  thank you both very much for joining us on THE FORECAST.
• 28:59
  Well, that's it for today. The story is going to rumble on
• 29:02
  over the next few days and we'll see what else comes out.
• 29:05
  But for now, bye bye.