BBCWatch Broadcasting Standards Commission Complaints Department 7 The Sanctuary London SW1P 3JS Dear Sirs, BBC – Crying Out For Reform The BBC TV programme on June 17 – What The World Thinks Of America – was the last straw, which has finally persuaded me to protest directly to you. This programme, which spawned other travesties by BBC outlets earlier in the day like a Radio 5 Live phone-in, demonstrated all that is wrong with the BBC. It showed chronic leftist bias, egregious incompetence and immaturity, and tried to persuade the nation to believe a notion that plainly is not true – that we all somehow despise America and all who sail in her. The programme was brimming with half-witted “results” from surveys. For instance, it asked “are you antagonistic or friendly towards the U.S.”, as though this might elicit an intelligent response. It quoted a known pea-brain, Tom Cruise, as saying “America scares me”. It didn’t say why. 60% of Brazilians were scared of the U.S. The programme didn’t say why. Other impossible or loaded questions followed. “Is American influence too great?” Compared with what, the viewers knew not. But 58% said it was, and this was paraded as of huge significance. We were asked to believe that 12% of Americans lived below the poverty line. No attempt was made to explain this. Bianca Jagger, clothes-horse and and former wifelet of Mick Jagger, was described as a “human rights campaigner”, and gave her inevitable negative view. Anita Roddick found U.S. power “terribly, terribly, unnerving". Again, no reason given. Another survey asked participants to say if they thought America was more dangerous than a list of organisations and countries including Al Queda and France. The results were read out as though they meant something. Perhaps the investigation you ought to be making is to find out why some people in Britain have a negative view of America. Is it perhaps because of the never-ending half-truths and biased drivel the BBC, and its fellow travellers in the media, pumps out about America and its leaders? As a former Reuter’s editor and reporter of more than 30 years standing, I know something about bias, and the BBC has it spades. The BBC needs to be reformed from top to bottom. It is too big, too dependent on government finance, and hires a steady stream of people who represent only a small segment of our society. I have been monitoring some BBC output for a while – see my BBCWatch section on my website - www.wintonsworld.com . I have also come to realise that many of the features claimed by the BBC to maintain contacts with listeners and viewers are a sham. Radio 5 live never shows the slightest interest in any e-mail I send, because, I suspect, they don’t want a forceful opinion to be expressed that might torpedo some comfortable left-wing view they are currently parading. The same goes for the Radio 4 Today programme. Protests about bias and incompetence are ignored when phoned into BBC representatives. But I digress. “What The World Thinks Of America” was shameful. It might not matter if it was put out by some small organisation and was just another varied voice, but this was the BBC. It had worldwide impact. Many Americans probably thought that it reflected some kind of truth about opinion in Britain. It was a perversion of opinion, and my license fee paid it for. I insist that you force changes on this out-of-control organisation and make it realise what unbiased and balance means. Yours sincerely Neil Winton Top