image source, Reuters
When Tim Davey took over as director-general of the BBC in 2020, he declared that impartiality would be his main policy.
Three years on, that policy and its implementation across the BBC have created a fresh crisis. This has alarmed managers.
The fact that the crisis is bigger than a controversy over a few tweets is evidenced by the fact that the final shows have been dropped from the weekly schedule.
The Gary Linegar controversy is more a test of the BBC’s core values and the current director-general’s core principles than the comments of a highly paid sports presenter.
Linegar’s political tweets and his decision to stand down as a presenter until his dispute with the BBC is resolved have added fuel to the debate over the role of the BBC in British politics.
But first, let’s look at the immediate problem.
It is worth noting that this is not the first time that Linegar has received complaints about his political tweets.
In 2016 and 2018, there was controversy over his comments on school children and Brexit. At the time, the BBC explained that Linegar was an independent journalist and that it was his personal Twitter account and that strict rules for journalists did not apply to a sports presenter.
The guidelines at the time said that the BBC’s policy of impartiality was not at great risk when someone shared an opinion on a field with which he had no connection, as a sports or science presenter would offer his views on politics or the arts.
Since then, the regulations have been tightened.
The new code of ethics on social media insists that hosts who become big personalities should behave with extra responsibility.
Some describe this as Linegar’s rules.
The question is whether those rules are enforced fairly. Twitter is full of evidence that some people think show hosts have gone too far over the past few years. The names of Alan Sugar, Chris Beckham and Andrew Neil are frequently mentioned.
BBC director-general Tim Davey responded by saying he was keeping a close eye and that there might be ways to escape if the guidelines were reviewed.
There are good reasons why he wants to end this crisis.
There is no doubt that impartiality is very important. But serving the license fee paying public is even more important.
Match of the Day was broadcast on BBC One on Saturday night. It was 20 minutes shorter than usual, with no host, no experts, no commentary. Other football-related programs were cancelled.
Cancellation of programs may lead to further complaints from license fee payers. They care more about what their favorite shows are on than what Linegar says on Twitter.
There is a growing tendency on the part of the government to criticize the BBC and its liberal bias.
Greg Dyke, the BBC’s former director-general, says the company appears to have bowed to political pressure from the Tory government with the decision to ax Gary Lineker from Match of the Day. He left the BBC in 2004 after falling out with the then Labor government.
All this leads to another issue about the questions raised about the BBC’s impartiality. BBC chairman Richard Sharpe is a former Conservative Party donor. He is accused of having a role in arranging a loan guarantee of 8 lakh British pounds to former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. But he has denied that he had any role in the loan arrangement.
Linegar has become a thunderbolt for the biggest debate. The BBC wants to find a solution as soon as possible to prevent this, which is now a common problem, from becoming a major crisis.
However, the BBC says Linegar, who has 8.7 million followers on Twitter, wants him to stop tweeting about politics. He, too, showed no sign of agreeing to remain silent. So it is difficult to say how this will be resolved.
As far as the BBC is concerned, it’s about impartiality. But for others, it’s about freedom of speech.
In fact, there is a statue of George Allwell, the former BBC talk show producer who wrote ‘1984’, outside the BBC headquarters in London. On the wall behind the Orwell statue is an inscription: “Freedom means the right to say what people don’t want to hear.”
80 years after Orwell left the BBC, the company realized it was in crisis. Orwell’s thoughts and the questions they raised for the BBC are central to Linegar’s discussion.
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