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Originally Posted by 1andrew1
I agree with most of what you're saying but I thought this part of the article was interesting in terms of political balance.
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The rules are what they are. Ofcom is simply trying to be as light-touch as it can so it avoids accusations of censorship. GBN correctly deduced that as long as its output is balanced overall, it is less likely to get in trouble if the opinions expressed in any one programme are occasionally a little on the edge. As I said earlier, it’s perfectly standard for a TV news programme to get an interview with a senior front bench politician without also interviewing their opposite number on the same show. That would be impractical most of the time. Ofcom knows this and as long as the channel maintains overall balance they’re happy.
However its senior executives lack skill and experience (of the kind the BBC and ITN have in spades) and in time have somehow come to think they can get away with just about anything. But they can’t. And now, having awakened the Ofcom kraken, they might discover that giving occasional airtime to a few lefty gobshytes will no longer give them a free pass to let the likes of Mark Steyn say whatever they like.