Cock-up or conspiracy?

A few weeks ago, it emerged that the flagship BBC news and current affairs show 'Newsnight' had declined to run a story alleging that one of the Beeb’s leading stars had been a long-term predatory paedophile; the reason given for pulling the transmission was that there was a lack of evidence. Considering the number of Jimmy Saville stories that are now in the public domain, that seems like quite a remarkable claim.
Then, last Friday, having endured a great deal of criticism in the wake of that decision, someone at the BBC thought that it would be a good idea to run a Newsnight programme alleging that another privileged and powerful man had, over several years, sexually abused a number of vulnerable children. Standards for journalistic rigour had evidently slipped a little after the Saville cancellation, because it was decided that this latest edition could run without the bothersome requirement to accumulate anything resembling a body of evidence.

These grim developments made the resignation of Director General George Entwhistle inevitable; anyone who heard his interview on Saturday morning would have realised that he was already a dead man walking.
But how could so many things have gone wrong in the first place? How could so many reporting guidelines have been ignored? There are very clear rules on what should happen when serious allegations are going to be made against any individual. Given that the Lord McAlpine story was all over the internet at least ten hours before Newsnight went on air on Friday 2nd November, it is truly mind-boggling to discover that a 'right of reply' call wasn't made to the man at the centre of the allegations.

In their haste to run with the story, Newsnight forgot the basic requirement to check the facts. Steve Messham, the man who made the accusations, was not even shown a picture of McAlpine and asked the simple question: “Do you think this is the man who abused you?” Now that he has seen a picture, Mr Messham has stated that McAlpine was definitely not the alleged abuser.

Most commentators have put this mess down to monumental incompetence, but is there just a possibility that there is something more significant at play? The BBC is under fire; it has long-term political opponents who claim that it is ripe for radical reform. It is currently confronted with allegations that it allowed a senior employee -despite persistent rumours and allegations- to not only get away with various sexual offences, but granted him a flagship light entertainment show that allowed guaranteed, continuous access to children.

As the revelations and the resultant media attacks accumulate, anyone inclined to conspiracy theories might suggest that somehow floating the idea that “everyone was at it back then” could be seen as a legitimate part of any defence strategy. Dragging major government figures into the mire might help paint a picture of a pre-PC ‘anything-goes’ culture in which pop stars, politicians and actors could, so long as they were relatively discreet, pursue their somewhat unusual tastes. In the context of such a permissive culture, the BBC's indulgence of Saville and his chums might appear to be just that little bit less heinous.
In mounting this counter-offensive, it would also be in the BBC’s interests to impugn its putative opponents, thereby damaging the credibility of their arguments. Perhaps it is not entirely insignificant that the man at the centre of the unsubstantiated Newsnight allegations, Lord McAlpine, was a senior Tory from the Thatcher era.

So -by default or by design- the debate over the future of the BBC may have taken an unexpected twist. The Director General has gone and it is likely that one or two journalistic heads will also roll, but some might consider that a small price to pay if the institution itself manages to survive the coming storm.
All you have to do is spend a few minutes online and check out any number of discussion boards to realise that, for a significant number of folk, the idea that Margaret Thatcher's cabinet was probably riddled with child molesters is germinating quite nicely. For a beleaguered BBC, faced with implacable opponents threatening root and branch reform of its entire operation, that might turn out to be rather a useful card to play.

But sadly, for whatever else it has achieved, this wretched affair has done nothing to help the cause of any victims of abuse.

A 'fix-it' of Savilles

I was at Headingley over the weekend, for days three and four of the test match between England and South Africa. It was a treat to witness Kevin Pietersen’s remarkable innings of 149; his effort put England in a position to at least consider the possibility of a positive result, something that didn’t seem possible after South Africa’s first innings.

The ground was full on Saturday, with the so-called ‘Barmy Army’ in particularly boisterous mode. There are those within the game who lament the rise of this loose affiliation of supporters, believing that -for all of their undoubted enthusiasm- their beer-fuelled antics are downmarket, often disruptive and, frankly, more suited to a sport like football. A large number of Army members sported fancy dress. In between overs, I spotted a phalanx of Wally’s, an assortment of super heroes, a handful of mutant ninja turtles and a troop of Mounties. Also on display were various members of the clergy, some Mexican bandits and others in general drag, complete with over-sized, gravity-defying comedy breasts. One group came dressed as the cast of the old TV show ‘Rainbow’ and it was amusing (at least it was the first time) to hear Bungle and Zippy being implored to behave in ways which would certainly have been deemed inappropriate on pre-watershed television.

Towards the end of the day, several folk in the raucous West Stand got a bit animated; I’m no expert, but it just might have been something to do with the amount of beer they had consumed. They got into a bit of a fracas with some stewards, who then tried to persuade them that it would be in their best interests to leave the stadium. Words were exchanged, there was some pushing and jostling and it all threatened to get a bit spicy. As this was developing, it was interesting to note the reaction among some folk in the crowd: they got their mobile phones out and recorded the incident, presumably in the hope that it might develop into something that would be worth uploading to YouTube later on. If it had really kicked off, no doubt the protagonists would be internet sensations by now.

In the fancy dress stakes, the top prize went to some fifteen merry souls dressed as identical Jimmy Savilles, sporting red track suits, peroxide wigs, copious amounts of bling and the trademark big cigar. Now then (guys and gals), I wondered what the collective noun would be for a group of Jimmy Saville look-a-likes? A ‘gaggle’ of Savilles perhaps? Or maybe a ‘track suit’ of Savilles? I’m tempted to go for a ‘bling’ of Savilles, but I’m not sure that that word was in use when Mr Saville was at the height of his fame. I think that a ‘fix-it’ of Savilles is appropriate, in acknowledgment of his long-running Saturday night show on BBC 1. ‘Jim’ll Fix it’, for those too young to recall, was a show designed to make dreams come true for young viewers who would write in with specific requests. Those dreams might have involved meeting a pop star, or appearing on a TV show with a favourite actor. One girl might have asked to get tennis lessons from a Wimbledon champion, while another boy would write: “Dear Jim, could you fix it for me to go skydiving?” There was one group which, memorably, wanted to eat a meal while riding the rollercoaster on Blackpool’s Pleasure Beach. Jim, of course, fixed it for all of them. On Saturday, the Headingley fix-it of Savilles was raising money for charity, in the same week that the late DJ's personal possessions had been auctioned off to help support some of his favourite causes.

It occurred to me that some of the activities we take for granted in 2012 would once have merited a letter to Jimmy Saville. Three or four decades ago, advanced technology belonged in a sacred domain, a magical, arcane world serviced by elite professionals deploying extraordinarily expensive machines and gadgets. Now, if you want to make your own pop record, film and edit your own video, or speak to your cousin in Australia, you can do it all from the comfort of your own bedroom.

We have everyday access to technologies which once belonged in the realms of fantasy, but -far from manufacturing dreams- we’re more likely to capture images of drunk folk misbehaving and then share those images with the world, allowing those drunk folk to enjoy a minor, anonymous, ephemeral notoriety. Jim could have fixed that back in the seventies, although I’m not really sure he would have wanted to.