StephenTall.org

Last night, when switching off BBC1′s Question Time — no, not even Tim Farron’s barn-storming showing could tempt me to endure a whole hour — I tweeted: In a perfect world, someone would watch #bbcqt for me & filter out the tedious/partisan/audience/Warsi & leave me with the viewable bits. — Stephen Tall (@stephentall) April 19, 2012 Cue only-slightly-sarcastic replies that  [ Read More ]

Cast your mind back two weeks, and you may recall the BBC making a hash of selecting its panel for the weekly political discussion show Question Time. In the week when the big political issues were the Iraq war, electoral reform and MPs’ expenses – on all of which the Lib Dems have a distinctive [...]

A couple of years back, I was moved to write to the BBC complaining about Question Time’s pro-Tory bias, regularly featuring Tory-supporting journalists alongside Tory MPs. Well, that’ll learn me to be careful what you wish for. Because what do we have to look forward to on tonight’s QT panel? The following: an official Labour representative [...]

Eric Pickles has, we hear, labelled Paddy Ashdown “frail and confused”. It seems an odd charge for the lifelong political hack and current Tory chairman, Mr Pickles, to level against Paddy – a former Marine, diplomat and spy, who’s placed himself in danger in service of his country more times than Eric’s had hot dinners [...]

So that was the Question Time that was. There is copious assessment of Nick Griffin’s performance, linked to here on LDV. My views are straightforward. First, Nick Griffin came over badly, but that is immaterial: those who are BNP-inclined will likely have seen him as the victim of a liberal, metropolitan, media stitch-up; and those [...]

Ahead of tonight’s BBC1 Question Time – featuring the BNP leader Nick Griffin – The Guardian reports his verdicts on his fellow panellists. Here’s what he said about Chris Huhne, the L:ib Dems’ shadow home secretary: Big hitter. Menzies Campbell would have been more daunting.” And here’s what he said about the other panellists: Bonnie Greer, American [...]

2 Big Stories Labour’s Hain threatens BBC with legal action over BNP invitation Labour’s Welsh secretary Peter Hain makes a bid for the media spotlight today by arguing that the BBC could face legal action over this Thursday’s edition of Question Time, due to feature an appearance by BNP leader Nick Griffin MEP: … in his letter [to [...]

2 Big Stories Government’s Libya policy: confusion reigns The mounting government confusion over its policy towards Libya continues today. First we had the Prime Minister’s refusal to make a comment on the release of convicted Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi; then it emerged that Gordon Brown had let it be known he agreed with the Scottish executive’s decision; over the  [ Read More ]

It’s Thursday, it’s 10.35 pm … it’s BBC1′s Question Time. The incorrigible Lembit Opik is the Lib Dem representative on tonight’s edition – fresh from helping launch today’s ‘Say No to Size Zero’ campaign with model Katie Green. The Lib Dem MP for Montgomeryshire has been the leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats and the party’s spokesman on housing. However,  [ Read More ]

If this week’s weather hasn’t got you all hot ‘n’ bothered, then what better way of remedying that than by watching tonight’s Question Time (BBC1 and online, 10.35 pm)? David Laws, the Lib Dems’ children, schools and families, will be the party’s representative. The QT website gives his impressive pre-Commons bio: “Before his election to Parliament in 1997, he had  [ Read More ]