The Mail, the BBC and Thatcher 'bias'

As sure as night follows day, so the death of Margaret Thatcher was always going to be followed by the Daily Mail complaining about 'anti-Thatcher bias' in the BBC's coverage.

On 9 April, this was published on MailOnline:

Note the use of 'public anger' to describe a reaction they support. When the Mail and Richard Littlejohn were criticised recently over their coverage of Lucy Meadows, which led to a protest outside the Mail's offices, the paper described it not as 'public anger' but an 'orchestrated Twitterstorm'.

The Mail's journalists had searched Twitter and comments left on their own website to find people criticising the BBC for being anti-Thatcher. There is nothing wrong with that per se, but the problem is that it only tells half the story - the half the Mail wants its readers to believe. It was equally easy to find tweets and comments criticising the BBC for being too pro-Thatcher in its coverage but these were completely ignored by the Mail. The Media Blog listed a handful of examples (there were many, many more), where tweeters accused the BBC of broadcasting 'pro-Thatcher toadying', 'pro-Thatcher propaganda' and a 'pro-Thatcher diatribe'. Another said: 'Shame on you BBC...Your pro-Thatcher bias is quite disgusting.'

But readers of the Mail's article only got this:

The BBC was accused of 'disgraceful' bias yesterday over its coverage of Baroness Thatcher's death.

Angry viewers complained its news bulletins gave too great an emphasis to her critics and to controversies such as the poll tax and the miners' strike.

Twitter users accused the BBC of 'shameless' bias against the former Prime Minister. The broadcaster also faced criticism because newsreaders did not wear black ties following the announcement of her death.

The one-sidedness of the Mail's coverage was emphasised when the Guardian revealed the number of complaints the BBC had received about its coverage:

the BBC said on Wednesday it had received 268 complaints that its coverage was biased in favour of Thatcher, and 227 who said it was biased against her.

A further 271 people complained that the BBC had devoted too much airtime to the former Tory leader's death.

Arguably, the fact the BBC received similar numbers of complaints from both sides suggests its coverage might have actually got it about right.

But it is clear that more people had complained to the BBC about a 'pro-Thatcher' bias in their coverage than had complained about an 'anti-Thatcher bias'. Would Mail readers have got that impression? Not at all.

And this is not an accident. In another article today about 'anti-Thatcher bias' at the BBC (which refers to 'readers' fury' but three of the four quotes it uses come from comments on the Guido Fawkes blog) the Mail's Alasdair Glennie says:

So far, the corporation has received 766 complaints over its coverage of Lady Thatcher’s death.

But that's it - he provides no breakdown of the figures. This is deliberately partial and dishonest - to give the actual breakdown would suggest there was more 'public anger' (to use the Mail's term) about a pro-Thatcher bias in the BBC's coverage. As that does not fit the pre-determined narrative of the Mail, it's quietly ignored.

So where's the real bias here?

The Mail also got upset about BBC news presenters not wearing black ties. To illustrate their article, they used of photo of Huw Edwards wearing a bright pink tie - and also a poppy - above a caption which said: 'Huw Edwards was among those who did not wear a black tie while reporting the news for the BBC'. As James Cridland pointed out, Edwards was actually wearing a dark blue tie when reporting on Thatcher's death. As the Media Blog uncovered, the photo of him wearing the pink tie and poppy (the poppy being a bit of a clue that it wasn't a photo from this week) was actually a photo from the Mail archives...and from November 2006. The photo has since been removed, but it's worth considering why they used it in the first place.

(Cridland had a tweet of his quoted by the Mail as one of the 'critical' members of the public - Cridland said in response: 'I wasn’t outraged, just interested'.)

It's also worth noting that the Allen and Glennie article states:

other users noted that BBC presenter Mark Mardell was wearing a black tie, whereas Sky's Adam Boulton was not.

So where are the Mail articles about Sky's (in the Mail's words) lack of 'sufficient respect'?

The Mail was also up in arms that the BBC dared give airtime to speakers who were not willing to sing Thatcher's praises, and were outraged that these guests were allowed to say what they believed:

One of Thatcher's arch critics – former Labour MP Tony Benn – was one of the first invited to speak on BBC 5 Live and BBC World Service and was given free rein to criticise Lady Thatcher.

It is, of course, entirely legitimate that all views were allowed to be heard and it seems curious that the Mail seems to suggest otherwise.

Mail columnist Stephen Glover wrote that although the BBC coverage 'pleasantly surprised' him at first, as the day went on, 'the case for the prosecution was subtly gathering force'. Given he wrote a column in 2007 about the BBC 'hating' Thatcher, this conclusion may not have been a complete surprise to his readers:

Again and again we were shown the same footage of 1990 poll tax riots, and familiar pictures of police grappling with miners during the 1984-85 miners’ strike. The clear message was: This is how it was under Thatcherism. Words such as ‘divisive’, ‘polarised’ and ‘out of touch’ began to be bandied about freely by BBC journalists describing the events of the 1980s.

It seems odd to suggest that Thatcher's time in office could be fairly and honestly reported without giving significant time to the miners' strike or the poll tax riots. Glover seems to have missed that such footage also appeared on Sky News. A comment on the Media Blog from Matt said:

When the news broke, I was in the unusual position of being able to watch BBC News and Sky News simultaneously (I was in the gym). Sky ran non-stop footage of the police beating up miners and poll tax protesters, while the Beeb ran interviews with politicians and sombre-looking newscasters talking to camera.

Glover also criticises BBC journalists for 'freely bandying about' words such as 'divisive', but later in his column he writes:

I don’t deny she was a ‘divisive’ figure

And:

You may say Margaret Thatcher was unusual in being so divisive, and so is bound to be dealt with in an unusual way.

And who was it who argued:

Her divisiveness was a mark of her boldness for which we should all be grateful.

Not a BBC journalist, not Glover, but Andrew Alexander - one of Glover's fellow Mail columnists.

So, it seems, Mail journalists are allowed to say Thatcher was 'divisive' - and indeed praise her for it - but BBC ones aren't.

It is not surprising that the Mail wishes to celebrate Thatcher's life and achievements. But to report 'public anger' with the BBC over anti-Thatcher bias without reporting on the pro-Thatcher bias complaints? To accuse the BBC of bias for not getting out black ties, when many journalists from other outlets did not either? To accuse the BBC of bias for covering the miners' strike and poll tax riots, and for giving airtime to Thatcher's political opponents, when other news outlets have done the same?

Where's the real bias here?

The Sun vs Gordon Brown (cont.)

This apology to Gordon Brown appeared in today's Sun:

In Trevor Kavanagh’s column of 12 November, it was stated that Gordon Brown accused The Sun of blagging his son’s medical records. In fact, Mr Brown has never made such an accusation, in Parliament or otherwise. We were wrong to use this erroneous allegation as a basis to make comments about his character and integrity and to suggest that Mr Brown was ‘not telling the full story’. We withdraw these criticisms and apologise to Mr Brown.

This is the fifth time that the paper has corrected claims about Brown in less than five months.

The Sun vs Gordon Brown

The Sun, 21 October 2012:

In his column “Toffs who play at being comrades” (September 30) Toby Young stated that Gordon Brown now charges £70,000 for an after-dinner speech.

We are happy to clarify that Mr Brown does not receive such money personally, and that all revenue from his speaking engagements goes to fund Mr and Mrs Brown’s charitable work and their involvement in public life.

The Sun, 25 October 2012:

“Brown's duty bill hits £114k” (July 18). We are happy to clarify that Gordon Brown’s allowance goes directly to office and staff costs incurred as a former PM and is not received by him personally. We acknowledge that expenses incurred in staffing are not “earned” as stated. His only personal income is his salary as an MP and he renounced the pension he is entitled to as a former Prime Minister.

The Sun, 18 January 2013:

In an article “Brown in £30,000 expenses row” (Aug 18), based on the Conservative Party’s statements about Gordon Brown’s expenses, we would like to make clear that Mr Brown does not claim for accommodation expenses when visiting London on parliamentary business. We regret any confusion caused.

The Sun, 22 January 2013:

In an article ‘Gordon is browned off’ (Sept 28) we stated that a Gordon Brown press conference in New York was cancelled when only one reporter turned up.

We would like to make it clear that Mr Brown was delayed at an earlier United Nations meeting which overran, paying tribute to Aung San Suu Kyi. We are happy to clarify the position.

(Huge hat-tip to Tim Fenton at Zelo Street for spotting these.)

Leveson on the 'clear evidence of misreporting on European issues'

Last month, the Mail claimed the EU was planning to ban Famous Five books from schools. The story was fiction and described as 'nonsense' by the EC in the UK. But when an MEP sent a letter to the readers' editor at the paper, he refused to publish it on the grounds that the original report:

may not have suggested in so many words banning books (that might make it look very unpopular) but it has criticised them

In fact, it didn't suggest banning books in any words - the report didn't include the word 'book' at all.

This is the latest thing the EU has been accused - wrongly - of wanting to ban. See also jam jars, selling a dozen eggs, cars from town centres, milk jugs, classic cars, shopping bags, Britain, kids from blowing up balloons and so on. It's not just non-existent bans - it's also half-truths about flying flags and pouring dead bodies down the drain.

When Express editor Hugh Whittow gave evidence at the Leveson Inquiry, he stated firmly:

we don't twist anything. We just present the news of the day.

When asked about a front page story '75% say: 'Quit the EU now'', Whittow accepted they did twist things. Robert Jay QC asked if the headline was misleading given that the 75% who apparently say 'Quit the EU now' included 47% saying renegotiate membership. Whittow replied:

I accept that from what you say.

Almost exactly one year before Leveson's report was published, Patrick O'Flynn, the Express' chief political commentator, claimed:

Over the course of the past year every criticism we levelled against the EU has been justified.

Lord Justice Leveson says in his report (p.687):

Articles relating to the European Union, and Britain’s role within it, accounted for a further category of story where parts of the press appeared to prioritise the title’s agenda over factual accuracy.

He concluded:

there is certainly clear evidence of misreporting on European issues...

The factual errors in the examples above are, in certain respects, trivial. But the cumulative impact can have serious consequences...

there can be no objection to agenda journalism (which necessarily involves the fusion of fact and comment), but that cannot trump a requirement to report stories accurately. Clause 1 of the Editors’ Code explicitly, and in my view rightly, recognises the right of a free press to be partisan; strong, even very strong, opinions can legitimately influence the choice of story, placement of story and angle from which a story is reported. But that must not lead to fabrication, or deliberate or careless misrepresentation of facts. Particularly in the context of reporting on issues of political interest, the press have a responsibility to ensure that the public are accurately informed so that they can engage in the democratic process. The evidence of inaccurate and misleading reporting on political issues is therefore of concern. The previous approach of the PCC to entertaining complaints only where they came from an affected individual may have allowed a degree of impunity in this area.

(Hat-tip to Gareth)

Sorry we said you received special treatment

Two weeks ago, the Mail on Sunday ran a story with the headline: 'The seven months pregnant woman told to give up her British Airways seat… just so Gordon Brown could fly Club Class'.

They trailed their 'exclusive' on the front page, with the main article on page five. The paper wrote:

Gordon Brown sparked a mutiny on a British Airways flight after he was blamed for an attempt to downgrade a heavily pregnant woman and Red Cross doctor into more cramped seats. The extraordinary scenes – dubbed Mutiny On The Brown-ty - unfolded on a flight from Abu Dhabi to London

The paper fails to mention who (in the Mail's newsroom) dubbed it 'Mutiny on the Brown-ty'.

The article included much sound and fury, as did the editorial:

We have pretty much put an end to privilege. The good things in life are obtained through hard work and effort, not through rank and status...

In a contest for a comfortable seat, between a woman a few weeks from giving birth and a man whose undistinguished period in office is already being happily forgotten, most people would know instantly which side to take.

But BA, and Gordon Brown’s aggressive and charmless aide, seem not to have realised this. In fact, a little diplomacy and good manners by the airline and Mr Brown’s assistant might well have resolved the problem.

Equality is a slogan Mr Brown uses plentifully. But it seems he prefers the theory to the practice.

Yet the paper also had a statement from British Airways which seemed to cast some doubt on their version of events:

A spokeswoman for the airline said Mr Brown’s arrival on the flight was a coincidence, and he had been unfairly blamed by the mutinous passengers.

‘The situation had absolutely nothing to do with Gordon Brown,’ she said. ‘We have apologised to [the complainant] and we have offered to pay compensation.

‘It is very rare for a customer not to be able to travel in the cabin that they have booked and we are extremely sorry that this happened on this flight. Gordon Brown and his party were booked in advance and were not involved in any way.’

And:

Mr Brown's office was contacted on Friday. Yesterday afternoon, his spokeswoman sent a text message saying 'I assume you have read the BA statement and are now not ­running the story', making it clear that BA and the former PM's office had been in discussions.

She released a statement that said: 'As BA has made clear, the arrangements were nothing to do with Mr Brown, who had booked his flight and seats well in advance and made no requests for - nor received - any special treatment.

'As BA will confirm, all questions about bookings, overbookings and allocations of seats are not - and could not be - a matter for Mr Brown but for British Airways.'

Despite all that, the paper decided to run the story, with a front page teaser, anyway.

One week later, the Mail on Sunday had an 'update':

Gordon Brown

Last week we published a story headlined ‘The seven months pregnant woman told to give up her British Airways seat…just so Gordon Brown could fly Club Class’ and an editorial.

The flight was overbooked but we accept that neither Gordon Brown nor his staff received any special treatment from British Airways, nor behaved in any way improperly.

We apologise to Gordon Brown and Kirsty McNeill.

The apology appeared on page five. This time, there was no trail on the front page.

(More from Angry Mob here and here, Shouting at Cows and Press Reform)

Slightly out of touch

After last week's second leaders' debate, five polling organisations brought out polls about who had 'won':

• Angus Reid/PB: Clegg, 33, Cameron 32, Brown 23
• ComRes/ITV News: Clegg 33, Brown 30, Cameron 30
• ICM/Guardian: Clegg 33, Brown 29, Cameron 29
• Populus/Times: Cameron 37, Clegg 36, Brown 27
• YouGov/Sun: Cameron 36, Clegg 32, Brown 29

All fairly close, with most of the results in the 30s.

But the Daily Express didn't have any truck with those, so launched it's own poll asking 'Who won the second debate?'

The results, published in the paper today, were surprising:

• Nick Clegg - 4%
• Gordon Brown - 6%
• David Cameron - 90%

The Express has been supporting the Conservatives very vociferously for many years - certainly longer than the Sun. Although it backed Labour in 2001, when Express owner Richard Desmond gave the party a £100,000 donation, it switched back to the Conservatives in 2004.

It obviously knows its (dwindling) readership.

'Hysterical bawlings from the sidelines'

Much has already been written about yesterday's four-pronged attack on Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg by the four newspapers most supportive of the Conservative Party, so this post will be a brief overview of these front pages and the reaction to them.

As Kevin Marsh said:

You do not have to support the Liberal Democrats or Nick Clegg or be carried along on the current poll wave to wonder, as a journalist, what was going on Wednesday in the newsrooms and editorial offices of the Telegraph, Mail, Express and Sun.

Of course, it's not exactly shocking that party spin doctor's speak to political hacks - as the BBC's Nick Robinson and the Guardian reported had happened before these newspapers appeared. Nor is it news that the media outlets have agendas and political bias.

It's hard to know if this actually was a concerted effort, but it certainly looked like it was, with all the stories appearing on the day of the second leaders' debate. The fact that each paper was focusing on a different subject suggested everything was being thrown to see what might stick.

One that didn't stick was the Telegraph's half-hearted attempt to create a scandal:


If the Telegraph thought this was a big deal, they would have published it last year with all their other expenses coverage.

Given that all the payments were declared properly, it always looked thin and the way the story slipped down the Telegraph's website homepage during the day rather gave the game away. Despite a rule-breaking attempt by Sky's Adam Boulton to bring up the story during the second debate, an attempt that has prompted complaints to Ofcom, the story sank without trace.

Forced to defend the story on his blog, even the Telegraph's Deputy Editor didn't sound convinced:

So far [Clegg] has been unable to produce an adequate explanation for them, or the paperwork to back up his justification. The likelihood must be that it is evidence of disorganisation, nothing more, but don’t know that yet.

So why not wait until the evidence is produced before rushing to print? But the paperwork did turn up during the day and that was that - although the prominence the Telegraph gave to the 'evidence' was nothing like that of the original.

Meanwhile, the Express was complaining, of course, about immigration:


But there was a bit of a disconnect between the sub-head, which focused on jobs for asylum seekers, and the article, which didn't.

Alison Little wrote:

Controversial Lib Dem plans to allow illegal immigrants to stay and work in Britain were exposed as madness yesterday as unemployment hit a 16-year high.

Nick Clegg struggled to defend allowing asylum-seekers to join the workforce when he came under attack from a panel of first-time voters.

With official figures showing 2.5 million out of work, they warned it would be unfair to law-abiding residents.

'Exposed as madness' is a complete exaggeration, and the use of 'crazy' on the front page is Express editorialising and nothing more.

But look how it goes from 'illegal immigrants' and then to 'asylum seekers' as if they are the same. This is emphasised by the 'law-abiding' comment in the next sentence, which implies that asylum seekers are not.

It's further evidence that for all they talk about these issues, there's little sense they really understand them.

The Sun was also on the attack, although their front page pun was very weak by their standards:


The Sun very publicly switched allegiance from Labour to the Conservatives last year when the Tories were substantially ahead in the polls. Following the surge in support for the Lib Dems after the first leaders' debate, there seemed to be some panic that the Sun - and the other right-wing papers - may not, after all, be backing the winner. And that's why the knives came out.

A curious incident from Wednesday illustrated not just this panic, but the contempt the Sun and its owner Rupert Murdoch has for the British public.

The Independent newspaper re-launched on Tuesday with the strapline:

Free from political ties, free from proprietorial influence.

It said:

You may not always agree with what we say, but it is spoken from the heart, and from a standpoint that's untainted by commercial or political imperatives.

In case the target wasn't obvious, a marketing campaign added:

Rupert Murdoch won't decide this election. You will.

The reaction? Former Sun editor Rebekah Brooks, now chief executive at News International, and obnoxious Rupert's obnoxious son James arrived unannounced at the Independent's office and demanded to know:

'What are you fucking playing at?'

The Guardian reports:

A bewildered [Independent Editor-in-Chief Simon] Kelner quickly ushered his visitors into his office, where they remained for what have been described as 'frank and full discussions' for another 20 minutes.

All were grim-faced as Murdoch, carrying a promotional copy of the Independent, accused the rival editor of breaking the unwritten code that proprietors do not attack each other and of besmirching his father's reputation. With his piece said and with the matter unresolved, the aggrieved media mogul left.

Bewildering is right. The arrogance of this is jaw-dropping. Murdoch and his son - like the other right-wing papers' editors and proprietors - do apparently believe they decide this election rather than over 40 million voters.

How dare they decide that the Sun's chosen candidate is not the one for them, according to latest polls. Indeed, when a poll by Sun pollster YouGov showed:

voters fear a Liberal Democrat government less than a Conservative or Labour one

the Sun decided to do the far-from-honourable thing: it refused to publish the results.

(Further insights into the Murdoch mindset come from biographer Michael Wolff and former Sun Editor David Yelland)

But perhaps the most notable of yesterday's front pages was the Mail:


So the Mail digs back through the archives and finds what it thinks, quite wrongly, is a 'Nazi slur'. Of all newspapers, you would think the Mail would be slow to accuse others of a 'Nazi slur'. In July 1934 it infamously carried the headline 'Hurrah for the Blackshirts' and then Mail owner Lord Rothermere - grandfather of the current owner - was effusive in his praise for Hitler.

And in 1933 the paper wrote:

The way stateless Jews from Germany are pouring in from every port of this country is becoming an outrage. The number of aliens entering the country through the back door is a problem to which the Daily Mail has repeatedly pointed.

Replace 'stateless Jews from Germany' with 'asylum seekers' or 'immigrants' and you could easily imagine that being said in Daily Mail now.

The 'Nazi slur' it attributed to Clegg was nothing like this. In fact, there was no 'Nazi slur' at all. The article, which was written eight years ago for the Guardian, related tales of how Germans are still subject to childish reminders about Hitler, and how many Brits still showed a:

misplaced sense of superiority, sustained by delusions of grandeur and a tenacious obsession with the last war.

There was little wrong with it, although you might think you are reading a different article to the one the Mail saw and so wilfully - and woefully - misinterpreted.

The Express, not wishing to let the story go, then put a version of the Mail's 'Nazi slur' claims on its website. The headline became even more grotesque, and even further from the truth:


The original never implied that Britain was 'more guilty than the Nazis', let alone that being a direct quote, which the quote marks suggest. It's dishonest and totally misleading.

But back to the Mail, where Editor Paul Dacre seems to have become somewhat obssessed with the Lib Dems. The election section of their website contained nine anti-Lib Dem articles on Wednesday - almost to the exclusion of anything else.

Then they ran a poll at the end of the second debate asking who had won. But with the results saying the victor was Nick Clegg, they decided to start another poll asking the same question - which Cameron was then leading.

The 'Nazi slur' headline received a lot of negative reaction - including from Mail hack Ann Leslie, who said she disapproved of it on the BBC's Question Time.

But this meant that a disgusting comment in the Mail's editorial was rather overlooked. Following on from their suggestion that there was nothing British about Nick Clegg, it said, under the headline 'Damning insight into the Liberal leader':

It's perhaps unfair to point out that Mr Clegg's father is half-Russian, his mother is Dutch, and he's married to a Spaniard.

Yes, the Mail is so reluctant to bring it up (for the third time in a week). 'Unfair' isn't the word. Pathetic, stupid, irrelevant and xenophobic would be much more appropriate.

The final word should go to Kevin Marsh, who sums all this up perfectly, although his conclusion is depressing:

Scrutiny? Is this scrutiny? Really? Perhaps we've become so de-sensitised to the awfulness of some parts of the British press that journalism like this passes as scrutiny.

We - mere readers, mere voters - are left with two unattractive possible conclusions.

Either the press really does think that these stories amount to genuine scrutiny of the men who want to run the country - that this is exactly what we need to help us choose our next government. Hysterical bawlings from the sidelines on dog-whistle issues like immigration and sleaze.

Or that parts of our press are proving once again that they are totally incapable of fulfilling their most basic function - supporting our self-government with reliable, honest news and information. And that they don't care since they place their commercial and ideological interest in a particular result above the democratic process they claim to support.

Recommended reading

Two fine new posts over at The Sun - Tabloid Lies.

Firstly, 'The anti-Conservative bias of Basil Brush', a look at what the Sun called 'alarming smears against Tories by state-owned BBC' - a phrase that has nothing to do with:

a) The Sun's support for the Tories, or
b) The Sun's links with Sky.

The paper's cast-iron (ahem) evidence includes a blue rosette worn by a cheat in an episode of The Basil Brush Show that was first broadcast in 2004. Yes, really.

They also blame the BBC for some footage of David Cameron straightening his hair before going live on TV, but conveniently forget to say it was Sky wot filmed it.

The second post is about the Sun's campaign on new tabloid bête noire 'meow meow'. The Sun have claimed their coverage has caused the rules on what schools can do when confiscating the drug to be changed. Alas, it appears the guidance is the same as it's always been.

That's some 'victory'.

Mail and Sun try to influence election; Sun tries to influence this blog

The lead story on the Mail website for most of yesterday was a very strange interpretation of an interview between Gordon Brown and Adam Boulton. Neither side emerged from the counter that well, but the Mail saw a bigger story:


Obviously a incident where the PM huffs out of an interview with a major broadcaster would be a big story. There's just one slight problem.

He didn't.

The Boulton & Co blog on the Sky website includes the line:

One man's "storming off" is another man's "getting up because it's over"...

Which immediately raises doubts about the veracity of the Mail interpretation. Watching the nearly twelve minute interview on the Sky blog reveals - shock of shocks - Brown doesn't try to leave at any point. The clip ends with Boulton saying:

Thank you very much Gordon Brown.

And Brown is still in his seat. Conservative blogger Guido Fawkes has posted part of what happened next on Youtube, complete with a juvenile Psycho sound effect. But it shows Brown remaining seated for a full three seconds before moving to get up.

So how does the Mail decide he 'cut the interview short' or:


He tried to leave once it was over. End of (non-) story.

Elsewhere, News International is clearly trying to set the agenda for the general election. During the interview, Boulton pressed Brown on Sky News' Leaders' Debate. Then yesterday the Sun revealed - to absolutely no-one's surprise - that it was backing the Conservatives to win the next election. These seem to be 'good' examples of where the media is trying to make the news - make itself the news - rather than just report the news.

Bizarrely, this blog received two emails (within 30 minutes of each other) from The Sun revealing the news about its change of allegiance in the early hours of 29 September. It even included a jpeg of the front page for inclusion. Why it would bother alerting a blog which has rarely written a good word about the paper is a bit of a mystery.

The Sun editorial writes about the:

failures of Labour in Government over the last 12 years.

Given the Sun backed Labour at the 1997, 2001 and 2005 elections, complaining about all twelve years seems a little...conveniently forgetful.

Inevitably, in listing Labour's failings, it mentions immigration, where they are accused of:

opening our borders without any regard to the consequences. Illegal migrants and bogus asylum seekers poured in.

The terminology here is very loose - 'illegal immigrants' and 'failed asylum seekers' would be far more suitable, but this sentence, which also includes the word 'poured', is designed to be highly emotive, rather than accurate.

The Guardian's Michael White points out that Rupert Murdoch does have a 'well-documented policy of being on the winning side' and with opinion polls putting the Conservatives well ahead, it was only a matter of when, not if, The Sun switched sides.

But even more importantly for David Cameron, he has the support of another key Sun figure, far more influential than Murdoch.

Yes, Page 3 girl Keeley (22, from Bromley, dressed in her blue pants for this special occasion) is backing him too:

[He] is the man...this is his time. Everyone will expect him to make things better. He can't possibly do this instantly as he will inherit huge, long-term, deep-rooted problems. We need to allow him time to implement fresh ideas and policies that will get the country off its knees.

Brilliant. With insight like that, she could get a reporting job at the paper.

British government responsible for eBay transactions in America, agree Mail mods

How can you get a pathetic partisan attack on the Labour Government in a story about a Nintendo game? See the Mail comments section. The article tells the story of JJ Hendricks, who recently bought a very rare, gold NES game cartridge on eBay for £10,800.

This leads commentator Wainthrop to rant:

Surprised anyone can afford such frivolities after the mess NuLab has made of our economy. It sickens me whenever I thinnk about Gormless and his idiotic cabinet. They must think running a country is like playing a computyer game they do it with such reckless abandon!

This once great nation is now the laughing stock of the world. Thanks Labour!

- Wainthrop, Wiltshire, 8/7/2009 9:51

But have a quick look at Hendricks' blog. Notice anything? Like the fact the price is in dollars? Or the use of the word 'Mom'?

Yes - Mr Hendricks is American (whois confirms the website is registered in Denver, Colorado). Why do the Mail moderators let through such idiotic and misleading comments?

Slack - his name fits his fact-checking

Notorious exaggerator and Migrationwatch poodle James Slack is up to his usual tricks, with another anti-immigrant, anti-Labour story in the Mail.

He says the Home Office has issued a document explaining how immigrants can 'earn' citizenship in six years rather than eight by doing 50 hours of unpaid voluntary work, including working at soup kitchens, helping out at a museum or being a school governor. Needless to say, these aren't the focus of the story, because that might make the idea seem, you know, reasonable.

And this is the Mail, so we can't have that. It focuses instead on the fact that trade union activity and canvassing for a political party are also on the list. And they turn that into this:

Want a British passport? Just stand on a picket line or canvas for Labour - 'Migrants will win fast-track passports if they stand on picket lines or knock on doors asking people to vote Labour, it emerged last night'.

Of course, earning citizenship is nothing like as easy as 'just' standing on a picket line or doing some canvassing, although the average tabloid reader probably thinks that headline is literally accurate.

Moreover, the rules are not about Labour - nine paragraphs later, it admits that the canvassing 'also covers the Tories and Liberal Democrats'. But Mr Slack, didn't you say they would be asking people to vote Labour?

Slack has form on pushing this idea that the country is full of immigrants who have the audacity to want to vote, and the implication is that Labour allows it because the newcomers vote for them.

In the final line of the article, it says that 'the earned citizenship scheme has been delayed by nine months, to December 2010', at which point it is probable that Labour will be in opposition. So it may not happen anyway. And it is hard to work out exactly what the status of these guidelines are - the Home Office website doesn't appear to mention them, and as the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill is still going through Parliament, it's likely that this is simply a list for consultation. But Slack has never let the facts get in the way of a misleading story...

[EDIT - 13 June: The Star has also written an incorrect headline with A Brit passport if you picket and vote Labour. Voting Labour gets you a passport? The story, obviously, does not support that claim.]

Star reveals its in-depth political knowledge

Just to prove there is something other than made-up reality TV and sleb stories in the Daily Star comes a made-up political story. It appears to have taken its lead from the unashamed Tory supporting Express, its sister paper. So the story Prime Minister's Cabinet reshuffle 'puzzles' voters tells us:

Defiant Gordon Brown unveiled his new-look Cabinet yesterday – but left voters clueless over who many of them are...to many ordinary Brits weary of the leadership saga, it was a sea of unknown faces around the famous Cabinet table in 10 Downing Street.

Cabinets are supposed to be crammed full of big-hitting politicians the public are familiar with.

But many of Mr Brown’s team have been hastily promoted, leaving voters asking: “Who are these people?”

And the evidence for what the public thinks? Well, it doesn't actually mention where this comes from. It is entirely possible that such a poll does exist, but the failure to name is source is immediately suspicious. If there is a poll, it's probably done in the Star newsroom.

Because, as the BBC's Chief Political Correspondent James Landale pointed out on the day of the reshuffle:

It's been a mini-reshuffle. Over half of the cabinet are in the same jobs. There are only six new entrants. It's not a substantial injection of new blood.

So how does the Star decide it's 'a sea of unknown faces'? Probably because they have been so busy watching Big Brother and I'm a Celebrity over the last few years that they don't have a clue about politics.

And to prove it: their 'humourous' 'alternative' Cabinet, which suggests Simon Cowell as PM and Lucy Pinder at International Development because

'this glamour girl, 25, would be a great at making sure the international community developed an interest in the breast of British'.

See what they did there? Brilliant.

Express snubs truth

The Express story Uproar as PM snubs the heroes of D-Day is one of those articles that claims there is some 'uproar' but fails to provide any evidence that anyone is actually outraged, except for the paper itself.

What is immediately noticeable is that the picture used is of Gordon Brown laughing. Brown has never been the most photogenic of people, but this image has been used for two reasons. One is because it makes him look a bit weird. The other is that it appears that he is laughing. Right in the face of these snubbed D-Day veterans.

But are they snubbed? Here's the story:

Gordon Brown was yesterday accused of snubbing war heroes because there will be no D-Day commemoration at Westminster Abbey next month.

Mr Brown said in March that he hoped there would be a service in London to mark June 6 being 65 years since the Normandy invasion, which claimed the lives of 17,566 British troops.
...
But it was revealed last night that no such event will be held.

But then it says:

A Westminster Abbey spokeswoman said "there will be no special service”, adding: “We are in discussions about perhaps having something at a later date but nothing is planned for June 6.”

And then:

A Ministry of Defence spokesman said: “We have held discussions with the Normandy Veterans Association about a service at Westminster Abbey to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the D-Day landings. The NVA’s preference is for a service to be held later in the autumn and we are meeting with Westminster Abbey in the coming days to discuss this further."

So according to that, the veteran's themselves did not want a service on that day. They get Vera Lynn to sound a bit upset - probably having told her half the story - but nobody from the NVA is in 'uproar'. Still, the Express, which put aside any pretence of balanced political reporting long ago, decides it's all Brown's fault. He is even blamed in the same story for the fact the French haven't invited the Queen to the Normandy events. Whereas the Mail just blames those cheese eating surrender monkeys across the Channel.

(On political bias, the Express has a story about middle class views on the economy, which is turned into a story about MP's expenses and greed, and is not only illustrated with a picture of a Labour MP, but a Labour MP who is a Muslim.)

Express totally gives up on reporting news

There are several noticeable things about today's Express front page. One is that it has a unusually large advert for Tesco at the bottom - it is very rare for there to be ads on the front of a tabloid - but I can recall one that dominant. (ignoring the Express' feeble wrap-around on the day after Obama's inauguration).

Two is the total lack of a mention of the MP expenses fiasco. Surely it couldn't be that the day the details of the greed of Tory MPs come out, the most vocally Tory-supporting paper wants to forget the story? The Express put it on the front page for the last two days, when it was Labour greed being revealed. (The main story on the Tories amounts to only 283 words)

Thirdly, the story itself. Secret of how to beat cancer is a standard Express health headline. And like most of them, the story is pretty thin. The 'secret' turns out to be that one way to beat cancer would be to lose weight.

Yes, at the Express, a story along the lines of 'being fat is not good for your health' is considered front page news. And almost deserving of as much space as a Tesco ad.

Lies, Express lies and statistics

On the front page of early editions of the Express was the curious headline 'Marriage is on way out'. Before you could say 'where is it going?', the police-baton-bruise on the leg of a G20 protestor had taken over.

But the story lives on in 'Weddings plunge by 40,000', a mindlessly partisan article by Sarah O'Grady. The headline comes from this: Between 1996 and 2006 some 40,000 fewer marriages were recorded. Fewer than when? What does that actually mean?

Using figures for just England and Wales, there were 278,975 marriages in 1996. In 2006, that was 239,450. So there were nearly 40,000 fewer marriages in 2006 compared to 1996. But O'Grady writes it in a very clumsy way.

She adds: Since Labour came to power, at least 4,000 fewer marriages have taken place every year.

And look at the Excel file here and it isn't as simple as dividing 40,000 by 10 years. For a start, 1996 wasn't the year Labour came to power - if you take the 1997 figure as the start, the difference with 2006 is only 33,000 less. The table also shows that between 2001 and 2004, the number of marriages actually increased for each of those years, before declining again. A decline that has been going on fairly steadily since the early 1970s.

So how does the Express come to the conclusion that 'critics blamed Labour’s 12 years in power for this erosion of traditional family values'?

If these figures go up to 2006, that is only 9 years of a Labour government. Of the 10 years between 1996 and 2006, Labour wasn't even in government for nearly a year and half of that period. Of the rest, there were increases in the number of marriages in four other years.

And compare this with the Major government from 1990-97. There were nearly 59,000 fewer marriages in 1997 than in 1990 - nearly double the decline under Labour.

But of course, the Express will never let the facts get in the way of a bit of political point-scoring. So in a shortened version of the same article, the headline becomes 'Has Labour destroyed the British way of life?' and the editorial thunders that 'The decline in marriage is doing terrible harm'. Three articles, not one suggesting this is an on-going decline...