Woman’s Hour team given impartiality training after ‘ bias over sex assault judge’
‘Gave the impression of sympathising’
It is one of the most politically correct shows on radio. But now Woman’s Hour has been hauled over the coals for being too PC – by showing bias in favour of a woman who accused a Donald trumpsupporting judge of sex assault.
the BBC has forced staff members behind the Radio 4 show to take ‘impartiality’ training after presenter Jane Garvey broke rules in a programme about US judge Brett Kavanaugh.
Miss Garvey, who has led protests over the BBC’s gender pay gap, was ticked off by bosses after she gave ‘the impression of sympathising’ with a guest who believed Mr Kavanaugh, 54, was guilty of sexual assault.
Last year he was accused of sexual misconduct by a number of women, including psychology professor Christine Blasey Ford, 52, who said he groped her at a party when she was a teenager.
She tearfully testified against him before he was confirmed as a member of America’s Supreme Court, but Mr Kavanaugh made emotional denials.
In a Woman’s Hour programme before the Supreme Court confirmation, Miss Garvey, 54, said it was ‘horrifying’ that some people interpreted his response as ‘entirely right’.
She insisted: ‘What is horrifying – well, I suppose if you are a feminist it’s horrifying – is the way that Kavanaugh’s indignation, his outrage, his frankly peculiar almost hysterical demeanour... has been interpreted by some as entirely right. Exactly how a man would react in those circumstances.’
the presenter, who was paid around £160,000 last year, agreed with a guest, law professor Kimberlé Crenshaw, who drew parallels between the Kavanaugh case and sexual assault allegations against judge Clarence thomas before he was appointed to the Supreme Court in the 1990s.
Miss Crenshaw argued that both men tried to convince people to ignore ‘these women and the facts’ as part of a smear campaign driven by other issues. Miss Garvey agreed with her, saying, ‘Same thing, yes’.
Woman’s Hour was accused of pushing the parallels too far. A listener complained to the BBC that the thomas case was ‘immaterial and prejudicial’ to the Kavanaugh hearings.
they claimed it was biased of the BBC to invite Miss Crenshaw on the programme and Miss Garvey had broken the rules by expressing ‘her own views on a controversial topic’. the BBC rejected some allegations, but it accepted Miss Garvey had not been impartial.
the broadcaster said in its judgment: ‘the presenter gave the impression of sympathising with that viewpoint and did not challenge the interviewee in a manner which would have ensured due impartiality.’
It added that the programme’s editor Karen Dalziel has ‘briefed the whole team about the importance of impartiality in their programmes’ and put them through extra training. the BBC stressed: ‘the Woman’s Hour team (along with other production staff) have attended a BBC radio briefing session on impartiality.’
BBC bosses insisted that all of the Woman’s Hour team underwent extra training. But insiders said that presenters were exempt. Miss Garvey declined to comment. the row comes after the BBC issued Woman’s Hour presenter Dame Jenni Murray with an impartiality warning in 2017 after she claimed in a newspaper article that a sex change can’t make a man a ‘real woman’.