BBC’s approach to complaints is almost Orwellian

LOfcom’s conclusion that the broadcaster failed in its coverage of an anti-Semitic incident speaks volumes about its handling of criticism

How is anyone supposed to trust a news organisation that takes ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ as a handbook?

ast month, the BBC launched a social media campaign to mark its centenary, #ThisIsOurBBC. One tweet informs us proudly: “If you know how it’s made, you can trust what it says. Trust is Earned.”

With perfect but presumably unintended comic timing, last week also saw the release of devastating findings from broadcasting regulator Ofcom’s ten-month long inquiry into the BBC’s reporting of an attack on Jewish children in Oxford Street last November. It found that the BBC was guilty of “serious” editorial failures in its coverage and that it had caused “significant distress” to Jews.

It is worth considering the details of the BBC’s behaviour because, though this is one specific case, it epitomises how the corporation reacts when confronted with its mistakes. Unlike most race hate crimes, this attack on Jewish children celebrating Chanukah was filmed and the video went viral after the Jewish Chronicle reported the incident. It was clear and unambiguous – and showed the reality of anti-Semitism on our streets.

But the Jewish community’s fears about the attack were soon added to by astonishment – and deep anger – over the BBC’s reporting of it. It included the line: “A slur about Muslims can also be heard from inside the bus. The Met Police has said the incident will be looked at ‘in its entirety’.” In its online report, the BBC referred to more than one slur: “some racial slurs” could be heard.

Anyone can listen to the tape; no racial insults can be heard from the Jewish children – as the police investigating the attack confirmed publicly, saying there was simply “no evidence” of a slur. What was in fact recorded on the audio was the Hebrew phrase “tikrah lemishu, ze dachuf ”, meaning “Call someone, it is urgent”. Yet, for weeks the BBC refused to alter anything – other than changing “slurs” to “slur” in its online report.

Two months later, on Jan 26, the BBC’s Executive Complaints Unit reported. It, too, refused to concede that the slur was a fiction, but said that “more could have been done” to “acknowledge the differing views… on what was said”. Except that the only “differing views” were of what happened and did not happen.

All organisations make mistakes. What matters is how they are corrected. But consistently, the BBC behaves as if it is beyond reproach, as if only those with an agenda or animus against it could possibly find fault. In this case, the BBC’s dogmatic refusal to accept any responsibility, led it to treat the Jewish community itself with contempt, loftily dismissing the pleadings of the Chief Rabbi and the president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, among others, for it to consult evidence and act accordingly.

Ofcom ruled last week that the BBC had “failed to observe its editorial guidelines on due impartiality and due accuracy…” and had “made a serious editorial misjudgment by not reporting on air at any point that the claim it had made in the news broadcast was disputed, once the new evidence emerged”. It also criticised the BBC’s behaviour towards British Jews, saying its failings were made even worse given that its misreporting was “causing significant distress and anxiety to the victims of the attack, and to the wider Jewish community”.

How is anyone supposed to trust a news organisation that takes Nineteen Eighty-Four as a handbook? The BBC’s coverage was Orwellian in its insistence that something which simply did not exist and had not happened – a recording of Jews provoking the attack with an antiMuslim slur – had in fact happened and did exist.

Trust, as the tweet put it, is earned.