The BBC will “doubledown on flying left-wing media” despite the rampant row engulfing the national broadcaster over impartiality, a top Tory told GB News.
Shadow Business Secretary Andrew Griffith further laid into Director General Tim Davie for failing to “get a grip and control” his newsroom.
The broadcaster is gearing up to grovel to MPs on Monday after mounting concerns over impartiality and possible bias burden the media giant.
It has come under particular scrutiny over the way staffers edited together footage from Donald Trump’s speech on January 6 2021 to appear as if he told supporters to “fight like hell” in a Panorama episode.
Speaking to GB News presenter Christopher Hope and Ellie Costello, Mr Griffith spoke candidly about what he thought about Mr Davie.
“I think the Director General is a very good broadcasting executive, but he wasn’t able to get to grips and control the newsroom, which is full of people whose own received worldview is just very different from the rest of the British people,” he told Christopher and Ellie.
He attributed the differing perspectives down to the corporation “sitting in its own London bubble” with its headquarters in the heart of the Capital.
“It should be getting out across the country whenever it has a chance,” Mr Griffith urged.
The broadcaster’s Director General and Head of News resigned on Sunday
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GETTY/GB NEWS
“It cuts back on things like regional radio, but it will double down on flying left-wing media.”
The Conservative MP further lambasted the BBC, saying: “Look, there’s a fundamental problem here, which is that the BBC can extract money from everyone in this country, regardless of the size of their audiences or the satisfaction of those audiences.
“So a business like Sky in its day, or GB News, has to fight every single day for viewers who have a choice.
“The BBC is not based on that choice and in return we need absolutely unscrupulous, strict impartiality.”
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Mr Griffith further declared that “everyone who has been part of the newsroom that’s done this false editing” who have been called out for “misleading stories”, should leave the BBC.
He said: “In fact, we shouldn’t believe that this is just a question of one or two senior people taking responsibility.
“They weren’t in the edit rooms. They weren’t putting that broadcast material together.”
However, the Arundel and South Downs MP declared that it was a chance for a “proper fundamental review of the BBC” and align itself with a “proper definition” of public service broadcasting.
Andrew Griffith spoke to GB News stars Ellie and Christopher on Monday morning
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GB NEWS
Mr Griffith slammed: “They have simply appalled the ordinary licence fee payer who they’ve extracted money from under threat of sending them to jail.
“And they’re not properly holding up the strict impartiality that we want to see from our national broadcaster.”
In the wake of Tim Davie’s and Deborah Turness’ resignations, a number of leading politicians gave their verdict on the Sunday evening resignations.
Nigel Farage demanded that their departure must kickstart “wholesale change”, urging the Government to appoint a business-savvy replacement.
“This is the BBC’s last chance. If they don’t get this right, there will be vast numbers of people refusing to pay the licence fee,” the Reform chief declared.