Opinion
Ofcom proves that the BBC cannot always be trusted
The JC Leader 11 November 2022
November 10, 2022 13:10
1 min read
The JC Leader 11 November 2022
November 10, 2022 13:10The timing could hardly have been more exquisitely awful.
The BBC recently launched a centenary campaign, #ThisIsOurBBC, on social media. In one tweet, it informs us: “If you know how it’s made, you can trust what it says. Trust is Earned.”
That last sentence is certainly true. Which is why this week’s Ofcom ruling against the BBC over its coverage of the Channukah assault on a busload of Jewish children is so important — and so damaging. Because the BBC behaved as if was hellbent on losing the trust of the Jewish community — first by refusing to alter its initial deeply misleading report of the incident, even after new evidence emerged showing that the report was wrong, and then by ignoring repeated calls by respected members of the community for it to act.
Had it not been for Ofcom, the BBC would still be maintaining the fiction that its reporting was word perfect. It took an outside body to call out the BBC’s mistakes.
That is why our call for a parliamentary inquiry into the BBC’s coverage of Israel and Jews is so important — and so right.
We have stressed that it is in everyone’s interests that the BBC is indeed trusted. But the corporation has shown that it cannot even be trusted to correct its own mistakes. It is deeply unsatisfactory that such an inquiry is necessary, but if the BBC is to regain its appropriate place as a trusted and respected broadcaster, it needs at the very least to understand the merit of constructive criticism.
We are happy to make clear that the BBC made a full apology for failings in relation to this matter in January 2022, following the findings of its own Executive Complaints Unit.
Those findings were consistent with those of Ofcom, which published its report in November 2022 at which point the BBC reiterated its apology. Ofcom stated there had been “a significant failure to observe its editorial guidelines to report news with due accuracy and due impartiality”. The BBC’s Executive Complaints Unit found the reporting “fell below expected standards of due accuracy and impartiality”.
We accept these points were not made clear in original reporting (in November 2022) nor had the BBC been “maintaining the fiction that its reporting was word perfect” ahead of Ofcom’s report. Further, there was no finding of guilt by Ofcom, nor a breach of the broadcasting code.