i thought gordon brown was the bully but the torys were too afraid to face alistair campbell so they tried force the bbc to drop a panelist.

nasty party all over again?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8709930.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/question_time/default.stm

Trying to think of an appropriate phrase with foot, shoot and yourself in it.

Its pathetic frankly, smacking of "its my ball and I'm going home".

I'd be bloody scared!

Very strange

Thought that that Campbell AHole came out of it not looking all that good. Tories should have sent William Hague.

that Campbell AHole came out of it not looking all that good

Care to exapnd on that at all? Didn't see the show myself, but I've never seen Campbell perform badly to camera yet. What did he do?

The tone of the BBC Question Time reporting was very odd. They seemed to imply that because there had been a Queens Speech then the Government had to supply a Cabinet member for the program!! While I would have liked a Cabinet member to be there – there is no requirement for one to come onto the program. Alistair Campbell implied that as he was there then the Government was playing chicken. If I remember correctly there was no one on the program last night from the Opposition Front Bench – Alistair is unelected and the best that could be said of his status was that he was 'representing' the Labour Party (not the opposition). Got bored after 15 minutes so used by prerogative and turned them all off

Indeed, I thought Campbell would look better. He didn't capitalise that well. Piers Morgan though…what an A1 cock.

Read a funny stat on Twitter this morning, when polled about why they didn't want to turn up, Tory MPs answered:

45% A bit scared
21% Had gout
20% Doing Expenses
14% Feeding Hounds

🙂

But as pointed out in the week of the Queen's Speech with new bills announced it would have made more sense to have a cabinet member on the panel than a shadow cabinet member.

Malcolm Tucker how come I missed this class TV!

Berm Bandit – his point blank refusal to acknowledge any mistakes or any dodgy information given out in the build up to the iraq war. Humility is not a trait that he has. People were not falling for his usual tactic of getting them angry and making them look a fool either.

I thought Piers Morgan played a blinder though.

Dunno, maybe the Tories think the BBC purposefully put on an aggressive lefty in order to cause them damage and they decided they didn't need to play that game?

Complete non story there are more pressing things to be concerned about. It is not for the BBC to dictate who appears on a television programme any more than it is a requirement for the government to supply who the BBC wants.

It strikes me that one of the biggest problems faced by those in government of all flavours, is the medias relentless persuance of these non stories and avoidance of proper reporting.

Ah well, the Beeb's days are numbered anyway. Rupert has told Clamberon to smash it up.

It was interesting that they managed to get Alastair Campbell to agree at one point that if they had known there had not been any WMD that they wouldn't have gone into Iraq, as is the line that David Milliband is following which is who AC supports for the Labour leadership.

But, a little later on when he was arguing the case for the war, he said that even though they now know there were no WMDs, and that they information was incorrect, he still thought they were right going into Iraq…

Is it just me, or is that a tiny little bit contradictory? It kinda points to the fact they wanted to go in whatever… and the WMDs were just a nice excuse…

Man you need a tinfoil helmet! If the beebs days are numbered it's because the population of this country seem to be getting feebleminded more into the X factor than politics or anything of substance.

It was an awful panel: Morgan/Cambell/Hastings – Journo Hounds who collectively have damaged political debate in this country more than just about anyone else.

redwood was pretty good at not toeing the party line

i really dont understand why the tories let this happen?

i really dont understand why the tories let this happen?

Quite refreshing though. Was good to hear David Davies objections to the proposed changes to capital gains tax, on Radio 4 yesterday, too.

I think there's always been an arrangement in place that the programmes are attended by "like for like" – so you don't end up with a minister/shadow minister debating with a random back bencher, and vise versa.

clearly no 10 thought that the "like for like" for an elected cabinet minister, was another elected politician, not Malcolm Tucker

Redwood made a good point that it want being rebellious or damaging to engage in debate on issues – we've had slavish executive led politics for far too long.

clearly no 10 thought that the "like for like" for an elected cabinet minister, was another elected politician, not Malcolm Tucker

well then surely they should have brought out david coulson, hes the perfect tory equivalent of alistair campbell, although he has (if possible) even less morals based on his phone tapping history!

i think you are right about redwood, it was good to see the real tory parties opinions, fotr that reason it would be better to see more front bencher vs back bencher debates

sabree rattling from the Tories – all part of the Murdoch masterplan

and if campbell is malcolm tucker that makes coulson the motherwell terrier for sure
which is which?

I think there's always been an arrangement in place that the programmes are attended by "like for like"

Rubbish

My father in law taught him, says he is the cleverest person he's ever taught.

Both are Burley fans though so can't be that bright.

Left wing blah, blah, blah.

I feel divided on this subject.

I don't support blackmail or censorship, but on the other hand (and I am left of centre myself) I don't support the Labour party's totally inappropriate policy of using unelected representatives to influence British Politics in very major ways and of 'couch and coffee' politics instead of cabinet based debate. Campbell and Mandelson – neither were elected yet both had as much influence on our UK policies as Blair and Brown – yet if the electorate disagreed with this, there was no means to remove them, as there was no vote option to dispose of them.

In a good light, it is possible to see the refusal to deal with Campbell as a healthy attempt (among other reasons) to block the continuing erosion of UK democracy, by insisting an elected person appear rather than Blair's best pal/hanger on.

How else can his and similar influence be blocked as Labour is too gutless and directionless to stop clutching at anyone they perceive as a 'strong' personality.

midnighthour
you think the other parties dont have similar unelected advisors and spin doctors
ashcroft,coulson,murdoch? ex mps, the entire house of lords etc

dont get me wrong the system depserately needs reform, politicians should have enough intelligence to do their job without the help of campbells and coulsons
the tories were scared in this case that campell would outwit and embarass a frontbencher so when blackmail failed they sent in a backbencher whos opinions they could disavow – thats doesnt sound like healthy democracy to me

I don't support blackmail or censorship, but on the other hand (and I am left of centre myself) I don't support the Labour party's totally inappropriate policy of using unelected representatives to influence British Politics

Not like Lord Ashcroft and the Tories then.

joolsburger – Member
Complete non story there are more pressing things to be concerned about. It is not for the BBC to dictate who appears on a television programme any more than it is a requirement for the government to supply who the BBC wants.

I think you might be a bit unfair there. The beeb is perfectly entitled to invite whoever they like, and it is most certainly for them to make that decision. On the other hand those invitees are perfectly entitled to refuse the invite.

What actually happened though is that the Tories tried to dictate the makeup of the panel. They are clearly NOT entitled to do that.

They didn't dictate they just said if Campbell's on our guy wont be. Seems very different from trying to knobble the panel.

Seems to me the Tories just didn't fancy engaging with him so they didn't. They seem to have better things to do than give him a platform for his rantings.

Seems to me the Tories just didn't fancy engaging with him so they didn't.

Because he is a smooth operator and they feared he would embarrass them.

Seems to me the Tories just didn't fancy engaging with him so they didn't.

Also don't forget when you have power you can pick and choose your publicity.

That's the difference between being the opposition and being the government I suppose.

It's nice and impartial of the BBC to make it a front page story. I'm not a tory by the way but I am increasingly coming to the view that the media are getting a bit too big for their boots.

So which elected Labour politicians were on then ?

the bbc always use their website to publicise their own tv shows

as a regular viewer of question time this was a very interesting episode, the minute they said at the end of last weeks show that campbel and morgan would be on it i thought it would be intresting

but someone as media savvy as coulson knows all this
and funnily enough the right wing press are burying this story and the left promoting it

considering the fact that its the bbc and the guardian vs the telegraph, mail, sun times, sky, itv

all of whom had been blasting brown for his dictatorial ways i dont recall nulab trying to blackmail the QT producers, even in the hoo ha about nick griffin, that story getting massive coverage across all the media

i think it is very newsworthy that a few weeks into power the new government is behaving like berlusconi

So which elected Labour politicians were on then ?

none but teh point is labour didnt try to blackmail the bbc to get one on!

Why's that the point? I'm sure they're more than happy with Campbell throwing his wait around.

they all p1ss in the same pot at the end of the show.

Call me Dave seemed more than happy to be on radio 4 the other morning. Let's be honest Campbell is really odious given the choice I'd give him a swerve too.