Talking-up Scotland

PDF for printing: there-can-be-good-news-about-scotland

Images: europol.europa.eu, speakerpedia.com *

 ‘The Scottish Government has written to the UK Home Secretary (Amber Rudd) urging her to sign protocols to allow British police to remain part of the European Crime-fighting Agency, EUROPOL.’ (BBC Scotland, 30^th September 2016 at 06:30am)

Good news for the SG/SNP can be broadcast but it has to be unrelated to independence and in line with the wider BBC agenda including the support for EU membership shared by its post-Blairite senior staff.

The BBC’s senior staffing is full of people who were appointed or promoted in the Blair era. They are strongly Unionist, in their own interests. They value further promotions unrestricted by a border and self-perceive themselves as modern, outward-looking progressives. They are strongly Europhile, in their own interests. They value opportunities to travel and self-perceive themselves as modern, outward-looking progressives. Like Blair, they want to see themselves as more caring than the Tories but they don’t want to pay too much tax and they really want to retain their salaries, perks and other privileges. They are by no means Tories. They fear the nasty right-wing of the Party which does want to destroy them and their allegedly lefty bias. There was a Sutton Trust report which did suggest bias in favour of New Labour. I have to admit not being able to trace this reference. Like all elite groups, they need no conspiracy to create their patterned behaviour. They act in their own interests and their interests are the same as for that elite as a whole. They go to the same kinds of schools and universities. They recognise each other on BBC appointment panels. For example, do you remember Kirsty Wark (Wellington Girls School) as she sniped at Alex Salmond on BBC Newsnight before going off to share holiday accommodation with Jack McConnell, then New Labour First Minister?

You can see from the results below that reports unfavourable to the SG/SNP continue to dominate the early morning (06:30) broadcast. Also, reports favourable to Labour in Scotland are disproportionately common. Third, despite repeated errors by the Tories in Scotland, there are no reports on these.

My rationale for looking at the early morning reports, linking them to voter anxiety, is more fully justified in an earlier piece ‘The Power of Nightmares: Waking up to early morning bad news on BBC Scotland and fearing the unknown’ at:

https://thoughtcontrolscotland.com/2016/09/22/the-power-of-nightmares-waking-up-to-early-morning-bad-news-on-bbc-scotland-and-fearing-the-unknown/

 

The rest of the Friday 30^th September report covered:

1. Football bribes
2. The EUROPOL story
3. The stricken oil rig being loaded onto a ship
4. Links between Dumfries and Kenya

Running Total:

Running total 21 to 30/9/16                                              Number of reports

Bad news for SG/SNP                                                            9

Good news for SG/SNP                                                         4

Bad news for Labour                                                              1

Good news for Labour                                                           5

Bad news for CP                                                                      0

Good news for CP                                                                   0

 

Still Tory-arse-free and requiring some salt regarding the Good News for SG/SNP figure.

 

*Footnote re the images above: Wow that’s brutal! I mean the EUROPOL building, of course.