CommonSpace columnist David Carr watches a controversial Question Time from Dundee so you don’t have to
I VERY seldom watch BBC Question Time. I can find better things to do of an evening than watch politically-themed showbiz, the main function of which appears to be to give us an opportunity to yell at the telly in much the same way that some yell at referees.
And that David Dimbleby really is insufferable, isn’t he? An arbitrary and grandstanding chair who insists on his own agenda. Quite why he’s regarded as an eminence grise has always escaped me.
From Wings over Scotland to Bella Caledonia and the Wee Ginger Dug, all have commented on last week’s episode from Dundee, and many social media commentators have alleged bias. Do they have a point?
Question Time is one of the BBC’s flagship UK programmes. It helps the BBC to fulfill its remit of ‘going out to the regions’ by pulling up its caravan at various locations throughout the UK.
Question Time is one of the BBC’s flagship UK programmes. It helps the BBC to fulfill its remit of ‘going out to the regions’ by pulling up its caravan at various locations throughout the UK, including – on a strictly proportional number of occasions – in Scotland.
And here’s the point: it is a UK-wide programme, covering largely UK politics. When it comes to Scotland, there is a delicate balancing act because the audience and panelists available locally will tend not to be representative of the UK-wide mix. And so there is some juggling to be done.
And who can blame the production team if they drop a ball or two? The programme has a limited remit in Scottish politics – despite the main production office’s Glasgow location.
In fairness to the critics, the Dundee audience, in their accents and their pro-union sentiment, appeared patently unrepresentative of their location.
Full disclosure: I – a non-Dundonian – applied to be part of it. I don’t know the selection process, but they asked me about how I’d voted at the last General Election, whether I was in a party. They were – presumably – selecting for a representative balance.
When it comes to Scotland, there is a delicate balancing act because the audience and panelists available locally will tend not to be representative of the UK-wide mix. And so there is some juggling to be done.
But representative over what area? Dundonian political sentiment is something of an outlier in UK terms. Isn’t it reasonable that it should be diluted with incomers? Even if it might make ‘going out to the regions’ look like window dressing.
And so a couple of former Labour candidates – did the BBC know? – featured prominently. Well maybe it’s inevitable that the politically minded apply for Question Time audiences. Meh. I’m hardly apolitical myself.
And then there was the panel. All of the Holyrood parties were represented, but who was that gawky, posh boy in the bad jacket and tartan tie with a remarkable resemblance to Peter Capaldi in Local Hero? (Some Telegraph columnist called Tim Stanley). Wasn’t he out of place?.
But this is not a Scottish politics programme (significantly, the May elections weren’t discussed). Was this not, simply, the usual ‘balanced’ panel?
The questions started. It was largely four against two as the Conservatives’ Ruth Davidson, Labour’s Jenny Marra, the Lib-Dem’s Oor Wullie Rennie and Posh Stanley unionsplained – mainly to the SNP’s John Swinney – why independence was never a good idea in the first place.
They were facilitated by the stately chair, Dimbleby, who required Swinney to “answer the points”. It’s what he does.
Dundonian political sentiment is something of an outlier in UK terms. Isn’t it reasonable that it should be diluted with incomers? Even if it might make ‘going out to the regions’ look like window dressing.
A question on Europe degenerated into an unclear argument over whether Scots had been swayed by fears over expulsion from Europe and who knew what when about a likely, future Brexit referendum. All very arcane and of limited relevance to our present situation.
Then the recent GERS figures and Scotland’s oil came up. Swinney was flailing by this point. I’ve never found him to be an effective TV performer. While it may be true that he took a pummelling, it’s also true that he didn’t roll with the punches.
The Greens’ Patrick Harvie was genuinely impressive. Scotland needs to wean itself off oil anyway, he contested. Because – the planet! Because – the economy!
Meanwhile, I followed the debate on Twitter. The Scots I follow were commenting on Scottish aspects, including the question of any bias, while on the #bbcqt feed a typical tweet read something like: ‘Scotland, Scotland, Scotland. Boring!’
It would be paranoid in the extreme to imagine the Beeb as puppeteers, pockling the audience composition, stage managing an anti-indy smackdown.
Michty! – as they say in Dundee. You mean that 90 per cent of the UK-wide audience for whom the programme was made were not interested in Scottish independence? Or even knew who these damned panelists were? Jings! Crivvens! Help ma boab!
Not long after, I gave up. You can watch the rest on iPlayer, if you can bear it. It was every bit as bad as every other edition of Question Time.
There’s bias, and then there’s bias. It would be paranoid in the extreme to imagine the Beeb as puppeteers, pockling the audience composition, stage managing an anti-indy smackdown. They’re not clever enough. And Question Time isn’t important enough. How many Scottish voters will have been swayed?
A less deliberate bias is unconscious and comes from the production process. Were we simply watching what happens when a pre-ordained format and a remit to aim at a UK-wide balance helicopters in to Scotland?
Don’t get me wrong. I have long thought that Question Time is a shambolically poor excuse for TV programme – and Dimbleby awful. And that was before they placed greater emphasis on audience participation, turning it into the televisual equivalent of an Alan Partridge phone-in.
A less deliberate bias is unconscious and comes from the production process. Were we simply watching what happens when a pre-ordained format and a remit to aim at a UK-wide balance helicopters in to Scotland?
Perhaps a London-based Question Time does not serve discussion of Scots politics well. That is certainly an argument for devolution of broadcasting.
But was that even the issue here? The BBC loves to present itself as a worldwide, journalistic beacon. Is it as good as it thinks?
The problem with the Dundee outing was that it was another shabby episode of a poorly produced entertainment show. Why did we expect better?
The CommonSpace opinion section is an open platform for anyone who wants to voice their views and does not represent the editorial position of CommonSpace itself. If you’d like to have a piece published, email CommonSpace editor Angela Haggerty at angela@common.scot
Picture courtesy of UK Parliament