Gaza: BBC Coverage Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
Bob Blackman
Main Page: Bob Blackman (Conservative - Harrow East)Department Debates - View all Bob Blackman's debates with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
(1 day, 18 hours ago)
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Lisa Nandy
I am very happy to give my hon. Friend that assurance. As I said in answer to an earlier question, my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has raised this issue, and he and I are working very closely together on it. My hon. Friend will be aware that the BBC World Service plays a critical role in ensuring that free and fair information is available all over the world, which is why we rightly expect the highest standards from the BBC.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
I welcome the Secretary of State’s robust view on the BBC. However, the problem is that the BBC does not refer to Hamas as a terrorist organisation, as it should. Indeed, the problem is that David Collier, an investigative journalist, could actually go through the documentary and identify all the errors that were made while sitting at his computer. If the BBC cannot do that, something is seriously wrong, particularly when it is in the position of commissioning this documentary, not doing it internally. Can the Secretary of State make sure that when she talks to the BBC, it makes extra efforts to ensure that if it commissions these sorts of documentaries, they are actually accurate and not using terrorists and potentially funnelling money to terrorists?
Lisa Nandy
I am happy to give the hon. Gentleman that assurance. That was part of the discussions I had with the BBC director general earlier this week. I would expect an organisation like the BBC already to have robust systems in place on that, and I have been assured that that is part of the internal review.