Rent boys, the 水晶 Methodist and 新たな展開d values at the BBC

By Stephen Glover for the Daily Mail

Published: 01:33 BST, 27 March 2014 | Updated: 18:29 BST, 1 April 2014

Although I have castigated the BBC over the years, I have seldom been as appalled by its strange values and 欠如（する） of 強健な journalistic 基準s as I was on Tuesday evening.

For several hours, テレビ視聴者s had been 知らせるd that BBC2's Newsnight was going to carry an '排除的' interview with the former chairman of the Co-op Bank, the Reverend Paul Flowers.

Readers may 解任する that last November the Mail on Sunday discovered that Mr Flowers had bought and taken 違法な 麻薬s, 含むing 水晶 meth, 割れ目 コカイン and ketamine. 明らかに incontrovertible 証拠 of his use of rent boys was also produced.

Scroll 負かす／撃墜する for ビデオ

'深い-seated 問題／発行するs': Former Co-Op bank 長，指導者 Paul Flowers has told the BBC's Newsnight how he checked into rehab for a month to を取り引きする his 麻薬 中毒, and lost many friends in the 過程

'Hellish': Paul Flowers 認める to the BBC's Jeremy Paxman that he had '深い-seated' 問題／発行するs to を取り引きする

非，不，無 of this was について言及するd on さまざまな BBC news 公式発表s. Instead, we were told that Mr Flowers had '明らかにする／漏らすd' that, while he was chairman, the ?政府 ― 含むing the （ドイツなどの）首相／（大学の）学長, George Osborne ― had put 圧力 on the Co-op Bank before it 中止するd 計画（する）s to buy 600 Lloyds Bank 支店s.

It was this botched 取引，協定 that exposed the Co-op's 墓／厳粛／彫る／重大な 財政上の problems. The 労働-supporting Mr Flowers was trying to 転換 some of the 非難する to the Tory-led 政府. And the BBC took his self-serving 主張s on 信用.

Whatever 圧力 the 政府 may have 適用するd, it was the Co-op's 決定／判定勝ち（する） as to whether or not ?to go ahead with the 取得／買収. 平等に, the bank's 悲惨な 財政上の 記録，記録的な／記録する was 完全に its ― and Mr Flowers's ― 責任／義務.?

This lopsided and weirdly indulgent 態度 に向かって Mr Flowers coloured the entire interview on Newsnight, which was 行為／行うd by Jeremy Paxman ― 伝統的に an admirably 堅い interrogator. On this occasion he was about as 法廷の as a puppy.

He smiled 情愛深く at the former Co-op Bank chairman and Methodist 大臣 or looked 関心d. He and Mr Flowers 株d jokes about Lucifer and the 宗教的な poet Dante. Questions were patted over the 逮捕する as though they were a couple of old clubmen reviewing the distant past.

Preposterous

Did Mr Paxman pull his punches because he was worried about the mental 井戸／弁護士席-存在 of the former 銀行業者? (Mr Flowers 認める he had …に出席するd a 28-day 中毒s 治療 programme that was 'cathartic and traumatic'.) Had some 事前の 協定 been made not to ask difficult questions? Or had Paxo been 教えるd by his bosses to go?平易な?

The reputedly fearsome inquisitor barely について言及するd 麻薬s or rent boys. When he did pluck up the courage to ask Mr Flowers whether he had taken 麻薬s while chairman, he was swatted aside with the excuse that, as the police were looking at the 事柄, he'd rather not comment.?

長，指導者: Methodist 大臣 Mr Flowers pictured giving 証拠 to the 財務省 委員会 in November

Exposed: Mr Flowers was caught on camera 明らかに discussing コカイン, ketamine and 水晶 meth

Downfall: The 不名誉d former bank 長，指導者, pictured on an 演習 bike is also 申し立てられた／疑わしい to have brought 麻薬s along to orgies

But Mr Flowers was 許すd to insinuate that the Mail on Sunday's 主張s were at least partly 誤った without 存在 招待するd to 明示する which of them he was referring to. When he preposterously 示唆するd that the paper had 'pseudo-国粋主義者／ファシスト党員, far-権利 傾向s [that] make Vladimir Putin look like a bleeding heart 自由主義の', Paxo did not demur.

Nor did he think it was 価値（がある） について言及するing 主張s that Mr Flowers was 調査／捜査するd for fiddling his expenses when chairman of a 麻薬s charity some years ago, or remind him that in 2011 he had been 要求するd to stand 負かす／撃墜する as a 労働 議員 in Bradford after gay porn was discovered on his laptop.

He didn't 問い合わせ about the soft 貸付金s and 寄付s made to the 労働 Party by the Co-op Bank when Mr Flowers was chairman, 含むing a £50,000 gift to the office of Ed Balls, who, with Ed Miliband, 招待するd him to a shindig at No?10 in February 2010.

マスコミ attention: Paul Flowers arrives at Stainbeck police 駅／配置する in 物陰／風下d in January to answer 保釈（金） over 申し立てられた／疑わしい 麻薬s 供給（する） offences. Police 保釈（金）d him again 未解決の その上の 調査s

Perhaps most bizarrely of all, he scarcely 診察するd Mr Flowers over his 悲惨な （議長，司会の）地位，能力, for which he was paid £125,000 a year. Paxo should have について言及するd that only last week the former 労働 City 大臣 Lord Myners criticised the Co-op Bank for its 'dysfunctionality' and undemocratic nature.

He did remember that last year Mr Flowers told a ありふれたs 委員会 that the bank's 資産s were £3 billion when they were, in fact,? £47 billion, but 表明するd no astonishment when the former ?chairman partly 非難するd his amazing error on the 侵略 of MPs.

It was like watching a once magnificent heavyweight ボクシング 支持する／優勝者 shuffling around the （犯罪の）一味, either unwilling or unable to land a 選び出す／独身 punch. If Mr Flowers had been a Tory-supporting, fat-cat City 銀行業者, Mr Paxman would surely have torn him apart ― and rightly so.

Needless to say, though the former 銀行業者 認める he had 'sinned', he was 気が進まない to 収容する／認める much fault, 主張するd that he had been 任命するd after 'a very rigorous 過程 of 選択' and 絶えず cast around for excuses for his?失敗s.

I realise that Newsnight 普通の／平均（する）s only about 500,000 テレビ視聴者s a show, but it remains the BBC's 真っ先の 現在の 事件／事情／状勢s programme. Mr Flowers is 有罪の of moral lapses inexcusable in a layman, let alone a clergyman, and he has 統括するd over a bank which may very かもしれない be going to the 塀で囲む.

If there is any man alive who deserves to be 運ぶ／漁獲高d over the coals, it's the Reverend Paul Flowers. Some 排除的! But I 嫌疑者，容疑者／疑う he 同意d to 存在 interviewed by Newsnight only because he knew he would be 扱う／治療するd with kid gloves.

Is it possible Paxo's brain has somehow been infiltrated by Ian Katz, the former 副 editor of The 後見人, who was 任命するd editor of Newsnight last July, where he joined an old 同僚 from the paper, political editor Allegra Stratton?

Bias

Mr Katz recently 強化するd the Left-of-Centre line-up on the programme by 任命するing Duncan Weldon, a former 労働 助言者 and 上級の 経済学者 at the 貿易（する） Union 議会, who has very little journalistic experience. But he is a good Leftie!

The same Mr Katz gleefully tweeted Mr Flowers's outrageous 発言／述べるs abou t the Mail on Sunday when the show had ended. Is this how a grown-up editor should behave? Is it serious journalism? No, and no.

Newsnight has nearly always had a Left-wing bias, but Mr ?Katz appears to be in the ?過程 of shamelessly 強固にする／合併する／制圧するing it. The 任命 of Mr Weldon (another 明らかな Leftie, Chris Cook, has also recently jumped 船内に as 政策 editor) 量s to another rude gesture に向かって those who don't 株 his prejudices.

But then the BBC ますます seems to 占領する a world of its own. A few months before Mr Katz was slotted into place, its director-general, Tony Hall, 任命するd James Purnell, a former Blairite 閣僚 大臣, as 'director of 戦略 and 数字表示式の'. On Monday, Mr Purnell opined that the licence 料金 作品 'pretty 井戸／弁護士席'. That's all 権利?then.

Arrogance

一方／合間, it 現れるs that Lord Hall is 辞退するing to appear before a 委員会 of MPs to discuss the BBC's ニュース報道 of EU 事件／事情／状勢s, （人命などを）奪う，主張するing that this would 土台を崩す '編集（者）の independence'. What arrogance! What bunkum!

Of course, the BBC has many 罰金 新聞記者／雑誌記者s. Paxo should be one of them. Another may be Laura Kuenssberg ― one 約束ing 最近の 新採用する to Newsnight ― who not long ago brilliantly eviscerated Harriet Harman over her links to the Paedophile （警察などへの）密告，告訴（状） 交流 during the Seventies.

But the interview of Paul Flowers 構成するd an abdication of proper journalism. That, and the way the BBC 促進するd it throughout its news programmes as a hugely important 排除的 ― 反して, in fact, it was ーするつもりであるd as a piece of anti-Tory 宣伝 ― betray some pretty 新たな展開d journalistic values. The truth is that the BBC would not have exposed his deviant behaviour and colossal mistakes ― as newspaper journalism has done ― in a thousa nd years.

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