Your teeth may need to be long to remember the phrase ‘the Vultures of Fleet Street’ being commonly bandied about. However, all these years later, it seems little has changed apart from the location of our national press. In those bygone days, if there was one place we could obtain our news without editorial slant or potshots, it was the Beeb. Good old Auntie, the BBC. Yes, she dragged herself along, always a little behind everyone else, but she had fibre and morals. She was here for us, and we knew we could rely on her. She told it as it was, without fear or favour. Not so today, I fear!
Today I find little to distinguish the BBC News and Current Affairs programmes, both television and radio, from our national press. It loves to sensationalise, nitpick, appears to have a view on everything, and will often tell us what will happen as a result of some news – when nobody can be sure of that! When I watch news programmes, I want the facts, and the facts only. Anything else should appear completely separate, in another programme, where it is made abundantly clear it is someone’s view, and not a factual report.
I wouldn’t be so bold as to accuse the BBC of having a party-political bias, I don’t believe it does, but I do feel it has changed from being that once respected Auntie into a Mischievous Nephew. I cannot excuse the national press for its mischief-making, but I do understand it – when a newspaper can be up to a day late with the news, it needs something to attract reader interest. However, that is not the case with television and radio, where news is often up-to-the-minute, so here I can neither excuse nor understand it. Is it all about ratings? It is certainly not about the people!
Public complaints, as opposed to views, are sometimes aired on Points of View, and they may even be referred to on the Breakfast programme and Regional News, but is any notice taken of them? Sound quality is a common cause for complaint, from viewers’ feedback to becoming a topic in local pubs. Compared to yesteryear, when radio and television repair technicians throughout the land relied on the BBC standard – and I know; I was in the game – today the sound quality of some programmes is so abysmal it leads one to suspect they were hashed together as a project for a bunch of trainees.
Recently, Brian Cox’s Wonders of the Solar System came under fire, and to give the BBC due merit here, it did respond to the complaints this time, but only this time? Background music should be just that: in the background, and nothing should obscure what the commentator has to tell us. Nevertheless, in recent years, it seems it has become all about making the viewer dive for the remote control to sit through a programme with a finger constantly operating the volume control. I have nine sound modes on my television, and often there is not one of them, not even forced mono, where, if I cater for the background or introductory music to not awaken the household, I can hear the narrator satisfactorily. From what I’ve seen and heard, there must be millions like me. Try watching the BBC News channel some nights, or the Breakfast programme, without waking the neighbours. I am beginning to hate drums! When I wish to interact, I shall press the red button, thank you! Do not force it on me!
Many years ago, in the days of cinema newsreels, especially when there was favourable war footage, the practise of increasing the sound level on introductions and logos was referred to as the Word of God. It was employed to give an air of authority to what the public were about to see – often propaganda. You’ll need some long teeth to remember Gaumont British News, British Movietone News, and dear old Pathe with its cockerel in the triangle. How that bird could crow when it was needed! Do we still require the same system in place today?
Of course, ITV is frequently as bad, especially with playing commercials at an amplified level, and some of those obscure free movie channels can be an absolute nightmare, but then, I don’t expect the same standards from them. Bring back Auntie; she was a good old stick!
