Mohamed Amersi is suing over Panorama episode that made claims of his suspected involvement in corruption
A Conservative and Reform UK donor lost out on a knighthood and a peerage amid claims of his involvement in corruption, the high court has heard at the start of his defamation case against the BBC.
An episode of Panorama in 2021 and a BBC article caused “very serious harm” to Mohamed Amersi, his barrister, Oliver Powell, said on Wednesday.
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The BBC has pulled material from its Bitesize educational website, used by 1.7 million pupils a week, after it was caught rewarding kids for backing open borders and pushing Left-wing views on migration and Net Zero.
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In the UK, the BBC has been taking in public employees from government departments, and letting them work on news content, specifically “fact-checking” and drafting material for BBC News and its “fact-checking” arm, BBC Verify.
The secondments came from the Government Statistical Service, and took place over the past eight years, with 39 civil servants spending three or six months at the BBC, while their salaries were still paid by their own departments.
The Government Statistical Service is now advertising more of these secondments for 2027.
This was first reported by The Telegraphon October 17.
Meanwhile, the BBC is the same public service broadcaster that the government wants to give more money by introducing a “YouTube tax” – a plan to extend the license fee to streaming services.
And the same BBC is the one the government wants to push up people’s feeds on YouTube and other platforms, by making those platforms give it prominence in their algorithms. A green paper, “Watch this space: a new strategic direction for UK media,” is proposing this.
In the past, Reclaim The Net has reported about this plan, and how the US government said that this would mean “mandating that platforms algorithmically amplify government-preferred media.”
So, to sum it up: the government wants people to fund the BBC, wants the algorithm to favor the BBC, and has its own staff inside the BBC writing the fact-checks.
The subjects they worked on were “small boat” crossings of migrants, Covid, crime, migration, and life expectancy. The work of these civil servants, whose salaries were still paid by their respective government departments, was published under the bylines “BBC News” and “BBC Verify.”
This is how some of the secondees described their work on the Government Statistical Service blog.
One from the Home Office said she worked as “BBC Verify’s consultant statistician, fact-checking claims in heated election debates, ‘filing copy’ on interesting stories, and advising journalists.”
She also worked on “small boat arrivals and visa applications” and did “quality assurance on copies and charts before they were published to the online live page.”
Another from the Department for Business and Trade said, “One of my first tasks was drafting ‘copy'” on annual population statistics, “This was because they related to migration, which was always a topic of interest.” And: “My lines were then quickly pulled into a full article on the main site.”
That post, however, “was taken down after The Telegraph contacted the BBC” – and the BBC “has since insisted that those on secondment do not write copy.”
But the civil servant had just said that he did.
This secondee also worked on “fact-checking claims about crime rates among different nationalities that were dominating news cycles.”
Another civil servant seconded to the BBC analyzed data on “small boat migration” to see if the weather in 2022 meant fewer crossings: “In probably my proudest moment, this made it into an article on the front page and a TV piece.”
The job advert says that “Your salary for this professional development opportunity will continue to be paid by your parent department.”
The person they are looking for should have “the ability to influence decision making, working with credibility and proactively with customers to share knowledge and information.” They will also “be representing their department and the Government Statistical Service.”
The BBC’s own rules, however, say that “Our audiences must be able to trust the BBC and be confident that our editorial decisions are not influenced by outside interests, political or commercial pressures, or any personal interests.”
And: “External activities of individuals working for the BBC must not undermine the public’s perception of the impartiality, integrity, independence and objectivity of the BBC.”
A spokesman for the BBC said that “All BBC journalism and editorial decisions are made by BBC journalists and editors, in line with the BBC’s editorial guidelines, so these statisticians never make editorial decisions.”
But the corporation has also said it will now amend the bylines of the articles written by the civil servants to show their true jobs – something it will do only now, after The Telegraph asked.
Opposition politicians and others have been scathing in their criticism of the scheme, with Mike Wood, shadow Cabinet Office minister, saying that the BBC “must never allow a political agenda to influence BBC coverage via the back door.”
Danny Kruger, of Reform UK, was even more direct: “This is scandalous and looks dangerously as though the BBC has breached its own rules on impartiality.”
Oxford professor Carl Heneghan said, “If you have people writing for you with competing interests, it won’t be impartial. It is the government organisation you will be partial to. You will want to toe the line.”
The arrangement is so absurd that people would probably laugh at it if they heard it was happening in North Korea.
But it’s happening in the UK, and it’s not funny. The “journalists” in question were never identified as government employees to the readers, and the change of heart in that regard comes only now, after a newspaper investigated and reported about it.
The BBC has suspended a placement scheme for civil servants amid an outcry over impartiality after it was revealed that Whitehall staff were tasked with fact-checking contentious issues such as immigration and Covid.
The BBC has been accused of using its Bitesize website to push open borders, Net Zero and woke ideology on children as young as 11, teaching them that more immigration is great and anyone who disagrees is likely a bigot.
The BBC is making a documentary series about the influence and legacy of J.K. Rowling without any input from the author which brands her a "polarising figure".
Further exclusive extracts from Chris Morrison's new book on the invented 'climate crisis' are published today on the Daily Sceptic. Read about the role of the BBC and Met Office in driving the hysteria.
The BBC pays white staff less on average than their ethnic minority colleagues in every pay band bar one, stoking concerns about the impact of the corporation's diversity drive.
Comedy clubs are begging for taxpayer bailouts, the BBC is censoring classic sketches and Muslim activists are trying to ban John Cleese. British comedy is becoming less funny by the day, says Steven Tucker.
The BBC has finally accepted that it should not have predetermined Nigel Farage's guilt by referring to his "failure" to declare donations. But, preposterously, it still claimed there was "no intent of bias".
The BBC has been slammed after publishing a piece arguing that the popular "bare-looking" manicure trend is rooted in racism, classism and "white supremacy".
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