NEWS OVER THE AIR

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 19886, 14 March 1939, Page 8

NEWS OVER THE AIR

8.8. C. UNDER FIRE BULLETINS CRITICISED "LEFT WING ALARMIST" LONPON, Feb. 26. For a week letters to The Times have been complaining that the British Broadcasting Corporation's news bulletins have a Left Wing bias, are alarmist, and are too full of unconfirmed rumours. ' Many correspondents are critical, and few are approving. The Daily Mail has joined in with a leading article, attacking the 8.8. C. Because many critics have declared that the 8.8. C. gives too much news of raids by General Franco's air force, Left Wing commentators, regard the campaign as part of an effort to persuade the British public to accept gladly the recognition of General Franco. They insist that what The Times readers and the Daily Mail object to is not the 8.8.C.'s partiality, but its impartiality. No Check on Items In a leading article, summing up the complaints. The Times says: "What-

ever news is both accurate and important must find a place in the bulletins, however unpleasant. News should not be suppressed to ensure the audience a good night's rest. "The complaint that items are selected without sufficient consideration of their relative importance has certain substance. The 8.8. C. chooses the items of news that certain great agencies offer. It may take or leave ' them. "The trouble is that the 8.8. C. has not its own means of checking the items. Consequently listeners are mystified at their failure to find any ; morning newspaper report (say, of some menacing movement of troops), which was broadcast prominently overnight. "A night-long struggle goes on in every responsible morning newspaper office to check and counter-check doubtful rumours. All have the whole material available to the 8.8. C, but all have, as the 8.8. C. cannot have, their own trained staffs throughout the world. The 8.8. C. would do j well to watch news values vigilantly, and use its vast influence to demand from the agencies straight- news, which once was their staple product, and which the serious public still desires and deserves." Paper's Policy Criticised At the annual meeting of the company which owns the Yorkshire Post, influential shareholders attacked the editorial policy of the Post, which,

almost alone among English Conservative newspapers, has strongly and consistently criticised Mr. Chamberlain's Munich policy. Lord Bingiey, a former Conservative member of the House of Commons, objected to "the persistent disparagement of Mr. Chamberlain" by the Post. He suggested that the Post should support the Conservative Party, subject to reasonable limitations, and so enable the party to have a better chance at the next election. Mr. Osbert Peake, a Conservative M.P., expressed the opinion that there was justifiable cause for complaint about the editorial policy of the Post. The chairman, Mr. Rupert Beckett, said that the criticism of Mr. Chamberlain was not due to lack of allegiance to the Conservative Party, but to conclusions reached after the collation and study of information, which experienced men had gathered at home and abroad. The general correctness of their conclusions had been vindicated. He would not consent to say anything that would tie the hands of i the Post. _____