Gary Lineker breached the BBC’s social media rules in tweets about Tory MPs during a row about the Government’s Rwanda policy, the incoming corporation Chairman believes. BBC News has the story.
Samir Shah told MPs that he defended the right to freedom of speech but such rows damaged the BBC’s reputation.
He said the sports presenter’s replies on X “seem to breach” rules against attacking individuals.
Lineker maintains that his social media posts are within the BBC’s guidelines.
MPs on the Culture Media and Sport Committee were questioning Dr. Shah ahead of his confirmation as BBC Chairman after he was named as the Government’s choice following Richard Sharp’s resignation in April.
Although the BBC is independent, the Chairman is appointed by the Government.
Lineker, 63, added his name to an open letter opposing the Government’s plan to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda.
That sparked criticism from Tory MPs, including Defence Secretary Grant Shapps, party Deputy Chairman Lee Anderson, and Jonathan Gullis, who accused him of breaching impartiality and complained to the corporation.
The Match of the Day presenter later said on X that he would “put a word in” for Mr. Anderson when he lost his seat at the next General Election, criticised Mr. Shapps’s use of several names in business dealings and said Mr. Gullis “hasn’t read the new guidelines… or, should I say, had someone read them to him?”
The row follows previous complaints about Lineker’s social media activities, which led to a review of guidelines conducted by the former Editor-in-Chief of ITN, John Hardie.
Dr. Shah told the committee that he didn’t think that the row “was very helpful either for Gary Lineker or the BBC or the cause he supports because it becomes a story about Gary Lineker and the BBC.”
“Non-news presenters are free to express their opinions but there is some guidance on civility, manner, and not to make ad hominem attacks,” he said
Worth reading in full.
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I think we’ve done this one to death. I can’t stand the bloke nor can I stand his views, but even if the BBC sacks him or nails him to a cross, it’s not important in the scheme of things. The fundamental problem is the existence of a state funded and controlled broadcaster, paid for through a tax on TV viewing. The only way this problem gets solved is privatising the BBC. OFCOM needs to go too.
Terrific post tof.
True. We cannot have a State Broadcaster that spouts Liberal Progressive bias since the people who fund it (us) are not all Liberal Progressives. Infact at the 2019 election conservatives had an 80 seat majority.
Indeed and I think it’s unrealistic to think that any media organisation can be forced into being “unbiased” or “balanced” or “neutral”.
Not sure I totally agree. Yes, the slimy, virtue-signalling, tosser that is Lineker is an irrelevance, but the context of his slimy, virtue-signalling, tosserism (new word for Oxford Dictionary?) isn’t. The context being the irony that the public are expected to line this dangerous prats pockets so that he can feel emboldened to troll half the people doing so.
But agree entirely with your solution. I cannot, however, understand why anyone on this side of the argument would still be paying the BBC to gaslight them – it’s absolutely baffling to me.
As I’ve said before, recently, the reason I’m still paying the BBC licence fee is because I want to watch GB News, and an occasional ITV programme, and occasional programmes on other channels. That shouldn’t be baffling. If I could watch GB News by paying GB News, and not pay anything to the BBC, I wouldn’t pay anything to the BBC, but the absurd reality is that I have to pay the BBC even though I don’t want to watch the BBC but want to watch GB News.
I suppose one argument is that the BBC is so evil that you should sacrifice watching GB News live for the cause. My household has a TV license as my wife watches TV and I don’t hold with divorce – that’s my excuse. I like to think if I were single I would ditch the TV license, but who knows?
You can watch what you want, just don’t pay the damn license. If we can’t even have the courage to refuse to pay to be mentally abused then we’ve got zero chance of doing anything meaningful. We should not be respectful of ‘laws’ that make zero sense or are harmful. If you’re not someone who’s comfortable breaking laws that aim to brainwash you and your children through dangerous left-wing propaganda, then just stop watching GB news live and stream it on catch up. Take a stand and chip in. That’s why I find it baffling.
The danger I see with singling out Lineker is that if he’s ticked off or sacked, a lot of people will think “job done” whereas of course we here know that the BBC cannot be saved and that it’s the world’s best funded (woke) political party.
I agree, but that’s all the more reason to criticise the BBC for not having presenters whom all sections of society can watch without getting irritated or annoyed.
I think it’s simply unachievable to have “presenters whom all sections of society can watch without getting irritated or annoyed”. The only sensible option is to allow sections of society to choose whose wages they help to pay.
The problems at the BBC go far deeper than Lineker.
As a BBC journalist and colleague of the egregious Spring woman wrote to me once:
“Of course those who believe in conspiracy theories are not going to call their beliefs conspiracy theories, and are going to call themselves mainstream, moderate people.
We viewed footage of the speakers and spoke to people who were there.
We have no obligation to give a platform to erroneous ideas. We don’t, to take an extreme example, broadcast the manifestos of mass murderers alongside police statements so that people can “make up their own minds”.
I’m not saying the people there were violent. Some of them were (as the story reflected) were drawn by legitimate concerns. But the speakers (Mr Icke and others) were not expressing mainstream views that would benefit from airing and debate.”
I’m sure this is quite typical of how most of them think. Quite possibly most broadcasters and journalists think it’s their job to educate and correct wrongthink, just don’t do it on my ££££ while pretending to be “balanced”.
Read what was sent to me and just take in the breathtaking arrogance, and the unshakeable belief that I would understand why only “legitimate concerns” should be aired.
I don’t think it’s at all unachievable to have “presenters whom all sections of society can watch without getting irritated or annoyed”. In fact I think the BBC are currently achieving it with Match Of The Day 2 – which, for some unknown reason, Gary Lineker never presents, maybe because he’s not being paid enough to work two days in succession – Mark Chapman doesn’t annoy whole sections of society, nor did Adrian Chiles before him. And nor did Des Lynam.
You’re clearly more tolerant than I am of TV presenters. I’m against coerced funding of TV channels on principle, but my main point was regarding matters political/moral/social, rather than aesthetic or personal. If a channel is concerned with news and current affairs then it will be appealing to some and not to others simply because of its political slant.
If Lineker was employed by a private media organisation he would have been sacked long ago. Which tells us all we need to know doesn’t it? el Beeb does exactly as it pleases.
Does anybody really believe Lineker is worth even 5% of his current salary? And it is a salary he receives because he is an employee.
If Lineker was sacked tonight Match of the Day would receive a massive bounce this weekend because football fans care only about football and not the cue card numpties talking “it’s a game of two halves Gary, innit.”
The only worthwhile programme to make off the ball commentary the star was Saint and Greavsie. Lineker and whichever muppets accompany him are piss poor amateurs compared to the aforementioned legends.
Get rid of the crisp salesman for the sake of some bloody peace for crying out loud.
Yep. According to the BBC, Obama and Biden are good and Trump is bad. Palestine is good and Israel is bad. The science of climate is all 100% settled and no discussion or debate is to be had. Since when did a TV channel decide matters of science?—————- Ofcourse it really isn’t about science which is why their world view on it is on the side of the climate justice and wealth redistribution people at the UN.
And also the Covid vaccines are so undoubtedly safe and effective that there can never be any experts making any criticism of the vaccines on the BBC, not one, ever, because anyone who makes any criticism whatsoever of the vaccines is therefore not an expert, according to the logic of the BBC’s propaganda.
Ah yes—The tyranny of experts.——–Isn’t it funny how you can have any occupation whatsoever and if you harp on about climate change you will be given air time. But if you question any of it you will be told “You are not a scientist”
I watch match of the day purely for the football. The week when they all stood in solidarity behind this tool and there was no commentary was great. Normally a 1hour 45 minute slot was reduced to just 45 minutes, which just goes to show how much crap they speak. The other bonus was I got to go to bed an hour earlier.
The punditry makes it more interesting but I don’t understand why the BBC pays Lineker so much for his tiny contribution to it, there are many ex-footballers who could do as good a job for a tenth of Lineker’s pay. Lineker makes a few good jokes, but they’re not that funny nor that frequent that they’re worth so much money. Robbie Savage and Chris Sutton on Radio 5 are much funnier.
I don’t really understand the appeal of this character. I vaguely rember him as a footballer. It is as if there is some sort of mutual programming arrangement whereby they selected him to be a rather unmasculine sportsman and then he went along with it and then he became what they turned him into as he feminised the nation. Just look at the funeral of Diana when people felt compelled to gush more than they did at their own mother’s funeral. As Orwell said in Burmese Days of his corrupt police chief: he wears a mask and his face grows to fit it.
FFS, let the man say what he wants.
I disagree with almost every single one of his political views.
But I don’t think he should lose his job over it.
That’s what the left does.
The point is that he is a BBC presenter and as we are all forced to pay the BBC licence fee if we want to watch TV, then BBC presenters should not be one-sided and represent only one wing of political opinion, and alienate half the viewers. Nobody has any objection to Gary Lineker getting a job elsewhere, such as Sky, and then saying whatever he wants, and earning as much money as Sky are willing to pay him, because then we can all choose to pay for Sky or choose not to.
I disagree. The BBC is not impartial. It is the communications arm of the British establishment which has a clear agenda. The BBC drives that agenda very hard.
The pretence of impartiality is farcical.Let Linaker say what he wants and we can put an end to the charade.
Can you imagine how much you have been softened up, lets say you and your parent’s generation until the 1940s. Those born earlier have an understanding of survival. My only concern is fellow English people and frankly there seems to be this delusion where we are still living in a time of tranquility. If you can turn your back on your fellow Englishman then you never really belonged or had a claim here. That means all of them warts and all.
Sorry, did someone use the words BBC and impartiality in the same sentence?