Tory Cronies Infiltrating B B C?

[FatticusInch]

Emily Maitlis certainly believes so.

https://news.sky.com/story/emily-maitlis-refers-to-tory-cronyism-at-heart-of-the-bbc-in-edinburgh-tv-festival-lecture-12680676

From the link.

Journalist Emily Maitlis has hit out at the BBC - her former employer - claiming its board has been infiltrated by a Conservative Party agent and former Downing Street spin doctor whom she claims is now an "arbiter of BBC impartiality".

Delivering the MacTaggart Memorial Lecture at the Edinburgh TV Festival, the ex-Newsnight presenter referred to "Tory cronyism at the heart of the BBC", as she spoke about her own perceived impartiality while working for the broadcaster.

It goes on:

Maitlis appeared to be referring to former Downing Street communications director Sir Robbie Gibb, who joined the BBC board in May 2021.

Prior to working in No 10 for the Conservative Party between 2017 and 2019, Gibb also had a successful 25-year career at the BBC, culminating in his role as head of BBC Westminster. Before that, he was deputy editor of Newsnight and editor of The Daily Politics and This Week.
Gibb has also previously acted as an editorial adviser to GB News.

Earlier in the day BBC chairman Richard Sharp told the Edinburgh TV Festival he "will deal with government interference", insisting "they value the BBC".

Mr Sharp, who is a former banker and prominent Tory party donor, was interviewed by actor David Harewood. He became BBC chairman in 2021.

Maitlis continued:

"When we hear Donald Trump or Zac Goldsmith or Nadine Dories or Marjorie Taylor Green talking about 'a witch-hunt', or Boris Johnson going the way of 'Deep State' chat, our senses should be primed. This is often a precursor to the rejection of legitimate checks and balances. We should ask why they're so afraid of scrutiny."

She’s not wrong, is she?
Who knew Tory donors were in charge at the Beeb?
One in the eye for the usual Johnson admirers who always claim that the BBC have got it in for him.

[FatticusInch]

A bit more detail from the BBC themselves.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-62662212

[FatticusInch]

This is actually quite perturbing, bordering on outrageous.

https://news.sky.com/video/share-12680736

[Mozz71]

Isn't it strange how the left think the Beeb is a Tory cesspit, while the right think it's a filthy, right-on, woke leftist commune.

You can please some of the people...

[FatticusInch]

Not heard many lefties calling it a Tory cesspit but I am perturbed at the level of blatant Tory influence on the board and at senior level, as I would be of any political party in power that had such influence in the state broadcaster.

[Spicerack]

They'll be having a season of Leni Riefenstahl films before tha knows it.

[jno]

nothing new - back in the general strike of 1926, the BBC took the knee before the Tories and refused to let the Labour Party leader on air.

[Zacs-Master]

I firmly believe we are witnessing the car crash of the BBC’s slow motion demise. I was a big supporter of the BBC but putting Matlis in the spotlight to host the Cummings interview (which was a cringeworthy watch) and then criticising her is, like the BBC R2 fiasco, like watching someone close their own coffin lid.

[tomus42]

It depends who you ask. Left wingers will tell you the BBC is infested by establishment Tory lackeys, and right wingers will tell you it's infested by Liberal elite leftie luvvies.

[FatticusInch]

Zacs-Master
//I firmly believe we are witnessing the car crash of the BBC’s slow motion demise. I was a big supporter of the BBC but putting Matlis in the spotlight to host the Cummings interview//

At the point of appearing pedantic but did she actually interview Cummings?
I thought she just just gave the opening monologue in the Newsnight programme?

[Zacs-Master]

Ah, apologies, it was Laura Kuensberg who did the garden interview, wasn’t it. My point about the BBC being a dissolving shambles still stands tho.

[middlemarch]

This is so absurd it actually made me laugh. A Conservative person on the Board is called "an agent" whereas Labour people on the Board are just normal folk sharing Emily Maitlis's world view. If there is a Conservative agent, he's been singularly unsuccessful as the BBC continues to sell the view from Islington - anti-Brexit, propagating "Climate Emergency" scares, leading the hounding of the Prime Minister, championing "diversity", claiming that there are 100+ genders.....
The views from outside Islingtonia are very different.

[ichkeria]

I think her point about being too even-handed is a good one.

You can end up giving equal weight to things which don't deserve it.

[youngmafbog]

//It depends who you ask. Left wingers will tell you the BBC is infested by establishment Tory lackeys, and right wingers will tell you it's infested by Liberal elite leftie luvvies//

There is a reason for that. The BBC is infested with the so called Metropolitan elite (aka Islington brigade) who both right and left wing hate.

[FatticusInch]

Youngmafbog,
//There is a reason for that. The BBC is infested with the so called Metropolitan elite (aka Islington brigade) who both right and left wing hate.//

You got a source/link to this mysterious, clandestine group?
Multiple searches have proved fruitless.