YP Letters: Expressing a view that you don’t like over BBC and Brexit isn’t ‘bias’

Has the BBC shown bias in its coverage of the closure of the Honda plant at Swindon?

PATRICK Mercer (The Yorkshire Post, February 23) accused the BBC of a lack of balance and therefore of showing bias over Brexit.

In particular he took issue over their coverage of the announcement of Honda’s closure of their Swindon plant.

Patrick Mercer: The sorry story of the BBC and Brexit bias

In the BBC’s article of February 18 about Honda closing its Swindon car plant, there were approximately 75 lines of narrative.

Of these 31 could be classed as neutral i.e. not mentioning Brexit at all, 24 made the case that Brexit was not to blame and 20 that it was.

One has to go to lines 14-15 before we get the first Brexit related comment from Unite union official Des Quinn who blamed the ‘chaotic Brexit uncertainty’ for the decision.

This is countered by Brexit-supporting local MP Justin Tomlinson on lines 29-30 that ‘it was based on global trends and not Brexit’. Bias is not the expression of a view that you do not like Mr Mercer. It is, however, expressing only one side of an argument without backing it up by evidence, something I am afraid you are far more guilty of than the BBC.