The BBC gave 2 uninterrupted mins to positive election coverage. It got little attention

Astonishingly, the BBC gave two full, uninterrupted minutes to a guest speaking positively – and correctly so – about Labour’s performance in last week’s local elections.

Labour supporters are all too familiar with the usual syndrome – of Tory guests respectfully given free rein to spout even outright falsehoods, while the same presenters interrupt and contradict the Labour guest constantly, barely allowing him/her to finish a sentence before leaping in.

Such was the case at the weekend with a very impressive black, female Labour guest – who was interrupted and spoken over while the white, male Tory had clear space.

But on Saturday’s afternoon news broadcasts – at least the 2pm and 3pm versions – journalist Michael Segalov was given the (relative) luxury of two minutes to speak about Labour’s significant achievements, without interruption.

Two questions were asked, appropriately and when he’d finished his answer to the previous one – and his fact-based comments were completely at odds with almost all of the rest of the weekend’s commentary. He even found time to put back-bench naysayers in their place.

And yet it seems most people barely noticed. When Segalov published a clip of the interview, it had – in over two days – only 12,000 views.

It’s too rare an occurrence for that – and too important that a more realistic, accurate and therefore positive view of the local election results becomes the take-away for the majority of people.

Labour made gains in seats and even more in vote share and – again – frightened the life out of the Tories. A general election returning those results would have put Corbyn in Downing Street, while the Tories lost almost triple the number of seats the BBC broadcast – and Labour under Corbyn showed last year it can perform even better in a General Election than in local elections.

But – apart from this two-minute segment – the BBC heavily emphasised a counter-factual, negative narrative of the results.

So watch. Then share:

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