HearFromYourMP

Comments

• Posted by Peter Darby, 14:32, Mon 1 December 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  I can only say that my opinions on the matter were entirely articulated by Charlie Brooker here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/2008/nov/29/charlie-brooker-screen-burn-tv

  Particularly the penultimate paragraph.

• Posted by Richard and Janette Welch, 16:50, Mon 1 December 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  I will defend to the utmost the need for the continued presence of a publicy/licence-fee funded BBC. So any idea of using this episode, or any other, as a vehicle to push forward the day when the BBC is advert funded is a non-starter with me.

  By the same token, however, when the BBC gets it wrong it should be castigated and, on occasions heads should roll. As they have here.

  For myself, I find Messrs. Ross and Brand inane and I think it time that their brand of 'humour' was more strictly vetted. But I am 63 and I daresay if I was 23 I'd find them funny. So it's a matter of degree. As a proportion of the output it's tiny and those watching know what to expect.

  All in all I think the end result about right.

• Posted by Adrian Walls, 18:17, Mon 1 December 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  Thanks David,

  I don't know really why I am here posting other than I had your email. I like neither of the characters and mostly choose to avoid the tv or radio these days across the board including Britain's once great current affairs and science broadcasting we see the importance of celebrity over content winning again and again. Luckily now with digital and the internet even without satellite there is more than enough comparable alternative choice, even if half of it is the same kind of tosh.

  The fact would be if the BBC had let Ross go there would have been a fleet of limos outside White City taking him for more money to any number of independant rivals. Whether you pay for Ros and Brand through a state license or 10p on a packet of breakfast serial in the end either way you still end up paying for him even if you do not watch him.

  The BBC does not have an easy job with the divergence of media formats and I think they are the ones best left to set the rules for how they can best mix the public purse and other money to deliver a variety of choice suiting all the viewers in the UK whilst ensuring it reflects but does not push the contemporary boundaries of acceptability. It cannot however be expected to serve as some kind of moral enforcement body to drag us back to the 1950's

• Posted by Christopher Hughes, 18:21, Mon 1 December 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  This episode should not be used to weaken the BBC as a licence-fee funded organisation. However there are clearly issues which need addressing.

  The offensive remarks were in a pre-recorded show and should have been edited. They may have been acceptable on Radio 1, but not on Radio 2.

  The action taken was probably sufficient but should have been prompter.

  It remains to question whether Jonathan Ross' salary is the best use to which the licence fee might be put.

• Posted by Mrs Eleanor M Davies, 20:11, Mon 1 December 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  Dear Mr Jones, I do feel that the BBC have let the majority of their viewers down badly, in the first instance by the enormous salary paid to Mr Ross and then by the total disdain with which they treated the recipient of the (joke?) phone call.

  Reluctantly people have - apparently - lost their posts because the pre-recorded item was checked but still allowed to be broadcast. Those of us who find such items distasteful are simply told we have the choice to switch off.

  Unhappily the general standards of what used to be a well respected organisation can now be summed up in that attitude. We should, indeed switch off such degrading rubbish , however we are not able to predict just when these episodes are likely to raise their ugly heads.

  Perhaps the advert funded channels might feel they have that latitude but certainly not the publicly funded BBC. They, however, also have channels which are vehicles for 'entrepreneural' output - if they restricted such items to these channels at least we should know what to avoid when we want uninterupted viewing in the evening.

  I should not wish to see them lose their public funding because they do produce some excellent items over an extensive range. The charge of political bias might also be looked into in a general clean up along with a stricter vetting of the work put out by the (usually blamed) younger employees.

  Thank you for taking the time to examine this matter.

  Eleanor M Davies

• Posted by Robert Redhead, 23:52, Mon 1 December 2008: (Is this post abusive?) #

  Broadcast of this material was a gross error, The BBC also needs to be less free with public money paid out in salaries to so called "Stars".The whole issue of the licence fee needs to be examined in light of criminal penalties for non compliance. While I was a CAB advice worker an American colleague thought we are mad to have to have a licence for a TV.

• Posted by Mavis Stevens, 15:04, Thu 8 January 2009: (Is this post abusive?) #

  Dear David I think the saga of the two presenters was given far too much publicity and had far too little consequence for the two involved. It is simply a question of all broadcasting networks and public attempting to close the stable door after the horse has bolted. For far too long any criticism of behaviour, language etc has been branded "bigoted" and "gagging free speech". I simply do not watch any programme I consider blasphemous or containg comments which are too crude or aimed at people unable to defend anything said about them (I include the Royal family in this). It is not simply a question of lack of decency, it is a question of opposition views being gagged at almost every point because people do not want to be considered bigots or old-fashioned. I just hope that the public who created this protest continue to raise matters of this type and to increase in numbers. Yours Mavis Stevens

• Posted by David Jones, 12:48, Fri 9 January 2009: (Is this post abusive?) #

  Thanks to all who responded.

  David

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