Mail envy

The Mail On Sunday had a pop at Newsnight this weekend, over low audience figures and low-brow agenda.  "Scoop" Miles Goslett managed to provoke a quote or two out of a BBC spokesman, thus...

A BBC spokesman said its research showed an average Newsnight audience this year of 664,000, and that the audience on May 19 was just more than a quarter of a million. The BARB figures, he said, were based on overnight figures of those viewers who watched it live and online and were not so accurate because they did not include those who had recorded the show to watch it at a later date. He said: 'On Thursday, May 19, the audience was 257,000 when it was up against a special edition of Question Time broadcast from a prison. The changes in technology and choice sweeping the broadcasting industry have meant audiences for many long-established television programmes have been affected. Peter Rippon is one of our most popular and respected editors.'


Miles managed to find a source who said Peter was a David Brent figure; an MP who, inventively, has called the show "Newslight"; unnamed viewers inside and outside the BBC who had "gently mocked" Paxman after an item on female grooming; and two obvious facts.  One, that the show is carrying fewer filmed reports - they're expensive; and two, there's no heir apparent to Paxo.

Miles won two scoop of the year prizes in 2009, for reporting, eight days after he heard it, that the Russell Brand Radio 2 Show featuring Jonathan Ross, was offensive.  Other reporters were not so sure it was a "scoop".  In May last year he seemed to have left the direct employment of the Mail, but has always written across a broad range of topics.  Sputum, going to the Ritz in jeans, bachelor cooking holidays in Tuscany are among my favourites. There is no record of concern from the Mail's publishers or readers about his editorial direction.  Someone must think the BBC sells papers.