The administrators of the BBC's News Content department are tightening their grip around the Flabby Neck of News Output. Last night's BBC 6 O'Clock bulletin on BBC1 was a little light news (things that have happened that might be interesting or surprising) propped up with diary and anniversary coverage.
Close to six minutes was devoted to Laura Kuenssberg's mini-Covid-Panorama, with our news stewardess placed in an unlit basement surrounded by discarded-but-working tv screens. Someone had tried to extrude a "news" cue out of her startling research: "Senior Government officials have told this programme that lockdown could have come earlier". Unfortunately, no-one said that into a microphone. Laura made do with Line-of-Duty style interview clips with Hancock, Starmer et al, and the sum total of human knowledge was moved on not a jot.
Then followed a run round the horse racing course with in-house trainer Dan Roan. Two minutes 10 seconds, in which we learned there was a meeting at Cheltenham the next day. And to wrap things up, Arts Editor Will Gompertz got three minutes with a film critic guessing who was going to win the Oscars, from a list of films that only Will and the critic had seen. Come in out of the kitchen, luv, this stuff's riveting.
Earlier, Home Editor Mark Easton spend some time empathising with the police's difficulties in managing demonstrations/vigils in a pandemic. It would have been more useful if Mark had pursued the "extensive discussions" that the Home Secretary had with Cressida Dick before the Clapham Bandstand trouble. I'm sure she told Ms Dick "Light touch stuff only, Cressie".
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