The Band Aid has a lot of goodwill and amazing fantastic worldwide reputation, which, to be fair, the BBC should be repugnant at trying to smear in the name of investigative journalism. On that matter, I find the vast majority of investigative journalism, even in the tabloids, excellent. When the BBC do it, as they do regularly, it is truly disgusting.
“On a number of occasions the BBC tried to rush out an announcement, on heavy news days,” said Mr Grade, a former Controller of BBC1 and chief executive of Channel 4. ”
They tried to bounce us into making an announcement, in terms that weren’t agreed, on the day the Chilean miners were released and then on the day the public spending cuts were announced. They said it was just coincidence. But it was a bit too much of a coincidence, if you ask me.”
According to this report,
“The strength of the BBC’s reputation meant that when it does make a mistake it was “more serious than anybody else’s mistake,” he said. Bob Geldof agreed. “The BBC has a special obligation, most singularly in the case of the World Service whose broadcasts are relied upon by people in difficult situations in places like Africa where the truth can be a life or death issue,” the Band Aid founder said. “So it has a particular responsibility to check its facts.”
As regard me, there is a report still on the BBC website today. The BBC have evidence that I did not commit the crime explicitly stated in the headlines, and that I have no caution, warning or reprimand, or any offence indeed. The BBC Trust refuse to make an apology for this, thus continuing damage to my personal reputation. This was discussed in 2006 when I was severely alcoholic, and they misused their opportunity to report which they had under law. I have seen at first-hand smear tactics by the BBC, and I find them repulsive. Whatever ongoing damage to my reputation by the BBC keeping their article today and people reading it and not inviting a disabled guy with 7 degrees and 40 months in recovery to interview, this is nothing compared to the ‘damage done to 24 years of charity giving work by Band Aid’ (Sir Michael Grade this morning).
Concerning the actual offense to do with Band Aid, the corporation admitted in an on-air apology it had “no evidence” for the claims which prompted a complaint from Band Aid Trustees including Bob Geldof.
The facts speak for themselves of how the BBC did it, in the public domain. An edition of Assignment, broadcast on the World Service last March, initially reported aid had been diverted by a rebel group in the beleaguered African country to buy guns.
The Yahoo report continues that that story was subsequently followed up online and on programmes including From Our Own Correspondent and the BBC News which named Live Aid and Band Aid as the source of the mis-directed funds.
This is another BBC smear. They ran 3 stories about me in about 4 days in 2006, when the General Medical Council had neither concluded that I had engaged in stalking, nor were investigating it. The criminal evidence was that I had not been. The BBC should be genuinely disgusted at their behaviour.
