Vocal Voices

Could the sides have handled this worse than they have? It's hard to think how.

Lineker has an opinion on the government's treatment of refugees - we all have. Unfortunately he aired it using language referencing Germany in the 1930s and by association the Nazis and the holocaust. That was probably wrong.

However, most of us would have missed it as we are not on SM, it was the media that picked it up and ran with it.

Step in a panicked BBC management who had to be seen to be doing something so Lineker was publicly told to step back from presenting MOTD. Another wrong, as the media now had another angle. A quiet word should have been enough.

Then came co-presenters and pundits - Shearer, Wright, Scott and others- all coming out in support of Lineker and so the story became a MOTD one, with it virtually being cancelled, and boy did the media make the most of that. It has been headline news for days on end.

And because of all this the issues with the Illegal Migration Bill, and there are some, have been lost. Buried under a celebrity bun fight to keep the masses happy. So much for "real" news.

It's been an interesting few days with a number of pertinent issued raised - free speech, anti-Tory bias, so on ....

Just two observations from me:

Firstly, I can see HMR&C sitting on the sidelines watching all this brouhaha with some interest, as Lineker's so-called self-employed / employed status is currently under investigation - they're pursuing him for an estimated £4.9m taxes. Does abiding by the BBC's employees guidelines give further weight to the argument he's an employee?

Secondly, as far as the actual row over the decimation of last Saturday's broadcasting is concerned, I don't have a dog in that particular fight, as I haven't watched MOTD for at least 20 years, I reckon!

Some other BBC employees aren't too keen on Mr Lineker. The ones who have stuck to their contract and stayed away from political controversy.

It's hard to see how Lineker has escaped any sanction, given that the newsreader Martine Croxall was taken off air for smiling and saying she was "gleeful" when Boris Johnson resigned, which I think is rather less of an offence than comparing the Conservatives to the nazis, which was plainly Lineker's intention.

The BBC really needs to be impartial, but it plainly is not. Given that this is the case it needs to either start depending on adverts for it's income or becoming a subscription service like Sky or Netflix.

Lineker makes me ache, tbh. If he's so woke what was he doing in Qatar? Lecturing and looking profound, but he wasn't principled enough to boycott the event. A hypocrite.

Match of the Day overdoes the punditry and the matey matey old mates are stale now. The format needs to be freshened up. Too much analysis, too many interviews, not enough football.

Workingman wrote:That was probably wrong.

How polite. Calling someone a ruthless genocidal murderer simply because you don't agree with what they have done or what they intend to do?

That isn't probably WRONG it is dead wrong and potentially libel. It is certainly defamation and should be treated as such.

There is a segment of our society who think that as long as they are offended by something they can say anything they damned well like and get away with it.

It is long past time that this ends.

Workingman wrote:That was probably wrong.

How polite. Calling someone a ruthless genocidal murderer simply because you don't agree with what they have done or what they intend to do?

That isn't probably WRONG it is dead wrong and potentially slander. It is certainly defamation and should be treated as such.

There is a segment of our society who think that as long as they are offended by something they can say anything they damned well like and get away with it.

It is long past time that this ends.