Liz Truss: An apology

Earlier this week, I wrote a post based on a short report about Liz Truss' comments on Eurovision where I assumed she didn't really know what she was talking about.

Having now seen seen her full quote I would like to apologise. I seriously underestimated how far from informed she was.

Earlier, the international trade secretary, Liz Truss, dismissed the idea that the UK’s nul points was a “post-Brexit snub”. She told LBC there was a “fundamental problem” with the way entrants are currently chosen and suggested the BBC shouldn’t choose future artists.

“I think we need to have more competition to get the right entrant, I think they need to be more tested with the public,” she said. “I’m here today at LBC responding to questions from listeners, that’s the kind of testing that we need our song contest entrant to go through. So maybe it should be LBC that’s running it, not the BBC.”

There's a lot to unpack here. I think we can safely say that Eurovision is not Truss' field of expertise. I'm not sure such a Trussian field of expertise actually exists. It might just be better to accept that Truss, like a confused sheep on an A-road, has somehow found herself outside a field.

It's perhaps unsurprising that Truss seems to think that going on LBC is somehow part of the democratic process and doesn't realise that, you know, she's an MP and should be listening to the public in the form of her constituents on a regular basis.

It's perhaps unsurprising that Truss also confuses what you hear being honked through the switchboard at Global Radio is a representative slice of informed public opinion and not merely the confused wheezing of people who are dull enough to tune into LBC and puffed-up enough to be bothered to call in. These are people using their time to put questions to you, Liz. That should be a big red flag for a start.

But let's put that to one side, and focus on the barely-beating heart of Liz's argument. Is the suggestion that LBC should choose the entrant Liz being playful, or is she seriously suggesting that a talk radio network ought to be choosing a song?

Taking that idea as being a sensible suggestion, and accepting that LBC listeners would probably choose Nigel Farage doing some skiffle as our entry, there's a bit of a problem with it. LBC is not, under its broadcast licence, allowed to play music except for "illustrative" purposes. So Liz is floating the idea that, in future, it would be better to have our entry for a song contest chosen by listeners to a radio station that cannot play music. 

That's probably not as unlikely as it sounds. LBC often invites its audience to vote on matters about which it is incapable of providing them the basics they need to make a valid opinion. But do we really think a song chosen on such a basis would perform any better at Eurovision, than the results of a Twitter poll asking "something something is it too woke" is at shaping public policy?

If we remove LBC from the mix, though, Liz is suggesting that the reason we flop on the big stage is because BBC clipboards are picking a winner and it would be better put to a public vote. We've already pointed out that Liz seems unaware of the involvement of BMG employees in the process - people whose business is driven by an understanding of what popular music with the widest appeal sounds like - but let's assume that Truss is mostly concerned about the lack of transparency in the process. After all, we're talking about a song contest here, not something trivial like the procurement of PPE during a pandemic.

Liz Truss is a cabinet minister in a government led by the apparent offspring of Humphrey Cushion and Arthur Daley who somehow managed to achieve an enormous majority in the last general election. It's clear why she might have more faith in the outcome of asking the Great British Public 'what do you think?' than those of us who have to live with the consequences.

That, though, isn't the real problem with Truss popping up to go 'why don't we ask the public?' Because, Liz, that's also been tried. It's been tried a lot. Asking the public, Liz, was what was done between 1957 and 2010, and then again between 2016 and 2019.

Now, fair enough, that means that The Public picked Bucks Fizz and Lulu and the Brotherhood of Man, but if we focus on their more recent form, you'd have to admit that the Public aren't really all that good at this selection business.

Joe And Jake? 24th in 2016.  Michael Rice? 2018's choice came bottom of the heap.

More curiously, although the public chose the tracks between 2016 and 2019, the chart positions of those songs suggests that, actually, nobody very much liked them. In fact, no public-selected Eurovision candidate has made the Top 20 since Scooch back in 2007, and there hasn't been a number one since Gina G in 1996. Michael Rice's single didn't even make the charts.

So asking the public to choose the song they like best simply results in them choosing a song they like well enough to send to Europe but not so much that they'd actually pay for it (or, in modern chart terms, even listen to it enough.) Which raises the obvious question: if it's a song that the UK public don't invest time or money in,  why would you expect the European public to give more of a shit when picking a winner?

Obviously, Liz Truss doesn't really give a raspberry tuppence about what happens in the Eurovision Song Contest, any more than I have any investment in who wins her local Conservative Association's Who Can Put The Most Spaghetti Down Their Trousers fund raiser, and the chance to attack the BBC over anything has ministers' knees jerking like they're auditioning for a spot in a Restless Leg Syndrome infomercial.

But, he says spinning to a close-up camera and pulling a serious face, this kind of rough-and-tumble over Eurovision, in which a woefully ill-informed person with a not-very-hidden agenda drives over the creative industries for a spot of sport is like a little microcosm of how the nation is now. There's no analysis, no understanding, no - god forbid - research. Just a stupid, unworkable proposal plucked from the air while Nick Ferrari is cuing up the next advert for a walk-in bath. If you really believe Eurovision deserves your opinion, Liz, could you do us all a favour and put some thought into shaping that opinion?

Anyway, this blog is on hiatus.

Global Radio: Jeni Barnett defends her position

Having blogged yesterday about Global Radio's heavy handed attempts to smother Bad Science (having been quite happy to propagate bad science, without the capital letters).

In the interests of balance, Jeni Barnett has posted a blog entry defending her original broadcast. Or attempting to:

I am not a scientist, I would not claim to be a scientist. When tested on the contents of the MMR vaccine I told the truth. I did not have the facts to hand. Was I ill informed? Yes. As a responsible broadcaster I should have been better prepared as a parent, however, I can fight my corner. I don't know everything that goes into cigarettes but I do know they are harmful.

So... let's just work through that thought. Jeni is admitting that she didn't know what she was talking about; she admits that she was being "irresponsible" as the presenter of the programme for holding forth on a subject about which she didn't have any of the facts, but somehow justifies this because she has a child.

And then she compounds the problems by suggesting trying to create a fallacy: "I don't know what goes into cigarettes, but I know they're bad."

Eh? But surely you know that cigarettes contain carcinogens, which is why they cause cancer. You presumably know there's evidence, lots and lots of it, which links cigarettes to lung cancer. If you don't know about that evidence, you probably shouldn't be broadcasting on radio; you probably should be thinking about doing some basic GCSEs.

But even if that level of ignorance was defensible, saying "I know cigarettes are bad, I don't know how" doesn't justify broadcasting dangerous rubbish about MMR. Because MMR doesn't cause autism, so implying that it doesn't matter you don't understand the science of MMR, it's enough to know it does harm is doubly foolish - it's foolish because it simply isn't good enough to take such a weak approach to a difficult subject; it's foolish because it simply isn't true to claim that there's a danger in the triple jab. And you'd know that if you'd researched the subject. And as you admit, you hadn't.

The real question is why Global are sending legal threats to Ben Goldacre when, really, they should be calling in their presenter and asking why she thinks having procreated is some sort of excuse for taking a biased and wrong position on a programme where she should have been acting as a balanced moderator.

Jeni wails:

I would like some of my critics to try and run a three hour programme.

Eh? You can't call someone for turning up to do a show, admitting they didn't have any facts on the subject they were talking about, and still blasting out fallacious science if you haven't presented a three-hour radio programme. What's that even mean, Jeni? "It's enough having to remember to play the commercials and not crash the news - you can't expect me to know what I'm talking about."

I am interested in the debate not a witch hunt.

A debate - although not one where you're bothered to find out what you're talking about before starting it.

Should anybody from BAD SCIENCE read this I urge you to continue the debate, and if it gets too heated there is always the option of turning me off.

Well, yes, Jeni - except the problem is, anyone can turn you off. What they can't turn off is the rising level of measles cases that are being generated by ignorant commentators like you frightening parents into not getting their children inoculated. And if you're going to justify doing that, it's probably in all our interests to have your show switched off permanently. On the supply side.

Global Radio menaces Ben Goldacre

Ben Goldacre - scourge of bad scientists worldwide - wrote a short feature condemning LBC presenter Jeni Barnett's ignorant and dangerous spouting on vaccinations. In the interests of fairness, he included a long clip of the broadcast about which he was complaining.

For his trouble, he's been hit with legal threats from Global Radio. Goldacre generously assumes the company is merely trying to protect its revenue (unbelievably, you can buy old editions of the Barnett programme for four pounds a pop). It's more likely that LBC are embarrassed at the idea of someone pointing out that they give a platform for biased nonsense and want to shut down any discussion of the programmes that they are unable to control.

Goldacre is appealing for help from anyone who knows a bit of media law.

He doesn't even get it right when he's talking about himself

From Media Monkey:

Writing in his column for the Sunday Express, Boy George takes the opportunity to "shamelessly plug" (as he puts it) his new radio show on "GLR". Not only does GLR no longer exist, but the station that replaced it, BBC London Live, is probably the biggest rival of the station he really works for - LBC. Here's hoping he has a good relationship with station owners Chrysalis.

Mind you, the Guardian's media column should be a bit kinder - after all, London Live was replaced by BBC London almost a year ago; and what paper has led to the internet suggesting that Jerry Hall has made up a defence of Pete Townshend because it misplaced their conversation about kiddie porn online from 2001 to 1991?

There's a guy... let's call him Simon...

and there's a station, we'll call it LBC. And they were together, but then... Why is it we only ever hear of Simon Bates when he's being sacked?.