Heads I win, Tails you lose
I congratulate Peter Cruddas, former co-Treasurer of the Conservative party, on clearing his name by winning £180,000 in damages against the Sunday Times, with half a million pounds of costs, over allegations that he had been corruptly selling access to the Prime Minister.
Mr Cruddas had previously been cleared by the Electoral Commission of breaking electoral law: the Commission said after complaints were made to them following the Sunday Times articles that they found
"no evidence to support the allegations and will not be opening an investigation into the matter".
Peter Cruddas won a ruling that certain of the Sunday Times allegations were "malicious falsehood."
What I find very surprising in the way that this story has been covered today is that the BBC, and various newspapers who would undoubtedly have presented it as a huge embarrassment for the Prime Minister and the Conservative Party had the Sunday Times article been found by the courts to be accurate, found ways to present it as an embarrassment for the Prime Minister and the Conservative party that the article was found to be libellous.
If David Cameron had not said at the time of the Sunday Times article that what had been alleged was unacceptable and set up a party inquiry to check what had happened and ensure that improper fundraising methods could not happen in the future, he would have been crucified in the media for being willing to tolerate illegal and corrupt methods of party funding.
Now he is being attacked because the fact that he he did say and do those things is being presented not as an attempt to act in an ethical way but as the unfair humiliation of an innocent man.
If the Prime Minister had made no response to the allegations, or if they had been found to be true, it would have been entirely reasonable that the press would have run a story attacking him and the Conservatives. But to attack him because the allegations were dismissed by the court and because he did try to do something about them is really quite extraordinary - espcially from the BBC who have a charter obligation to aviod bias.
It now seems that the way the media pack will react when a political party is accused of wrongdoing is that if the allegations turn out to be true, you lose, if they turn out to be false, you still lose.
And if that sort of "heads I win, tails you lose" approach isn't a breach of the BBC's duty to be unbiased, it is difficult to see what would be.
Mr Cruddas had previously been cleared by the Electoral Commission of breaking electoral law: the Commission said after complaints were made to them following the Sunday Times articles that they found
"no evidence to support the allegations and will not be opening an investigation into the matter".
Peter Cruddas won a ruling that certain of the Sunday Times allegations were "malicious falsehood."
What I find very surprising in the way that this story has been covered today is that the BBC, and various newspapers who would undoubtedly have presented it as a huge embarrassment for the Prime Minister and the Conservative Party had the Sunday Times article been found by the courts to be accurate, found ways to present it as an embarrassment for the Prime Minister and the Conservative party that the article was found to be libellous.
If David Cameron had not said at the time of the Sunday Times article that what had been alleged was unacceptable and set up a party inquiry to check what had happened and ensure that improper fundraising methods could not happen in the future, he would have been crucified in the media for being willing to tolerate illegal and corrupt methods of party funding.
Now he is being attacked because the fact that he he did say and do those things is being presented not as an attempt to act in an ethical way but as the unfair humiliation of an innocent man.
If the Prime Minister had made no response to the allegations, or if they had been found to be true, it would have been entirely reasonable that the press would have run a story attacking him and the Conservatives. But to attack him because the allegations were dismissed by the court and because he did try to do something about them is really quite extraordinary - espcially from the BBC who have a charter obligation to aviod bias.
It now seems that the way the media pack will react when a political party is accused of wrongdoing is that if the allegations turn out to be true, you lose, if they turn out to be false, you still lose.
And if that sort of "heads I win, tails you lose" approach isn't a breach of the BBC's duty to be unbiased, it is difficult to see what would be.
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