Smears, Jeers and Tears

It’s not been a great week for the Government with the slowly unfolding email smears, and the Culture Minister being heckled at Anfield.

The story of the smearing emails has dragged on for far too long now, perpetuated by the media’s need for a new headline every day, and encouraged disgracefully by the hypocrite Tories parading their fragrant wives to take turns tut-tutting Gordon Brown and criticising him for employing someone who wasn’t perfect, then firing them straight away.

The truth is that there was absolutely nothing in those emails that I wouldn’t have expected someone in there to be discussing – ways to undermine opposition politicians are a government’s currency. I would be extremely surprised if there isn’t an equivalent operation in Tory Central Office – albeit with a slightly better firewall this week.

This is a great example of a media firestorm. A chap got caught sending an email he shouldn’t have, and he was fired. That genuinely is the end of the story. Everything that followed is 100% media-generated…

Tories are interviewed and their indignation is broadcast to the nation… Every day another titbit of information is released, despite the fact that it all reached the public domain in one chunk… Gordon Brown is asked to apologise and refuses, saying quite reasonably that he has done nothing wrong… Commentators start to talk of a “smear culture at the heart of our politics…” Vox pops are taken from members of the public, voicing their anger after spending three days being poked with the stick… Tories change tack, saying that things will be better when they are in charge, as though Blair didn’t say exactly the same thing (or Thatcher, for that matter)… Labour desperately tries to move on the agenda to the great work they are doing in healthcare, but this is drowned out by George Osborne’s bloody wife grabbing the headlines… Brown finally caves in and apologises, presumably just because he is so bored with the whole thing… Tories crow and claim a victory despite having achieved nothing save making every single voter slightly more nauseous.

I’m not surprised that Brown apologised, but it really is pathetic. He’s like a parent who threatens an unruly child with no pudding, only to cave in and let them have another French Fancy. It started with the on-off election after he took over from Blair but, this time, Brown’s apology has left his credibility is in tatters. He has caved in over and over again, to the point that, this time, everyone knew he would end up apologising, hence the unrelenting pressure. Why didn’t he do it a week ago? Now he is even weaker.

In an attempt to shift the headlines, Brown sent Culture Secretary, Everton fan, and Rimmel-model Andy Burnham to Anfield to tackle the Hillsborough Memorial Service. Poor old Burnham had no chance. In what must have been the most awkward moment of his career since he wore eye shadow on Question Time, his speech to the fans was drowned out by chanting Liverpool supporters demanding “Justice for the ninety-six.”

I have a lot of sympathy with Liverpudlians – any city that can boycott The Sun for twenty years is alright by me. But the endless singing is enough to grate on anyone. The service was ended with a 25,000 crowd joining Gerry Marsden in an emotional “You’ll Never Walk Alone.” I don’t know what Boris Johnson was talking about…

Burnham stepped right up to the plate though by calling for the release of all unpublished evidence from the twenty-year old disaster. The cabinet minister and long-standing member of the government said, "I believe now the public interest lies very clearly in full disclosure of all such information, so that the families and others can make their judgement on all the facts."

Well hang on, Mr Burnham, which secretive bodies have been hiding this information. Who is covering it up? Surely that is something the government could have a look at. When he says that “further information should be published,” who is he addressing? Why doesn’t he just mention it to Jack Straw at the next cabinet meeting?

The BBC Gets It Right

Football Focus this week “dedicated the show to the 96 victims of the Hillsborough disaster.” I must admit that my heart sank when Manish introduced the show thus. I expected that Football Focus would make an almighty mess of this. I did them a disservice.

They had produced a fifteen minute, Sue Johnstone-narrated documentary using a great deal of the original footage, and interviews of victims’ families and witnesses. It was pitch-perfect – factual, emotional without being self-indulgent, and truly affecting.

Even Motson did well. A witness to the unfolding tragedy, he pitched his account beautifully and, save a solitary catch in his voice, he didn’t resort to emotional cliché.

Alan Hansen then presented a touching retrospective where he interviewed former team-mates who, like him, were on the pitch as the disaster began; and who, like him, spent the next few weeks attending funerals, and the next twenty years trying to reconcile what they had seen.

We saw John Barnes walking solemnly behind a coffin, Barry Venison at the cathedral service; and we heard John Aldridge on the verge of tears as he related to Hansen the stories of incomprehensible grief.

Lawrenson was given very little to do, which was a good idea because, even in his funeral suit, the man’s capacity to say the wrong thing is simply not worth the risk.

BBC commentator Steve Wilson who, as a young Liverpool supporter, was in the ground that day, was given license to stray from the party line and criticise the authorities’ response on the day and in the intervening years. In a calm voice, he condemned the behaviour of South Yorkshire police on the day, and of the perceived closing ranks of the authorities since then.

The truth is that nobody has ever been brought to account for what happened that day and, in the era of blame culture, that is extraordinary.

In this blog, I am quick to criticise the BBC, their sports department in particular. What’s more, I have a contrary tendency when it comes to public displays of grief. However, I am happy to say that, on this occasion, the BBC got it just right.