The British Propaganda Corporation

In times of national crisis, when Britain is under threat or involved in overseas conflict, the BBC gives unquestioning support to the official government line. To all intents and purposes the BBC becomes the mouthpiece of the government, an agent of propaganda. This is understandable, it may even be acceptable, though what is less easy to understand is why a referendum on Scottish independence should have been treated like a war, or why Alex Salmond was put on a par with General Galtieri or Saddam Hussein.George Square

And even when the referendum had been ‘won’ the BBC couldn’t drop its prejudice. On the day following the referendum gangs of Loyalists roamed the streets of Glasgow, attacking peaceful Yes supporters and burning Scottish flags. Many of these thugs – some giving Nazi salutes – had come over from the Six Counties, others had come up from England. Yet the BBC reported it as two groups – one pro independence the other pro Union – both intent on violence. If they’d believed they could have got away with it I’m sure the BBC would have portrayed the pro-independence students and families as the aggressors. It was left to the Herald to give the truth, even identifying a Rangers supporters group involved in organising the violence and encapsulating what really happened in George Square and nearby streets with the memorable phrase, “The heart of Glasgow had gone from Woodstock to Belfast in the space of just one day”.

Of course no one at the BBC would admit to it, nor would anyone in the Conservative Party, or at The Times, or in the Tesco boardroom, or on the trading floor at Deutsche Bank, but those thugs that terrorised central Glasgow last Friday night – violent and malodorous though they might be – are allies, for they’re all found in the great Unionist spectrum. This explains why the BBC and the rest of the London media deliberately misreported those events in Glasgow.

*

If the Scottish referendum presented a very real threat to England’s prestige this wonderful United Kingdom, then it follows that potential or lower level threats must also be dealt with, using the same agencies, primarily the BBC. Yesterday the BBC produced the results of a poll that purported to show that only 3% of people in Wales favoured independence. A quite remarkable finding when compared with other recent polls.

Polls this year by ITV Wales put support for independence at 14% in May and 17% in September. Another poll in September, this one by Face for Business, suggested that support for independence was as high as 29%. Now it would be easy to dismiss this last poll as being wrong . . . though few did, for it seems to have been ignored by the media. I was tempted to dismiss it myself, until I looked into it a little more and found that it provided a breakdown by age group, so I made a comparison with what has been produced for the Scottish Pollsreferendum by Lord Ashcroft Polls, and the concurrence is quite striking.

The little table I drew up unsurprisingly shows that there is more support for independence in the younger age groups, while it falls off dramatically in both countries after the age of 55. Though the fall is greater for some reason in Scotland, where among the 65+ support for independence is 46% of the highest independence supporting age group, while in Wales it’s 51%. This is strange, even more so when we consider that so many English people retire to Wales. (In the area where I live they make up two-thirds of the 65+ age group.) And even if the FfB poll is all to hell, I still don’t fully understand why support for independence in Scotland declines so dramatically in the 65+ bracket.

Whatever the answers, we have to remember that opinion polls are not simply produced to tell us what people are thinking, many are designed to influence how people think, and this explains the BBC poll. Also, to provide ammunition for the defenders of the UK State who, in Wales, love to trot out the lie that, ‘only between five and ten per cent want independence’. (Hang on, is this why the Face for Business poll was totally ignored?) The only way to establish how many people in Wales want independence is to ask them the same question that was asked in Scotland last Thursday (with Wales substituted for Scotland) – ‘Should Wales be an independent country?’ That’s it, one simple question. Anything else, involving multiple choice or ‘answer-guided’ questions, is unacceptable and designed to confuse and mislead.

Among those making political capital out of the BBC’s propaganda poll was Councillor Pearleen Sangha of Swansea (well sort of, as I’ll explain). She re-tweeted @PearleenSangha enthusiastically that within a margin of error there could be nobody in Wales who wants independence. Even making allowances for the fact that Ms Sangha doesn’t know SanghaWales, not even she believes that. But it’s not about what people really believe, is it, we’re talking propaganda here. Councillor Sangha is a staunch defender of the Union, and was up in Scotland for a few weeks campaigning for a No vote. Though seeing as she’s from the USA I can’t help wondering if she’s a UK citizen, and if not, should she have involved herself in a constitutional issue like this. Although nominally a Swansea councillor Sangha is now working for the Labour Party in Cardiff, so her Uplands constituents see very little of her these days. Though perhaps they don’t notice, for even when she was in Swansea she was strictly a Monday to Friday and 9 to 5 councillor. That’s when she was there, because she also likes to take lengthy trips home to California, and being a true party girl, she never misses a Labour conference or knees-up.

UPDATE 27.09.14: I’m told the Evening Post ran a story today (can’t find it on the website)  in which it queried Councillor Sangha’s status. She claims to have resigned as a councillor in July and informed the party leadership, which was then (the recently departed) David Phillips. Yet no one else seems to know about this, certainly no by-election has been called. But despite what she told the Evening Post, on her Twitter account Cllr Sangha is still describiSangha Twitterng herself as a Labour councillor for Uplands! (Click to enlarge.) Lending weight to the suspicion that she is still, officially, a councillor – even though, due to her long absence and appalling attendance, record she shouldn’t be – is the fact that her council e-mail address is still receiving mail. In addition, she is still listed on the council’s website as a councillor. So what’s the story here?

28:09:14: A story on the Evening Post website today tells us that “Uplands councillor Pearleen Sangha steps down from her post”. She is quoted as saying “It is with regret that I have formally tendered my resignation as a Swansea councillor”. Which I take to mean that she’s resigning now, following the recent attention. Though she claims she decided “some time ago” to resign, perhaps at “the end of July”, when she says she informed the “leadership” of her intentions. (‘Leadership’ suggests more than one person, so who exactly did she tell?) She also wants us to know that she has not received her councillor allowance since then – good for her! Though the problem is that she went AWOL long before July, so it looks as if she was getting paid her councillor allowance while she was no longer in Swansea, no longer attending council and committee meetings, no longer serving her constituents. It has been obvious for a year or so that Pearleen Sangha was not doing her job as a Swansea councillor, but the local Labour Party allowed this situation to persist, and for her to collect her councillor allowance – simply because she is working full-time for the party, in Cardiff. What a squalid arrangement! What contempt it shows for the city of Swansea and its people. Yet another example of the Labour Party putting its interests first.

*

Robert Burns wrote a damning indictment of those who sold out his country’s independence in Parcel of Rogues; perhaps it should be updated, or maybe someone should give us a new song for the twenty-first century.

Any new ‘Parcel of Rogues’ would have to mention the British Propaganda Corporation, and the London newspapers . . . you know, those ‘journalists’ who’ve been tapping phones, and bribing bent London coppers, like the ones involved in the murder of Daniel Morgan. And we mustn’t forget the noble and upstanding politicians, most of whom seem to be fiddling their expenses. Sticking with politicians, let’s remember ALL the parties opposed to Scottish independence – Labour, Tory, Lib Dem, Ukip, BNP, National Front, Britain First, and a host of even smaller, loonier parties; plus of course the Unionists and Loyalists across the water. Finally, there was Carwyn ‘the veto’ Jones. Then there’s the supermarkets, the supermarkets that rip off Welsh farmers. And how could we forget the banks, for all of them were opposed to Scottish independence because they feared being properly regulated, as they are just about everywhere outside of the UK and the USA. Have you noticed that the bankers who end up in court are not the ones who nearly wrecked the Western economy but ‘rogue traders’, in other words, those who lose the banks’ money! Then there’s the oil industry, ‘Scottish oil running out’ they screamed . . . then four days after the referendum we learn that they got it wrong. But of course, this was unknown before referendum day! These are just some of the turds to be found floating in the cess-pit of modern Britain, the most corrupt and unequal society in Europe.

If the people of Scotland had known the truth, if they could have relied on an impartial and unbiased media, then Scotland would today be on its way to independence. That’s why Britain’s elite so desperately needed its propaganda machine and its foot-soldiers. But it was so blatant, so clumsily done and so easily exposed, that the backlash has started, and Scotland will be independent within ten years. The changes Britain will see in the coming decade will not end with Scotland. Fasten your seatbelts!

Will those sending not-for-publication comments appreciate that I cannot reply to, for example, anonymous@anonymous. If you want to provide information please e-mail editor@jacothenorth.net.
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Brychan

I’ve just noticed this story on BBC Wales….

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-34248950

£500m spent demolishing pylons through beauty spots and putting the cables underground.

I’m sure it’s very nice for the national parks in England, but the beautification in Wales, between Penrhyndeudraeth (links up to Dinorwig and up to the coast line from Wylfa) and Trawsfynydd is not what it seems. The only reason why the 400Kv monstrosity was built through southern Eryri in the first place was to export from the Trawsfynydd Nuclear Power Station which is now decommissioned.

The maintenance of the overground lines are no longer cost effective as the village of Trawsfynydd consumes nothing like the power the lines were built for. The replacement underground cable will be nothing of the sort, it’s actually a complete removal to save maintanance costs and replacing it with a 33kv spur. England, however, gets the real investment.

BBC just cut and pasting corporate press releases rather than investigating the facts.

trampie

Its through state education and the main stream media that the masses are brainwashed.

Anon

THE NUMBERS GAME – Politics & Polling in the Independence Referendum

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rhyg5WA47qA

Anon

THE BIGGER THE LIE – Media Bias in the Scottish Independence Referendum

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ajd4R-9BEIw

Jobovitch

You say “Yet the BBC reported it as two groups – one pro independence the other pro Union – both intent on violence.” Do you have a link?

Carnabwth

“Students in Swansea are here for about 3 years and each year when one third leave they are replaced by new intake so, students numbers remain the same and it’s a sizable group which deserves representation at local level.”

Isn’t it the same with tourists in holiday resorts? When they leave….they’re replaced with a new intake etc blah blah blah.

Daley Gleephart

… and long-distance lorry drivers. We can’t ignore lorry drivers.

Cherry Hinton

Fully support your views Jac – Mr Gleephart is totally ignorant of the effect of student nominations as Cllrs in Swansea – he is blinkered by his Labour ideology-I am nearer 80 than 70 – lived in Swansea all my life – went to Swansea Univ. so I am not anti student- but as stated students voting in their Univ.digs change the whole ethos of an area- they leave after 3 years and the permanent residents in the Ward are left with the student choices.
And yes I do think- perhaps you should as well- having a pathetic argument over the language I use which reflects the feelings of the permanent residents in Brynmill indicates that you have no logical argument against a residency criteria.I am not criticising Rob Stewart but questioning the deceitful way his predecessor dealt with M/s Sangher’ s resignation.and the failure to call an election to replace her.

Daley Gleephart

What makes you think that all students vote Labour? My view on this is not based Party ideology. Swansea’s universities and places of higher education play an important economic and social role in and around the city and I think that it’s about time that some people woke up and realised that. Students aged 18 years+ are adults and have the same rights as others – Long may that continue.

As for the Brynmill area, yes it has changed from being mainly an area of family homes to one where there is large number of young people in flat shares and bedsits. Obviously demand for student accommodation can been the main mover but there is also the fact that very few parents want to live in a house that doesn’t have a garage or off-road parking and they’re far from keen about old-style room layouts and the high cost of heating them.

Students in Swansea are here for about 3 years and each year when one third leave they are replaced by new intake so, students numbers remain the same and it’s a sizable group which deserves representation at local level.

Llewellyn

If you check your facts on North Sea Oil you’ll see that it as been in decline since 1999!
http://www.jodidb.org/TableViewer/tableView.aspx?ReportId=9620

UK May 2002 2.3 million Barrels/day compared to May 2014 857 thousand barrels/day!

Paul Williams

Oil is always going to be in decline – it’s a finite resource so every barrel that is taken out of the ground means there is one less in there! Bear in mind the number of small countries who have made a success of independence without the luxury of having their own oil and I wouldn’t see an independent Scotland struggling anytime soon

Cherry Hinton

Pearleen Sangha has supposedly resigned- made her intention known to the party or Il Duce in July- why wasn’t she told to go then- seems strange it has only now just come out – is it a case of Rob Stewart finding out where the paper clips are and moving them? What a disgraceful,deceitful way to treat the residents of Brynmill. Me thinks if she had resigned in early July – it would have been during the summer vacation- no students to pick as candidates and then Brynmill would have probably voted in someone they knew and lived permanently in the Ward.David Phillips devious finger prints are all over the situation.
Yes Jac totally agree that students who pay Local Council Tax morally have the right to vote.The point is they don’t pay it and neither do the absent landlords .

Daley Gleephart

Are you suggesting that we move back to the days when only landowners had the right to vote? Love the OTT way words like ‘deceit’ and ‘disgrace’ are bandied about these days. When someone does something really bad, what words are left to describe their behaviour?
‘Me thinks’? – methinks. A really pretentious and annoying way to say “I think.”

Daley Gleephart

Okay Jac. Can you explain why students should not be allowed to vote in the area where they live and spend money because they don’t pay Council Tax but should vote at ‘home’ where they don’t pay Council Tax?

Red Flag

I would have thought it was obvious. Most of them come from nowhere near the campus and are only there during term time. Most of them have little to no idea as to the local area and it’s indiginous population and it’s needs ( I live near Bangor Uni – most of the students there have no idea about anything local other than their campus and the Academie night club) . Allowing them to vote distorts local politics to the detriment of the local population. Luckily the ones in Bangor are to lazy to vote – and equally luckily it’s a heavily welsh area and neither Plaid nor llais Gwynedd (who between them dominate the council) make any play for students – quite the opposite, they cite them as a problem causing a shortage of affordable rented housing.

Daley Gleephart

What you’re crusading for is a residency test.

Swansea Councillors refused planning permission to convert a guesthouse in the Uplands into an HMO and a Bloke in Cardiff* over-ruled the decision.
http://www.southwales-eveningpost.co.uk/Uplands-guesthouse-converted-10-bed-HMO/story-23007689-detail/story.html

* Bloke in Cardiff – If the Wales Government didn’t exist, Bloke in Cardiff would work for the Welsh Office. Local Government would be under the direct control of Eric Pickles.

Daley Gleephart

You have wriggled away slightly from voter entitlement. Personally, bearing in mind that I’ve got no means of changing the law, I think students should be entitled to vote in the area where they study because they should have representation. Refusing the right to vote may appeal to some who think themselves superior to others but it has caused quite a few problems in the past hasn’t it?

I bow to your superior knowledge of the planning process. /knee bone, thigh bone, now hear the word of the lard/

Daley Gleephart

Calm down. I was referring to events in Britain http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/citizenship/struggle_democracy/getting_vote.htm and the American War of Independence http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_taxation_without_representation Dear, oh dear. The trip to Scotland doesn’t seem to have done you any good.

lard: Eric Pickles.

Red Flag

He’s not denying them the vote. There is no reason why they can’t register for a postal vote back at their parents address – in fact that would suit Labour better being as they have single-handedly corrupted the postal voting system and have the convictions to prove it

Daley Gleephart

Jac has no power to deny the vote. Jac: I had not considered Nazism as my knowledge of German politics is as bad as my knowledge of its language. I doubt if that stop you using Strawman Technique though.

Marconatrix

What puzzles me is why, even if these ‘strangers’ are allowed to stand for election, anyone local votes for them? Why indeed the local party adopts them as candidates in the first place. It suggests total political apathy, in which case good luck to them, time the locals woke up.

Marconatrix

Well I have now! Green in more ways than one I fear, but probably ‘mostly harmless’, which is more than can be said for UKIP. Interesting how the Greens are now quite credible in Scotland, but not apparently elsewhere in the UK.

In theory Green values should on the whole agree with trad. rural Welsh values, so to me at least it always seemed a great pity that there was a vast cultural gulf between the two factions. Unfortunately Green types will readily pay up to support some lost tribe in the Amazon (not that that’s a bad thing btw) but be totally insensitive to Welsh language and culture which seems to be simply invisible to them. It’s like trying to talk to a brick wall, they just don’t have the concepts to understand, having always been part of mass world-wide culture. This makes them ‘useful idiots’ for those who really do understand what Wales is about and want to put an end to it.

Brychan

Trefforest examples…

(a) Multiple occupancy household where two of the residents are of Eastern European nationals. Female works as blood technician at the local hospital, the partner works as a bus driver. Both pay income tax and NI contributions to HM treasury and the full amount of council tax is paid on the property to RCT council. Both can vote in EU elections and are on the electoral register, but both are barred from voting in Welsh and Westminster elections. Both pay contributions to and are integrated socially and employment wise into the local community, but cannot vote.

(b) Multiple occupancy household where the residents are from England, and both are students at UniGlam (or whatever they call it now). No payment is made of UK taxes. The property is exempt from council tax payable to RCT council as they are students. Both residents can vote in the Welsh and Westminster elections in Pontypridd. There is no payment towards the local community other than ‘spending’ in retail and hospitality outlets in the area. The student fees payable to the Welsh institution is actually less than that payable to do a similar courses at a similar institution in England.

—————–

We tell the Bratislava couple to go home to vote but send a polling card and directions to the polling station to the English couple. The same scenario applies in Ceredigion, Swansea and Bangor. It should be noted, however, that the law was changed in Scotland, so, in the 2014 referendum so that all EU nationals had a vote, if resident in Scotland at the time of the ballot.

Is there any politician is Wales prepared to implement universal suffrage for all those resident in Wales, or do we just give a free ride and a ballot paper to the English?

Jobvitch

EU citizens living in Wales and on the electoral register were entitled to vote in the last Wales Assembly elections and they will be entitled to vote in 2016. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Assembly_for_Wales_election,_2016

Brychan

Clarification required because RCT have stated in writing to at least one person I know that “European citizens are allowed to vote in European and Local Elections only”. They also state this on their electoral registration documentation pack, and also here…
http://www.rctcbc.gov.uk/en/councildemocracy/democracyelections/elections-voting/elections-voting.aspx
Is this just a sloppy council or a deliberate attempt to exclude certain types of electors from polling stations?

Red Flag

They also misrepresented the results. 6 alternative answers will water down anything.

For instance, 52% of people supported more devolution up to and including independence (49 + 3). Stay the same, less devolution, scrap devolution and haven’t a clue got 48% combined.

This is actually good as there is no way Wales would move straight to independence but it shows that the desire for more devolution is there – which when granted leads in turn to the desire for more. Then more then more and with each step the desire for independence grows and eventually the step from devolution to independence becomes tiny.

It’s the old Chairman Mao “a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step” – and that’s where we are now, in the process of single steps.

Tarian

The BBC is the Enemy Within. It gets a massive budget to pump propaganda into every home and throughout the globe through the World Service. No one who seriously looks at its coverage of any issue could argue that it is not an aggressively partisan State Broadcaster. They constantly harp on about how much the BBC is loved and trusted, and how it is respected and envied throughout the world. This is of course a crock of shit, but the drip-drip-drip of positive soundbites has an effect. I’ve lost count of the number of well educated people (who should know better) that parrot the line about the BBC being fair and impartial. It is like a poison which slowly and unnoticed seeps into our bloodstream, distorting our thoughts, undermining our ability to think critically. If someone could make a documentary about all the distorions, ommissions of reporting and outright lies the BBC indulged in during the referendum then it would be destroyed. It must be destroyed and discredited. It is the enemy of freedom on a par with Pravda and ITAR-TASS in the Soviet period.

The Scots are crowdfunding new media including TV. Wales limps behind in the distance.

Jac, I have criticised Plaid and share many of your concerns but it is the only game in town. Despite everything it can still make an impact but only if we put aside our differences and pull together. I reckon a big push in the South could really rebalance the party and give it new vigour. I intend to do what I can or, as Tommy Farr said ‘die in the attempt’. You are right about Wigley. He was massively liked and respected in south Wales, especially in Merthyr. We need people of his kind to step up. It is interesting to me that the real vigour in Welsh nationalism in the 60s and 70s came from the valleys, but the potential leaders were pushed out and sidelined. Well, it won’t happen again. There is a tide rising in the valleys and if we can win Plaid we can win Wales.

Cherry Hinton

Regarding Cllr P Sanger – I lived in Brynmill for several years – I still have family and friends there – they always returned a Swansea born and bred Cllr- David Phillips treated as the ‘Special one ‘ by Swansea Univ Students Labour Party persuaded several students to stand in the 2012 local elections – thus the rise of Theaker, Bayliss and Sanger (an arrogant madam) Brynmill is a student occupied area where they obviously came out in force to vote for their chums. This then leaves Brynmill with people who don’t care, won’t care and can’t care – the indigenous residents were in the minority- they are left with dubious representatives chosen by students who leave after 3 years and only spend 6 months in the Ward .
I don’t think students should vote in the area where they are students- they should vote in their main home town.
The present student Cllrs are a bunch of ‘Hurray Henrys’ who know nothing about Swansea or Wales or the Welsh.
We are their stepping stones to becoming ‘Champagne socialists’ running around the corridors of Westminster.

The Earthshaker

The upside of the BBC in full propaganda mode is the total lack of awareness of the damage their doing to their reputation, as the saying goes never interrupt your enemy when he’s making a mistake.

The Scottish referendum opened a lot of people’s eyes across the UK to the lies and deceit being peddled for the sake of propping up a morally bankrupt UK establishment and I hope this latest shameless BBC Wales spin effort jolts those with journalistic expertise here in Wales into action to forming an alternative media base similar to what’s emerging in Scotland.

And for those so inclined there is a fully legal way to watch the BBC without a licence as the Wings Over Scotland blog pointed out recently http://wingsoverscotland.com/enough-is-enough/

Phil Davies

I think etominusipi like that one…

I’ll limit my comments to: SPOT ON Jac…

Marconatrix

Decline in the 65+ age group in Scotland: Pensions, dear boy, pensions. Many were led to believe their pensions were at risk, then add in the natural conservatism of the old, memories of the post-war welfare state, and how “we won the war”, and it’s no great mystery.

Q1: Why do the Welsh figures begin to fall off at age 45, 10 years younger than in Scotland?
Q2: Is there a correlation between Welsh indy support and Welsh language/culture, especially the effect WME?

And the big question re Scotland, never mind the Nazis, why weren’t the ordinary NO voters dancing in the streets? Having put the lid on half a nation’s hopes and enthusiasm, what had they to offer to fill the gaping void? In Welsh you have a word for it — taeogaeth.

A brilliant vision was presented just within reach and many were simply too hesitant to grasp it. It reminded me of Waldo’s poem Cwm Berllan, where the last line says it all :

“Na, gwell imi beidio mynd yno rhag ofn”

Also note the phenomenal growth in SNP and other pro-indy party membership, apparently partly at the expense of Labour. Labour’s strangle hold on politics in West Central Scotland seems to have finally collapsed. The question for Wales is I imagine, how to challenge the similar dominance of Labour in South East Wales?

etominusipi

whatever exotic butterfly it was whose casual wingflap in a dwindling Brazilian forest provoked a computer to fall off the back of a lorry into Jac’s possession, the creature did us – we, the still-invisible myrmidons of an emergent blogosphere – a great service. the analysis is unusually honest and penetrating, the judgement mature, the human commitment strong, the style direct, articulate yet at times ruggedly poetic with a fine feeling for cadence tonal qualities, the invective sparing but incisive when employed and always directed where it is well-deserved. i doff my cap in respect to a master of the written word, and one for whom it can truly be acknowledged that “le style c’est l’homme”.