Eddie Barnes: Brown vs the media

Fresh from his combative performance at the party conference yesterday, Gordon Brown appears to have decided that along with the Conservatives, he is going to take on the media as well. The Prime Minister was in an unusually confrontational mood during an interview with Sky's Adam Boulton this morning, describing Boulton as "a political propagandist" and repeatedly accusing Sky's political editor of getting his facts wrong, and failing to ask the right questions.

Coming on the morning that Sky's Murdoch stablemate The Sun officially declared for the Conservatives, you can imagine why Brown might be a little sore at the media coverage he is receiving. It's all so unfair isn't it?....last week, he is lauded as World Statesman of the Year by Bono....this week, all the British press pack want to know is whether he's definitely going to cling on until the election date.

The Brown's are said to be furious about whay they see as the bias of the UK press pack. Newly self-cast as official underdog, it now looks as if the PM is preparing to cast the media as part of the great conspiracy trying to force a Conservative government upon the country. It's another of Brown's dividing lines: on the one side, there's him and the silent majority, who want to talk about the "issues that matter"; on the other, there's the media elite who are only interested in froth and personality.

Dangerous ground. It was never an either/or situation. The truth is that both personality and issues matter. Brown could take a leaf out of Lord Mandelson's book who has managed to turn the media's fascination with his own personality to his considerable political advantage.

None of this is that easy to take on board when you're facing the pummelling that Brown is getting at present. But it would be Prime Ministerial to try.

David Maddox: For Foulkes Sake (1)

MSPs have this morning been debating the parlous state of broadcasting (and the media in general) in Scotland which has allowed the Steamie to bring the first in what should be a regular series of Foulkesisms by Labour Lothians MSP Lord George Foulkes (pictured).
Baron Foulkes of Cumnock made a very colourful speech in which he lambasted the quality of BBC Scotland.
"Just take a few examples," he said. "Listen in the morning. Switch from Good Morning Scotland – and that awful, parochial, kailyard stuff – to the Today programme with erudite people, incidentally who went to Keith Academy, like James Naughtie appearing."
He went on: "Look also in the evening at Drivetime with Abeer McIntyre whining away or turn on your radio, switch it over, to Radio 4 and you hear mellifluous wit and wisdom of Scotsman Eddie Mair."
He claimed the most "astonishing example" came on yesterday's Reporting Scotland when newsreader Jackie Bird presented a story about BBC presenters, including herself, who had "limited" medical information disclosed by a Fife doctor.
"We almost had Jackie Bird interviewing Jackie Bird about this astonishingly parochial thing," he said.
It should be said that there was much concern raised about STV potentially disappearing and BBC Scotland reducing staff in the debate general. But it was interesting that in these difficult times no MSP (not even Lord Foulkes) looked at the issue that a mammoth state funded media outlet (the BBC) is actively crowding out a struggling market on lots of different platforms. STV and other commercial interests have a difficult battle on their hands on the TV, radio and the web against such odds.