DOUGLAS MURRAY: Biased, sneering and using BBC as her megaphone... it's not the first time Emily Maitlis has forced her bosses to apologise for her

Last month, while the Prime Minister was still in hospital, the BBC’s Newsnight opened with an unprecedented monologue. The presenter, Emily Maitlis, was visibly angered by Boris Johnson’s colleagues describing him as a ‘fighter’.
In a weirdly literal and deeply ungenerous speech, Maitlis informed viewers that such language was wrong. She proceeded to give her views on ‘inequality’ and other issues.
On Tuesday this week Maitlis did it again, opening with a shockingly partisan attack on Dominic Cummings and the Prime Minister, declaring that the former ‘broke the rules’ and made the public ‘feel like fools’ and accusing the latter of ‘blind loyalty’.
For many viewers, this was a step too far.
On Tuesday this week Maitlis did it again, opening with a shockingly partisan attack on Dominic Cummings and the Prime Minister
On Tuesday this week Maitlis did it again, opening with a shockingly partisan attack on Dominic Cummings and the Prime Minister
BBC bosses apologised for the rant – not the first time that Maitlis has forced them to do so. This week’s monologue is just the latest reason the 49-year-old has been in trouble with her own bosses over the one-directional, partisan nature of her presenting.
The presenter, Emily Maitlis, was visibly angered by Boris Johnson’s colleagues describing him as a ‘fighter’
The presenter, Emily Maitlis, was visibly angered by Boris Johnson’s colleagues describing him as a ‘fighter’
Last September, a complaint was upheld against her for a ‘sneering and bullying’ interview carried out on the programme in July. The BBC’s internal executive complaints unit found that she was too ‘persistent and personal’ in her criticism of the pro-Brexit journalist Rod Liddle.
In truth, she didn’t even bother to disguise her contempt for him. She asked Liddle, absurdly, if he would describe himself ‘as a racist’, adding ‘because many see you that way’. She then informed the longstanding columnist: ‘All you do is write about suicide bombers blowing themselves up in Tower Hamlets.’
Pointedly, Liddle asked her: ‘Do you have to, at every possible juncture, show the BBC’s grotesque bias?’
He seemed to have been asked on to the show simply for her to insult him.
And seven months before that, the BBC had to issue another on-air apology after remarks Maitlis had made on the programme about the pro-Brexit campaigner Richard Tice.
You will search in vain for similar attacks on, or necessary apologies to, anti-Brexit campaigners.
Maitlis has been a fine journalist but today she appears to be one of the large number of people who have been driven furious by the events of recent years.
On social media, she proclaims her pro-Labour views and continues to retweet the most loud-mouthed Left-wingers and Remain campaigners.
She has consistently attacked the US President and expressed other highly partial viewpoints.
The licence fee is meant to assure quality content (something that has become ever less evident in recent years). And it is meant to mean that the BBC is a news source that everybody can trust
The licence fee is meant to assure quality content (something that has become ever less evident in recent years). And it is meant to mean that the BBC is a news source that everybody can trust
How are the public meant to believe that when she sits in front of the camera to present, this deeply partisan person somehow becomes impartial?
After her performance this week in particular, such an idea is impossible to sustain.
Of course, plenty of media figures are open about their political views. Several have left Newsnight in the past and pursued modestly successful careers in Left-wing activism. But they did so because – as Maitlis seems not to understand – if you are a partisan activist you cannot use the BBC’s current affairs programmes as your megaphone.
While no one is forced to buy any British paper, if we want a television we are all forced – on threat of imprisonment – to pay a subscription to the BBC.
There are supposed justifications for this. The licence fee is meant to assure quality content (something that has become ever less evident in recent years). And it is meant to mean that the BBC is a news source that everybody can trust.
Impartiality may be impossible to achieve 100 per cent of the time but it is nonetheless meant to be the aspiration.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson's special advisor Dominic Cummings arrives at Downing Street after news broke that he travelled 260 miles to Durham during lockdown
Prime Minister Boris Johnson's special advisor Dominic Cummings arrives at Downing Street after news broke that he travelled 260 miles to Durham during lockdown
For Maitlis to have decided to give up on it entirely will not only corrode public trust and further divide, rather than unite, our nation.
It will also fuel the growing political pressure to alter the present hugely advantageous funding arrangements that the BBC enjoys.
After the declining standards of recent years, I know many who no longer bother to appear on Newsnight when asked, and not just when Maitlis is presenting. Many believe it has increasingly come to resemble the unwatchable Channel 4 News and, more importantly, they feel that it is no longer worth it. Fifteen years ago, when Jeremy Paxman was the presenter, being on Newsnight was an event for guests and viewers alike. Commentators would come off air to find their phones buzzing with congratulations or commiserations.
Today, the buzz has long stopped and the programme has now come to feel like it is being broadcast into a great silence.
This is not a coincidence. Events of recent days are a reminder that the last stage before total irrelevance is a desperate last grab for relevance.
Perhaps the BBC’s bosses should conclude, like the viewing public, that the programme is past its best.
 
Emily Maitlis' REAL political colours: Newsnight presenter's Left-leaning views are exposed in tweets and retweets to her 360,000 followers
Emily Maitlis has never been shy to disguise her Left-leaning views, as even the most cursory glance at her tweets and retweets directed at her 360,000 followers reveals.
Unable to contain her excitement at Dominic Cummings's trip north, she tweeted about it before her monologue on Tuesday night. 
But her bias goes back a long way, as Ross Clark explains…
WEDNESDAY MAY 27
Missing from the Newsnight presenter's chair, Miss Maitlis is busy on Twitter, retweeting Newsnight's feed, which was quoting Donald's Trump's rogue ex-press secretary Anthony Scaramucci: 'It's a very tough decision for the executives at Twitter… You didn't think you were going to be in a situation where you had a pathological liar as the President of the US and now you have to sit there and measure and weigh through what he's doing.'
Miss Maitlis then retweets three negative tweets about Trump, including one by comedian Sarah Cooper: 'Still processing the fact that the President has no clue what he's talking about on national television.'
MAY 26
Far from having second thoughts about the way she had introduced the subject of Cummings that night, Miss Maitlis proudly retweets praise from user 'Nearly Legal', a lawyer recommended by (who else?) The Guardian: 'Okay, that is an opening. @maitlis telling it as it is.'
Miss Maitlis retweeted multiple negative tweets about President Donald Trump, pictured at the White House yesterday
Miss Maitlis retweeted multiple negative tweets about President Donald Trump, pictured at the White House yesterday
MAY 24
Retweets a clip showing people shouting and making obscene gestures at Cummings as he walks towards his home, with a comment by New York Times correspondent Jane Bradley: 'These aren't journalists shouting at Cummings but furious members of the public.'
Miss Maitlis tweets: 'The damaging thing about this whole issue for government is that Cummings instantly loses any right to tell others they are out of touch/elite/ missing the public mood. That's properly over now. He has become the thing he loathed.' Retweets the Labour Party's official account: 'There cannot be one rule for Dominic Cummings and another for the British people.'
Retweets the Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff: 'Just want to say there will be good Tory MPs and ministers hating every minute of this, who need to decide if this is what they want their party to become. Politics is being demeaned and as with expenses scandal, there will be lasting damage.'
MAY 14
Retweets LBC radio presenter and arch-Remainer James O'Brien: 'The far-Right routinely disseminate and pretend to believe things they know not to be true to stoke hatred and division. To see the tactic being adopted by Conservative MPs and even an actual minister is a moment of real danger for our democracy.'
Retweets an anti-Tory doctor who congratulates her following an item in that evening's Newsnight: 'As a frontline healthcare worker I'm so grateful you are calling out the lies, u-turns and incompetence of this government. Proper journalism.'
She also retweeted the views of LBC radio presenter and arch-Remainer James O'Brien, pictured
She also retweeted the views of LBC radio presenter and arch-Remainer James O'Brien, pictured
MAY 11
Retweets Times columnist Jenni Russell: 'Boris was never up to the job of crisis leader. His role was figurehead. But his Cabinet can't fill the gap because they were chosen for Brexit loyalty, not competence. We're being led by bunch of inadequates.'
MAY 6
Professor Neil Ferguson has resigned from the Government's Sage committee after his married lover visited him. In contrast to the excitement she will show when Cummings is accused of breaking lockdown, Miss Maitlis retweets a scientist: 'The lockdown is here actually to protect your community and protect the NHS… So in a sense, not to let this [resignation] distract people from complying with the lockdown.'
APRIL 5
Miss Maitlis retweets a doctor who has been angered by a column in the Daily Telegraph: '@Telegraph has really decided to ratchet up the blame game. Yep, it's the NHS who's to blame for the Covid19 lockdown. Oh – and US-style healthcare would be better. NHS staff – who's with me in boycotting Telegraph advertisers? Because this kind of accusation stinks.'
The presenter retweeted a scientist's views over the resignation of Professor Neil Ferguson, pictured
The presenter retweeted a scientist's views over the resignation of Professor Neil Ferguson, pictured
DECEMBER 9, 2019
Three days before the general election, she tweets: 'Don't underestimate the similarities between G.B.Done [Get Brexit Done] and M.A.G.A [Make America Great Again, Trump's campaign slogan] – they each work if they are consistently repeated and chanted – but never explained.'
DECEMBER 7
Retweets Lib Dem candidate Sue Wixley, praising Tory voters who lend their vote to the Lib Dems.
DECEMBER 4
Retweets Lib Dem activist who claims then-leader Jo Swinson has been unfairly criticised for her time in the Tory-led coalition Government. 'The irony is Jo Swinson, who no one knew five years ago, is being held to account on her record in government, while Boris Johnson completely shrugs it off.'
Tweets by a Lib Dem activist who claimed then-leader Jo Swinson, pictured on election night, was unfairly criticised, were also shared by Emily Maitlis
Tweets by a Lib Dem activist who claimed then-leader Jo Swinson, pictured on election night, was unfairly criticised, were also shared by Emily Maitlis
NOVEMBER 6
Retweets Jonathan Lis, of anti-Brexit group Brit Influence, after Miss Maitlis grilled Tory ex-minister James Brokenshire on Brexit.
'Maitlis puts a suggestion to James Brokenshire that simply won't go away: after so many years of attempted detoxification, the Tories are back to being the Nasty Party again.'
Miss Maitlis goes on to retweet supportive comments that Brokenshire was 'completely out of his depth' during her interview and was speaking in 'banal soundbites'.
OCTOBER 20
Retweets a post by the then Lib Dem MP Sarah Wollaston who had defected from the Tories. 'No one should be duped by the fake 'One Nation' Tory spin. This would be a very different and far more Right-wing #NastyParty if it gets back in. The cull of the moderates has been ruthless.'

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