Mark Mardell's Euroblog

How would you like to own an owl?

• Mark Mardell
• 1 Feb 08, 06:54 PM

Thanks for all your comments on the Balkan pieces. I am not going to get embroiled in the central argument at the moment but wanted to reply to a couple of side issues raised.

“How would you like to own an owl?” is the question asked of the bounty hunter cop in “Do androids dream of electric sheep?” the novel on which “Blade Runner” is based.

He's being bribed to give up his mission. He lives in a society where all animals are rare, owning them confers both status and a sense of self worth. Now that’s what I call an inducement to abandon professional ethics.

So for my money, as it were, the story about the BBC getting EU funds doesn’t even come close. But it does make me groan because it makes postings like Brian Whittle’s inevitable.

Most of the money is a loan from the European Investment Bank to the BBC’s profit-making arm , which, I take it, means mainly BBC World.

There is also some money from the EU itself to fund the BBC’s web-based numeracy and literacy campaign .

Flying pigs

I take it Mr Whittle’s prose style is a sophisticated dig at this dastardly European attempt to undermine every Englishman’s right to punctuate as wildly as he chooses.

He writes: “Do pigs fly Mark how much do you get for your Pro comment... get some one who stays in the middle.”

Just for your complete assurance: No, I don’t get any money from the EU personally, I hadn’t got a clue the BBC got any such money and it wouldn’t have made an iota of difference if I had. The middle, or even triangulated above it, is where I try to be.

I know I shouldn’t get riled, but I do. I can’t for the life of me see what “Pro comment” there was in Joe the Digger unless it was his desire to face towards Europe rather than Russia, which is his opinion, rather than mine.

My response to all such complaints has to be: point out what you are specifically unhappy about and I will explain or justify and indeed, if necessary, apologise.

Early day motion

A Conservative MP, Bob Spink, has put down an early day motion, what amounts to a House of Commons petition, on the same subject of the EU funding.

He does have a specific complaint, about the lack of BBC coverage of a pro referendum march at the end of October .

I may be wrong, but I can’t find any newspaper coverage at the time either.

I think most journalists would like the money that pays for us to do our job to descend untarnished from heaven. Any form of funding, whether it is from a government, advertising or a rich proprietor carries with it a potential risk.

As far as broadcasting is concerned, I think the risk is thankfully an unrealised potential. I worked in commercial radio for a long time. Never once did I hear of an advertiser trying to interfere with news coverage.

Equally at the BBC, when my betters have been grappling with the Government over the license fee, no one ever says “pull your punches, for a few months” and, more importantly, the Westminster team has always been as tenacious and questioning as ever at such times.

But if anyone wants to put large sums of money into my bank account, to show that I am not suborned by their cash, I would think it was an experiment worth trying.

Head of steam

But I can feel a head of steam gathering behind another question of coverage. Those opposed to the Lisbon Treaty are asking why there is so little in the media about the Commons Debate.

JorgeG and Max Sceptic strike a somewhat uncomfortable chord suggesting I should be perhaps reporting on “core EU” and the debate on the Lisbon treaty rather than having been in the Balkans.

It's true, I spend much of my time agonizing whether I am in the wrong place.

“Core EU” first. While these last few blogs were published I was back in Brussels doing reports on the climate change package and Commission consumer policy.

And I would argue Kosovo is very much core EU: the police and justice mission are the biggest the EU has ever undertaken, the foreign ministers are riven down the middle and it is the biggest issue on the plate in Brussels right now.

It's one of the bees in my bonnet that many people underestimate the scale of the EU’s foreign policy role and ambition. It's big and it's getting bigger,for good or ill.

Now Lisbon. I could duck the responsibility and say it's up to my colleagues at Westminster to judge if it’s a story.

Failing the test

But the fact is I’ll holler if I think something has been unjustly ignored and I haven’t been raising my voice.

I well understand the growing frustration among those opposed to the treaty that the Commons debate hasn’t turned into a big news story, with even those newspapers with a clear agenda pretty much relegating it inside and down the bottom.

Why is this? In some ways, while the debate passes the current affairs test with flying colours (it's important and you should know about it), it fails some basic news tests.

It's not that new: many of the arguments were aired throughout 2007. It hasn’t been bloody or brilliant.

The Government (almost certainly) isn’t going to be defeated and doesn’t face a major rebellion. This is not an excuse: I am trying to explain it as much to myself as anyone else.

Anyway, I am off to Paris to see how they do things differently in France: on Monday they are changing the constitution so they can avoid a referendum.

We also have the Irish referendum to come. Who knows I might even make it back to my old stomping ground, Westminster, before the commons debate concludes.

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