The Labour Party was accused of ‘making excuses for BBC bias’ on Friday night after a senior figure called for an end to ‘wittering on’ about the Corporation’s impartiality.
Sir Chris Bryant, tipped by some to be culture secretary in a Labour government, made the remark at a ‘Creative Industries’ hustings last week.
He suggested that calls to root out the BBC’s alleged Left-leaning bias were designed to damage its reputation.
Sir Chris who is standing for re-election in the Rhondda and Ogmore constituency, said: ‘We’d be absolutely insane as a country if we let the BBC die.
‘It’s one of the few things… that we are renowned for across the world.’
Labour’s spokesman for creative industries then added: ‘Of course, there’s got to be review of the licence fee and the way it operates… But the fundamental principle must be [to] stop messing around with wittering on about impartiality and all of that kind of stuff.’
Tory MP Alexander Stafford said last night: ‘It’s clear from Chris Bryant’s remarks that a future Labour government would make excuses for BBC bias – not make sure that it doesn’t fall prey to the sort of classic Leftie, metropolitan bias that we so often see.
‘The BBC… should never favour one political opinion over another.’
Sir Chris rejected Mr Stafford’s claims, saying: ‘Of course, the impartiality of the BBC is vital to its integrity. That’s why I’m sick of ministers trying to interfere in it.’