The Hutton report All channels
I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here ITV1
Like the bizarrely skewed conclusions of his report, Lord Brian Hutton's unique sit-down comedy performance in room 76 of the Royal Courts of Jesters gave every indication of a man inhabiting a universe parallel to that inhabited by the rest of us. Here indeed was where a (very dull) episode of Jackanory met a Ronnie Corbett-style shaggy dog story, complete with oversized chair.
Hutton's story - that Blair was some sort of tragic Cinderella figure tortured most terribly by the tyrannical ('Boo! Hiss! Behind you!') ugly sisters Dyke and Davies - was extraordinary enough, but it was nothing compared to his bizarre speech patterns. As Hutton dwelt (albeit rather too briefly for some of us) on the topic of 'Wippons of Mars destruction', I wondered if perhaps we'd been all along misled (by the BBC, presumably) about the nature of the Beagle's abortive mission.
Still, even as one prayed that Hutton would never be tempted to give up the day job (retirement) in order to tour his sparky one-man show around the provinces à la An Evening with Alastair Campbell, the import of the report was starting to sink in. And on the most simplistic level - the one at which a TV critic necessarily operates - it just didn't compute.
First up, the question of how - other than by divine intervention - one body of human beings, a Government for example, could be any less error-prone than another body of human beings, such as, for the sake of argument, a broadcasting organisation. But even if, in drawing his conclusion, Hutton appeared to defy logic, the thing that concerned me was how the BBC was going to cope with reporting on itself at the precise point it was plunged into crisis.
'Again and again, by and large, [Hutton] comes down for politicians and officials and against journalism and the BBC,' said (the BBC's) Andrew Marr in his first dispatch, holding a copy of the report and wearing an expression that may be familiar to those urban dog owners who have ever been caught short with a bagful of fresh poop and no nearby bin to dump it in.
Wednesday wore on, the snow clouds gathered, the bad smell lingered and the BBC minded its Ps and Qs as it tried to do the story justice, and then Gavyn Davies resigned. Channel 4 had mistakenly flagged this as breaking news as early as 1.25pm, at which point Hutton was still a long way from his 'and they all lived happily ever after', though it finally came at teatime.
Meanwhile, on Channel 4, ITN and Sky there wasn't much in the way of crowing and quite a bit in the way of journalistic solidarity. Journalists know that in the trustworthiness pecking order they rate somewhere just above estate agents and below part-time pickpockets, but are able to live with that because everybody else knows that politicians are just below three-card tricksters and cold-calling double-glazing salespersons. Everybody except Hutton, that is.
'If the report was much more than the BBC had feared, it was much better than the Government dared hope,' said (the BBC's) Huw Edwards, with uncharacteristic quotability, during the Corp's (corpse?) 10 O'Clock News-cum-Wake. 'Devastating for the BBC, glorious for the Government,' said (the BBC's) Mark Mardell.
The Corp twitched a bit, every now and again. Davies may have fallen on his sword - a sword of truth, surely? - but in the BBC's wide-eyed news reports there was an air of complete gobsmackery combined with a degree of bullishness. Given this, on Wednesday's Newsnight Jeremy Paxman was frustratingly restrained when confronted by an extremely smackable Alastair Campbell, who was wearing his air of smugness as if it were L'Air de Vindication by L'Oréal.
Eventually, however, as the crowing became too wearisome, Paxo asked Campbell if he'd leaked the report to the Sun, at which point the latter stiffened and sniffed sniffily (Sanctimonious by Calvin Klein?). Indeed, it was interesting how much, attitudinally-speaking, Campbell resembled sniffy, sneery Sex(ed-up) And The City siren, Samantha. So much so that had he been carrying a clutchbag and wearing a pair of sparkly courts, he would have flounced.
But if it had been tough enough on Wednesday, the pervasive mood of dismay mingled with disbelief turned to downright anger on Thursday when Greg Dyke eventually bowed to internal pressure. In what may have been the most badly managed bit of Outside the BBC have ever Broadcast, the not-awfullytall former DG was hidden by the scrum of reporters crowded in front of the rapidly revolving doors of Broadcasting House.
'An inspirational leader,' mourned Andrew Marr, first out of the starting blocks and setting the tone for an afternoon of media breastbeating. 'Black times for the BBC. It will indeed never be the same again,' said Sky's Adam Boulton.
Meanwhile, even as the We ? Greg placards were being constructed by weeping BBC staff, the almost wilfully charisma-free acting director general Mark Byford, made an adjectivally enhanced speech: 'Warm... independent... impartial,' he droned. 'Trusted ... reliable ... authoritative... courageous... rigorous... robust... creative... ambitious... '
Only Doc, Bashful, Dopey, Grumpy, Happy, Sneezy and Sleepy failed to get a mention - and they're demanding an immediate apology.
By late afternoon, Sky News was reporting scenes of 'hundreds of supporters demonstrating outside BBC Television Centre', though there were (bafflingly, given the location) no pictures as yet. Anyway, it sounded thrilling - Vive la revolution, even if it isn't televised! - and so, swept up by the excitement and emotion, I contemplated driving to Shepherd's Bush and hurling carnations at Greg's passing Lexus.
In this respect it was a bit like Diana all over again, except that Greg was still alive and thus could stand on desks and say stirring stuff like: 'What we have been trying to do is defend the independence and integrity of our journalism. Do not be cowed.'
This was a speech which made me glad I had pursued a career in journalism rather than estate agency - a feeling confirmed, incidentally, by the BBC2 series Property People, which is excellent. Mind you everything on BBC2 is excellent, as is everything on BBC1, 3 and 4, not to mention Radio's 1 through 7, via 5 Live and the World Service, CBeebies, CBBC and News 24.
On Thursday night's Channel 4 News, Jon Snow revealed that the BBC meltdown had elicited more than 2,000 emails and text messages, 'the majority slating the judge's whitewash'. Snow also interviewed the British Bureau Chief (BBC? Spooky no?) from the Italian state broadcaster, RAI. Asked if the nation which had voted for Berlusconi understood exactly what the fuss was all about, he smiled: 'It is difficult because it seems quite natural to an Italian for a politician to lie.'
By this time I was choosing my viewing mostly in order to avoid any sightings of Alastair Campbell, who just wouldn't let it lie. Former BBC chairman Sir Christopher Bland summed up many viewers' feelings when he told the BBC there was 'a certain triumphalism [about Alastair Campbell] at the moment that I find wholly distasteful'.
By Thursday evening surely even the cloth-eared Government - largely represented by Tessa Jowell, who was busy appearing everywhere - must have noticed that, ironically, in their short-term victory were potentially planted the seeds of longer-term defeat. And then, by the time Newsnight had swung around again and one heard Melvyn Bragg telling Kirsty Wark that Greg Dyke had been 'a masterful director general', or listened to the baying audience during Question Time, it felt as if there had been a fundamental shift in the mood of the nation.
Maybe there hadn't, of course, and maybe nobody who wasn't a journalist, BBC employee or politician cared about this quite as passionately as the rest of us, but that's not the way it felt.
Back in his days as DG, before he became an acronym for GOD, Greg Dyke had occasionally been accused of dumbing-down, chasing ratings and all manner of other sordid commercialism, some of which was unfounded. Nonetheless, it should come as no surprise that when ITV1's I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here pulled in ratings close to 10 million last Monday night, the DG did what any other really clever DG would have done in these extraordinary circumstances: jump up and down and make a fuss in order to distract millions more viewers from tuning in to see Jordan's breasts and John Lydon's charms.
Currently almost as riveting as the Hutton saga, I'm A Celebrity etc will, I suspect, claim even more of the nation's attention, not to mention mine, over the next week. In the meantime, however, I'm wearing my Greg Dyke memorial black armband as a tourniquet.
