Is the coalition right to boycott Question Time?
Should the Beeb have booted Alistair Campbell off the panel?
This is from the BBC editors blog of Gavin Allen – editor of Question Time.
“..This week, for the first time in my three years as executive editor of Question Time, we were told by Downing Street that a cabinet minister would only appear on the programme if another member of the panel was replaced. According to No 10, a senior member of the cabinet was available to do Question Time but only if Alastair Campbell was replaced by a member of the shadow cabinet.
Very obviously, we refused and as a result no minister appeared, meaning that the government was not represented on the country’s most-watched political programme in Queen’s Speech week – one of the most important moments in the Parliamentary calendar.
No 10 stated that the objection to Alastair Campbell was that he was not an elected Labour representative or a front-bencher..”
What do PBers think?