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| BBC: We went too far in U2 tie-up BBC's editorial complaints unit says promotion, which included concert on roof of Broadcasting House, breached guidelinesThe BBC today admitted that it breached its guidelines in promoting U2's latest album, No Line on the Horizon, and that altering its logo to "U2=BBC" was inappropriate.The corporation's editorial complaints unit said coverage of last year's album launch, which included a concert on the roof of Broadcasting House, amounted to "undue prominence for commercial products or organisations" and breached BBC editorial guidelines.It said the use of the slogan U2=BBC "gave an inappropriate impression of endorsement", and said a reference to the BBC being "part of launching this new album", in an interview between Zane Lowe and U2's Bono on BBC Radio 1, was inappropriate.Critics complained at the time of the launch, last February, that the BBC had given the band millions of pounds' worth of free publicity across TV, radio and online.The commercial radio trade body, the RadioCentre, made a formal complaint. Conservative MP Nigel Evans said it was "the sort of publicity money can't buy. Why should licence fee-payers shoulder the cost of U2's publicity?"But complaints about an edition of Jo Whiley's Radio 1 show, and a BBC News online report of the U2 concert on the roof of Broadcasting House, were not upheld.The complaints unit said its findings had been discussed at the Radio 1 and sister station 1Xtra editorial meeting.It added: "In addition, the Radio 1 leadership team have reminded executive producers and presenters about the issues to be considered in relation to judgments about undue prominence, and the distinction between the reporting of new artistic work and commercial promotion."The management of BBC marketing, communication and audiences (the division responsible for the U2=BBC graphic) has reminded all staff of the need to consult the editorial policy team in a timely manner for advice when potentially sensitive issues such as commercial interests are involved. A session on working with third parties will be included in marketing, communication and audiences monthly editorial issues training programme.""We acknowledge the findings and have taken note for the future," a BBC spokesman said.The unit also upheld a complaint from the RadioCentre about the BBC's coverage of a tour by Coldplay. The "Radio 1 presents Coldplay" website included a link to the websites of ticket agents, which the unit said was "not in keeping with the BBC's guidelines on links to external websites".Previously, the BBC fair trading committee upheld a complaint about the Radio 1 promotion of Coldplay.The U2 ruling marks the second rebuke for Radio 1 this week, with the editorial complaints unit ruling that a Radio 1 interview with two British National party members was not rigorous enough.• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000.• If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".BBCTelevision industryU2John Plunkettguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
How Mo Mowlam misled Tony Blair for nine years about her killer cancer Doctor tells of a 'professional nightmare' as the Labour minister ignored his advice and kept her condition secret while in officeMo Mowlam, the former Northern Ireland secretary, was respected for her frankness. She was blunt in a way that the public found truly refreshing for a top politician. On one occasion she even told Ian Paisley to "fuck off".It has now emerged, however, that there was one fundamental issue about which "honest Mo", who died in 2005, refused to tell the truth – to the constituents who voted her in and to her boss, Tony Blair. For nine years before her death, she had maintained the fiction that she was suffering from a benign brain tumour when in fact it was malignant. The reality was known only to Mowlam, her husband Jon Norton (who died last year), and her former doctor, Mark Glaser.Glaser first told Mowlam in 1996, just months before Labour swept to power, that she had a malignant tumour on her brain – and a life expectancy of just three years. After the landslide victory, Mowlam was appointed to the cabinet at the head of the Northern Ireland Office. It was the moment for which she had built her career.Glaser has revealed the secret to Neil McKay, the author of the Channel 4 drama Mo, starring Julie Walters. He also told McKay that he ordered Mowlam to tell Blair the truth. But she rejected her doctor's instructions, and instead informed both the prime minister and the public that the tumour was, in fact, benign and fully treatable.Glaser, who is now chief of cancer services at the Imperial College NHS Trust, said he felt a heavy sense of responsibility as Mowlam took up the post of Northern Ireland secretary, in charge of the peace process, denying the existence of a debilitating condition that he expected would kill her within three years."A frontal lobe tumour can cause disinhibition, behavioural disturbance and poor judgment," he told McKay. "And there she was taking up a job in what was effectively a war situation. But there was nothing I could do. I was her doctor. I was responsible for her care, even if she wouldn't let me keep records in the proper places or write to her GP."Glaser describes his plight at the time as a "professional nightmare" and says Mowlam "deceived me". He said: "I told her to tell Blair, but she didn't, she lied. So I went the extra mile for her because she demanded it from me. I didn't seek this. I was trapped. It was a moral issue and a medical issue. She was doing this very important job, one that affected so many people's lives, while she was ill; but she was also my patient and I owed her confidentiality."The doctor explains how the treatment he administered to Mowlam was, initially, very successful and allowed her to carry on with tortuous and exhausting peace talks until she was moved from the post by Blair, against her will, in 1999.Had she been in the post much longer, Glaser told McKay, he might have had to go to Blair himself to tell him the truth.While Glaser was troubled by the problems Mowlam posed, he came to like and admire his most famous and difficult patient. He felt by the end of her life that he had become her social worker as well as her doctor. He tells how in advance of particularly important or testing meetings Mowlam would ring and ask to have her medicine adjusted, sometimes to stop her being sick. As time has worn on, Glaser has begun to feel that her illness may, oddly, have been a reason for the success of the peace talks, rather than a cause of instability that threatened them. "She was racing against time," he says.It is seems clear her tumour may have accentuated and exaggerated her already unusual levels of openness and exuberance, endearing her to the normally flinty, unforthcoming politicians of Northern Ireland who felt more able to open up in discussions as a result.Even Clare Short, the former international development secretary, a friend of Mowlam's who had a relationship with Jon Norton after her death, was unaware until she saw the drama recently of the real cause of her death. Short had no reason to doubt Norton's explanation that she died from the effects of radiotherapy. She said Mowlam remained very angry to the end at the way Blair removed her from the Northern Ireland job, believing it was the result of a plot hatched by her successor in the post, Peter Mandelson.Walters, who shaved her head to play the part of Mowlam, says: "The script is very truthful. It is very real."Mo MowlamLabourNorthern Irish politicsTelevisionToby Helmguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
UK follows US with national data site Inventor of world wide web brought in for launch of data.gov.ukFirst Barack Obama dived in. Today sees Gordon Brown's turn to open up government information to the public with the launch of a new website: data.gov.ukBrown brought in the inventor of the world wide web, Tim Berners-Lee, last June as an adviser for the launch of data.gov.uk "so that government information is accessible and useful for the widest possible group of people".It follows the Obama administration's data.gov, launched in May to provide thousands of sets of data about the US to the public – the result of Obama's first legislative act as president. Since then Australia and New Zealand have followed suit with official data sites.In theory the information can be used to provide ultra-local information, even down to postcode level, for things such as crime, health indicators or educational attainment.The minister for digital Britain, Stephen Timms, said the launch would create new opportunities for businesses. "By allowing industry to use data creatively they can develop new services and generate economic value from it."This is the first step in that process. Put together on a shoestring budget, at the moment the site simply gives people a place to find public data. Users search for a subject, such as "crime" or "exam results" and the site comes back with the latest data for that topic.The project has involved some of the country's most prestigious software developers in competition, creating examples of what people would do with public-sector information, with a £20,000 prize fund. Among the winners were maps for local recycling, cycle paths, school catchment areas and postbox locations.Professor Nigel Shadbolt of Southampton University – brought in with Berners-Lee as a fellow adviser – says this is a big day for free information. "Today marks an important step forward in the work the prime minister asked us to lead – it gives data to the public and sets the groundwork for further progress."Over the next few weeks and months we will build on this by adding more functions. We are already working with departments, agencies and local authorities to release even more data all the time."Maurice Frankel, of the Campaign for Freedom of Information, said the government had much further to go. "The question is will it get the impetus to keep growing beyond data sets that are available anyway?"This month the London mayor, Boris Johnson, launched the London Datastore – a set of data collections about the capital – and cities such as Toronto, San Francisco and New York have done the same.Simon Rogers edits the Guardian's Datablog at: guardian.co.uk/datablogInternetFreedom of informationSimon Rogersguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Man jailed for life over 1983 murder of Colette Aram Paul Hutchinson sentenced for raping and strangling 16-year-old Colette Aram, a case featured in first episode of CrimewatchA businessman was jailed for life years after he raped and strangled a teenage girl and boasted to murder squad officers that he would never be caught.Paul Hutchinson, 51, who is twice married with four children, was told he would serve at least 25 years after he admitted murdering Colette Aram, a trainee hairdresser, in October 1983.Hutchinson, who had no previous criminal convictions, was caught after his son was detained on a driving matter in June 2008. A DNA swab taken of his son provided a familial match to genetic material found on a paper towel at a pub where the killer stopped for a ploughman's meal minutes after killing Colette.The landlady of the Generous Briton had noticed blood on a customer's hand. Forensic experts found that the paper towel contained DNA traces of Colette and her killer, but it failed to match anyone on the police database.Colette's murder was the first case profiled on the BBC's Crimewatch when it launched in June 1984.On the day she was killed, the 16-year-old spent the afternoon baking cakes before walking to her boyfriend's house a mile away from her home in Keyworth, Nottinghamshire. The former electrician-turned-businessman bundled the teenager into the back of a stolen Ford Fiesta. He beat her over the head with a bottle before raping and strangling her and arranging her body in a field in a sexually provocative pose.After the murder, Hutchinson, a psychology graduate who had also been a youth worker, returned to the village to watch the police investigation unfold and later sent a letter taunting officers that he was still free."No one knows what I look like. That is why you have not got me," he wrote, also claiming he was wearing a Halloween mask. "You will never get me."Hutchinson, of West Bridgford, Nottingham, was sentenced at Nottingham crown courtafter admitting the killing at a hearing last month.The court heard that on the day of the murder Hutchinson hid in a shed, spying on young girls at a riding school. He stole the car and drove to Keyworth, where, armed with a bread knife, he approached two more schoolgirls.Later that evening, Colette, who was usually picked up by her boyfriend Russell Godfrey, set off to his house in the village. Witnesses reported hearing a woman screaming at about 8.10pm before a car drove off at speed. It was not until 9am the next day that officers found Colette's naked body in a field a mile and a half from where she was abducted.At the time of the murder Colette lived seven streets away from Hutchinson in a house she shared with her parents Jacqui, 63, Tony, 69, and brother Mark, now 45.After his arrest, Hutchinson had planned to blame the murder on his dead brother. But he changed his plea after detectives revealed they had found a DNA sample of the brother and it did not match the sample taken from the pub.Detective Superintendent Kevin Flint, who was in the incident room the night Colette disappeared, has led the investigation since 2004. "I think the message this conviction sends out is that we will never give up," he said.Hutchinson's DNA has not been found at the scenes of any other unsolved crimes.CrimeJames Sturckeguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Defoe brother 'punched to ground' The half-brother of footballer Jermain Defoe died after suffering brain damage when he was punched to the ground, a court hears. news.bbc.co.uk |