The BBC responded to UKMA Chair Peter Burke’s complaint about their cover-up of the outcome to the Government’s imperial units consultation. The response to the Government’s survey was almost unanimously pro-metric. Almost 99% expressed either support for the status quo (mandatory metric with an optional imperial supplementary indication) or to use fully metric pricing (with no imperial) despite the fact that respondents who wanted to express these options were forced to use the free text boxes or reply by email. The BBC reply failed to address the key issues in the UKMA Chair’s complaint.
You can find the UKMA Chair’s complaint in the previous Metric Views article so there is no need to repeat it here.
Here is the content of the BBC’s response to the UKMA Chair’s complaint:
Thank you for contacting us and for reading the BBC News Website.
Firstly, we apologise for the delay in replying.
We were also sorry to read you had concerns about the reporting in the article: “Pint-sized bottles of wine to be sold after Brexit review” (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67795075).
For us, the BBC News website is the best of BBC News on the web and an unrivalled resource of authoritative fact and comment.
We take our responsibility to report accurately and with due impartiality very seriously.
As with the coverage of any developing news event and its aftermath, the content of the story was updated as the story evolved, which is standard practice.
However, the current version of the article still makes clear:
“The government has confirmed it is not planning to change the rules on selling in imperial measures after Brexit.”Due impartiality isn’t necessarily always achieved in one single report or programme, so we would ask that you take account of how we cover a topic over time.
That said, your concerns are noted.
We do appreciate your points about this, as we remain absolutely committed to bringing the user the most comprehensive, impartial, factual and fair news reporting.
Please be assured that your concerns were sent to senior staff at the BBC News Website and senior management via our daily report.
Your views are important to us and we welcome feedback from our audience to help us review how our news is being written and reported.
Thanks again for taking the time to get in touch.
Please also accept our best wishes for 2024.
It sounds like a run-of-the-mill standard BBC reply to a complaint when the BBC wants to dodge the key issues in a complaint. The UKMA Chair replied to point out the BBC’s failure to address the key issues in his complaint:
Thank you for your response. I’m not happy with this. Firstly, the story did not evolve in the course of the day. The announcement about champagne bottle sizes was made at the same time as the government’s announcement that nothing significant would change. It was mentioned in your first story and given the very limited prominence which it deserved. Secondly, it would have been perfectly possible for you to publish a second story if you felt that was appropriate, without pulling or overwriting the first story. Anybody looking on the BBC website for coverage of this issue will now be directed solely to a story in which the emphasis is totally wrong. I would wish you to acknowledge this fact.
Metric Views 
This looks like a cover up of a cover up. A total disgrace to the BBC.
Quite clearly we are getting nowhere with the BBC now, just another political channel that cannot be trusted.
I have for some time had reservations about the slant of un-bias on the BBC, I guess with extremism the bias is somewhat biased.
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It looks to me as though once the BBC saw how the tabloid press were dealing with things, the race to the bottom started and the BBC felt that they had to out-tabloid the tabloids.
When I was at school the golden rule in the exam room was “Answer the question”. What everybody missed was that in the initial consultation document, the Government made it clear that the use units of measure in the drinks trade fell outside the scope of the consultation. Why then did they make announcements concerning the drinks trade in their response to the consultation?
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This response makes things worse than I thought.
I did think at first that the Government had issued two press statements in quick succession, with the bias to the pint sized wine bottles on the second.
It now looks as though the Government issued just the one press statement, with all the information in a sensible and balanced order. The BBC followed this in its first report. I can think of no stronger (I won’t use the word “better”) reason for the BBC’s second report than Martin’s suggestion that it wanted to compete with the sensationalist press. There is plenty of weasel-language in its response to our complaint.
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What can we all expect? This is the Fake News Media in full glory. Just one lie and half-truth after another. Not only did they change the focus of the story before most had the chance to read the first version, they claimed that “pint” bottles will be available next year, meaning this year of 2024.
Even though one company produced a 500 mL size in anticipation of the law being changed to allow this size, the reporters and editors at the BBC and other Fake News outlets kept hiding this fact and insisting it will be the pint of 568 mL (actual fill 570 mL), even though a spokesperson for Rathfinny wines said they have no intent of producing this size and only wanted permission to produce 500 mL, which to them is a pint. Also, 568 mL is an impossible fill. The machines can only do increments of 10 mL, making the closest fill to be 570 mL.
Not listening to the people in the wine industry and putting words in their mouth is the apex of yellow journalism. The Fake News media has lost all credibility and in all essence deserves to be boycotted.
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An AI bot read your letter, picked out a few key phrases, and wove them into a form letter expressing our sorrows at your concerns. e get responses like that in the US, too.
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I agree with John, I doubt if a human or an MP ever see these emails. It is the same everywhere now.
Adding the word lies or liar into the text seems to flag up a human of some sort though.
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It’s very noticeable that in today’s BBC report about the public consultation on energy bills, the headline points to the significance of the unusually high number of people that took the trouble to respond:
“Energy standing charges review prompts huge response“https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-68024339https://web.archive.org/web/20240119015146/https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-68024339“A call for views on standing charges by energy regulator Ofgem has received a huge response … Ofgem said 20,000 people had been in touch before consultation closes later on Friday”
Whereas in the BBC report about the imperial units consultation (both the original, and the re-written version) the even more significant figure of over 100 000 respondents is not mentioned once. Even the tabloid newspapers reported the extraordinary number of respondents to the imperial units consultation:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12903773/Government-scraps-Brexit-dividend-imperial-measurements-shops-voters-prefer-metric.html“Some 98.7 per cent of more than 100,000 respondents were either happy with the status quo (81.1 per cent), in which metric is the primary measure and imperial can be displayed alongside, or wanted imperial scrapped altogether (17.6 per cent).”
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