How much coverage would one consider it necessary for the BBC to give to the topic of leadership primaries in one political party in a foreign country?
BBC coverage of the Likud leadership primary which took place on December 26th included the following:
December 26th:
BBC News website:
“Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu in party leadership challenge”
BBC Radio 4:
‘Today’programme – the first item in the opening news bulletin was a report by Barbara Plett Usher (from 01:39 here).
BBC World Service radio:
‘Newsday’ – the lead item (from 00:37 here) was a four-minute interview with Israeli journalist Noga Tarnopolsky.
‘Newshour’ – the lead item was a four-minute report (from 00:12 here) by Barbara Plett Usher.
December 27th:
BBC News website:
“Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu comfortably wins party leadership challenge”
BBC Radio 4:
‘Today’ programme – a report from Barbara Plett Usher (from 33:44 here) and an additional report from the same journalist in a news bulletin (from 1:03:38 here).
BBC World Service radio:
‘Newsday’ – a four-minute and twenty-second report from Barbara Plett Usher (from 14:09 here).
‘Newshour’ – a report by Barbara Plett Usher (from 45:04 here).
Yes, the BBC apparently really did consider it efficient use of public funding to produce at least nine multi-platform reports in two days on the topic of a leadership poll conducted by one political party in a foreign country in which less than half of the 116,000 members eligible to vote returned a predictable result.
