Forum Topic

The BBC being criticized again!! 

I wish people would make their minds up!!!Question Time:  The BBC is being criticized for airing a lady in the audience saying "we should completely close the borders.  Enough is enough".  She also said that the number of people flooding into the UK "who cannot speak English is costing public services too much.  This happened during a fiery debate about Priti Patel and the new points based immigration rules. https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/watch-bbc-under-fire-for-airing-womans-comment-to-completely-close-uk-borders/ar-BB10eI1p?ocid=spartanntpandhttps://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/tv-radio/bbc-question-time-racist-video-immigration-ash-sarkar-twitter-a9349316.htmlation-ash-sarkar-twitter-a9349316.htmlSo, what were the arguments about the BBC before?  Too liberal and anti-Brexit?  Or is it the governments mouthpiece?Mind boggles!

Ivonne Holliday ● 2300d16 Comments

Hello Philippa,I agree and, not willing to be too cynical, some would say that British workers going abroad to work is an entirely different matter... Sorry!

Ivonne Holliday ● 2298d

I am not arguing with that Bunny.What I am saying is that British people who have been abroad for over 20 years and they do not speak the local language. If you go the Vendome in France, I do not think you need to be fluent in French.  If you come fruit picking to the UK, I do not think you need to be fluent in English.The question of benefit payments is another matter altogether.

Ivonne Holliday ● 2298d

Isn't it odd how people seem to forget Auf Wiedersehn Pet time when there was no work here and our workers went abroad to earn?

Philippa Bond ● 2298d

Ivonne, I think the difference is if you can get by and don't have to work, then it doesn't really matter all that much. But you can't expect to go to Germany, for instance, and get a decent job without speaking German, and don't think you can get much in benefits either.

Bunny Payne ● 2298d

Hello Michael,If you are visiting a country as a tourist it is OK to have a few words in their language (good morning/afternoon/evening/night, please, thank you, xx beers, etc)But living in a country for 20 years and not speaking a word of the language of the country they have adopted?  Horrific!It almost sounds as do as I say and not as I do!!

Ivonne Holliday ● 2299d

I speak 3 languages: English, Yiddish and Rubbish :)

Simon Knight ● 2299d

Michael: A journalist acquaintance of mine (English)  was able to say "Two ice-cold lagers, please, and my friend will pay" in 40 languages.

Alexander MacLeod ● 2299d

Charming man

Andy Pike ● 2299d

Maybe we all just have different realities, scary ...https://www.technologyreview.com/s/613092/a-quantum-experiment-suggests-theres-no-such-thing-as-objective-reality/(This website's timer and user count must have 🙂)

Michael Ixer ● 2299d

Not entirely xenophobic but ignorant.The only difference between her ignorance and yours is one of degree. You clearly do not have the faintest idea what economic the make-up of EEA migrants is, which is embarassing for you, because the details are easily available on the internet and if you think yourself eligible to comment on a public forum, you should spend a few minutes educating yourself first.Go forward a few years, when there are still pickpockets and beggars, carehomes can't find staff and your kids are priced out of a job by £25,600 pa earning Indian PhD's, you may think again.The latest rules really are daft, as is anyone supporting them. On a spectrum, you are not quite so much a gobshite, with not quite such a small brain.

Michael Winstanley ● 2299d

Ivonne. Interestingly I've come across Lithuanians, Poles - and Russians and Ukrainians - living in London, probably aged late 20s early 30s, who speak Russian but also speaks excellent English. Sadly, I have to admit my own language skills are pretty poor (what other country would give one an option of physics/technical subjects versus French/history) but I can manage 2, 3, 4 beers in couple of languages ...

Michael Ixer ● 2299d

I wholeheartedly agree with you Michael.The Scandinavians (and Germans for that matter) speak English extremely well!It probably will not be so for countries like Hungary, Czechoslovakia. But they were under Russian rule after Postdam, were they not?It also riles me no end, people saying that immigrants should speak English here, when English people who have emigrated to European countries 20 years ago cannot utter a word of the language of the country they have adopted!!!  GrrrApologies for this rant.  I find I it so hypocritical that the UK demands people who come here to speak English when the English going abroad just gesticulate and speak louder expecting everybody to understand!

Ivonne Holliday ● 2299d

PS I suspect any EU pick pockets will take a tip from the South American ones and come on tourist visas ...

Michael Ixer ● 2300d

So everyone has to suffer because the Tories cut the police budget ant there's no longer sufficient resources to deal with crime?I need some satire 🙂https://southendnewsnetwork.net/news/bbc-to-adopt-points-based-system-when-choosing-question-time-audience/

Michael Ixer ● 2300d

Micheal Yoh can call it xenphobic but you surely must have met those beggars who claim not to speak English same with the pick pockets up town. It's ok pretending all euro or wider incomes are looking to work in the hospitality or care industry but many do not and its those folk want to stop coming in. The new rules may be a blunt instrument  but something needs to be done. Portillo spiked senss last night and the lady in the audience was a gob shite with little brain and all tgsts wrong from one side of the debate but not all that want controls are that daft.

Andy Pike ● 2300d

I'm not sure where the myth of EU - and for that matter - non EU citizens not speaking English comes from. All the people I've come across speak pretty good, if not excellent English (OK, it might be an American or Indian variant); in fact, when I was doing some consultancy with in Scandinavia in the late 70s the Danish project manager used to correct the written English of one if his English programmers, and when I checked if they had manuals in English a Norwegian colleague laughed at the idea of a US IT company producing manuals in Norwegian or Danish. In my experience the reason there's so many Europeans in the hospitality industry is because they can speak multiple languages to international customers and the predominantly migrant staff in my elderly relatives' care homes all spoke adequate English ... OK, perhaps a few fruit pickers aren't that fluent but this sounds like mode Brexit xenophobic nonsence to me?

Michael Ixer ● 2300d