Big Brother Bliar ramps up his control of intelligence gathering .....
Private Eye - 6-19 January 2006 - # 1149 - p.10 - Media News -
"Changes in store for BBC Monitoring, a branch of the World Service that listens in to foreign radio broadcasts and transcribes "material of interest".
Once the responsibility of the Foreign Office, the service will now be controlled by the Cabinet Office in what is seen as a vital intelligence gathering role."
The BBC operation at Caversham is fundamentally a branch of the news-gathering service, but as direct government control suggests, it was always far more than that. "Material of interest" would always be available to TB through the foreign office, and their capability is way less sophisticated than the real spooky boys and girls at Cheltenham.
So it would appear that filtered reports are not enough - presumably he wants to control the listening process, directing them towards specific 'targets' ?
Anyone else care to speculate ?
What? I thought the BBC was
What? I thought the BBC was all "Keeping Up Appearances" and Inspector Morse!
Morse was ITV, before a
Morse was ITV, before a fellow pedant points it out (the main commercial network over here). The BBC can be blamed for Keeping Up Appearances, however.
Re the Caversham thing, aren't there changes afoot at the World Service to make it less a World Service and more 'Uncle Tony Speaketh Unto The Middle East'? Could be connected?
That could be a valid
That could be a valid connection - our Dear Leader would certainly love the ability to 'broadcast his pearls of wisdom unto the nations of the world'.
This control option will then allow him to direct 'BBC Monitoring' to listen out for references to himself on all world broadcasts.
Could be a major ego-boost for him ... as long as he doesn't read the translations of what they are actually saying !