Michael Buerk: BBC staff read Guardian "like their bible"

'I don't care about relative poverty at all. Inequality is no problem at all - we are all unequal. Equality of opportunity is all that matters.'

But how can there be equality of opportunity if there is no equality of education?

Relative poverty and inequality do matter. As a society and nation, we have a duty to raise the standard of living, quality of life and education of all our people. It is not right that people live in damp-ridden homes and suffer ill health due to their environment. We have a duty to look after all our people, just as we have a duty to police all neighbourhoods and protect all people from crime. We don't want to go back to the times of the nobles and the serfs, to Marie Antoinette's "let them eat cake" and "let them read the Guardian".

spiders

The highest post war unemployment levels have all been under Tory governments, Thatchers was the highest 3.8 to 4.5 million dependent on which count method you use. The Blair/Brown governments reduced it and now the Tories are increasing it. The current Tory governmet has the all time record for under 25 unemployment at over one million (they must be very proud).

With regard to poverty the Blair/Brown government reduced it, not quick enough and not far enough I will admit. It surged under Thatcher and is again with the current governments policies.

Pensioner poverty increased under Thatcher (the removal of the link to wages didnt help), remember all the hypothermia deaths, Labour mostly removed pensioner poverty with pension credits and to be fair the Tories have not aimed their spite at the pensioners YET although I note the pensions link to CPI not RPI which will dilute pensions value.

The scource, the institute of Fiscal Studies and various publications.

yep I can assure you I wouldn't like the Daily Fail up me. At all.

@claig

I can assure you that I would never joke about the Daily Mail. The only people who make jokes about that illustrious newspaper are socialists who "don't like it up 'em"

I think Claig is definitely a joke poster- that remark about the 'sensible'' Daily Fail was priceless...

spiderslegs- relative poverty is all around you, clearly. It doesn't mean how much richer one rich person is from another; it means the gap between the poorest and richest sections of the population, a gap which has been increasing massively since the 1980s. Surely even Tory politicians actually know that? (although they would of course deny it, but they're good at that sort of thing, all politicians are). That is why they are obsessed with moving on/starving out the poor and making services 'competitive', i.e. stopping them from serving the poor- by charging big fees for them, for example.

I would however agree with you on the idiocy of 'growth' as a measure of political success.

"Most of them shouldn't read any newspaper at all" oh please be quiet.

The BBC news rooms and libraries have access to a database of almost every national and local paper, and many international ones as well as having hard copies of the dailies. What staff prefer to read in their own time is up to them.

"I read the Telegraph FFS. And the Spectator."

Well if you are satisfied with only half the picture, that is your choice. I want the whole picture, I seek the truth, I read the Daily Mail. As John F. Kennedy famously said "Ich bin Daily Mailiner".

Sorry - see my AIBU - just opened the second bottle

• & columist

*met a Mail reader.

Claig they make jokes about the Mail because it, is, laughable. No serious person would read it. In all honesty, I have never read a Mail reader.

They daren't make jokes about Telegraph colomists because they know they are more erudite & have more bile....

Heathen - thankyou.

And Claig my opinions of The Mail are my own. I read the Telegraph FFS. And the Spectator.

I would expect that type of view from a heathen. But one can always change and see the light.

claig - "'The Daily Mail is not a sensible newpaper, it is hysterical shite that uses scaremongering to push politicaly ill-educated folks into paroysms of fear. About everthing.'

Where did you get this idea from?"

From picking up the paper and reading the words that are written inside it.

HTH.

spiderslegs. There have been occasions when real scandals broke about the Labour party and surprisingly enough the only paper that ran with the story was the Daily Mail. The Daily Telegraph was silent on the matter. You won't find Labourites making jokes about the Daily Telegraph because they think it is insignificant, they don't fear its influence. There is a reason that Labourites hate the Daily Mail. As Lieutenant Pike used to say about the Daily Mail, "they don't like it up 'em".

Ah, now I know where you got that erroneous, scurrilous impression of the Daily Mail from.

'The majority of my friends are left-wing (mind you they are the bourgeoisie that proclaim from their ivory towers).'

Are some of them from the ivory towers at Millbank?

Claig - I read the Telegraph - am a subscriber - I find it much more pertinent when it comes to the real world.......

And I vote as I do because I am, in essence, a libertarian, I strongly believe in people & their ability to do good for themselves, if given the chance.

I firmly believe in a small state. Help where it's needed, low taxes & don't even get me started on the concept of the state being the 'natural' providers of education (though I do believe it should be funded through taxes & avaiable for all).

'The Daily Mail is not a sensible newpaper, it is hysterical shite that uses scaremongering to push politicaly ill-educated folks into paroysms of fear. About everthing.'

Where did you get this idea from? This sounds like something straight out of New Labour's Millbank HQ. This sounds like the sort of stuff one would be unfortunate enough to hear at a Red Flag or Red Wedge concert.

"All we are saying is give truth a chance."
Read the Daily Mail and from your eyes will fall scales.

newwave I have never voted on a single principle, to vote for a party because you like their policies on transport would be reckless in the extreme.

I'd like to see your figures that illustrate Tory government increase absolute poverty (relative poverty is an idotic measure - 'we have a Mercedes but no diamonds,, they have diamonds').

I don't think that's true, we have had GDP growth for the last 30 years - that too is an idiotic measure of political success - where does it stop??? We can't have unalloyed growth - can we?

Much spending is directed by local government & there is a partisan element to how that's structured. Many of the front-line cuts are directed by Labour councils to show how 'horrid' the Tories are.

The majority of my friends are left-wing (mind you they are the bourgeoisie that proclaim from their ivory towers). They know my politics & don't despise me.

Spiders.

Not hate, despise.

The reason for this is what I describe as the "Tory poison pill theory" which is as follows:

You may vote Tory because you like their poilicies on transport of maybe housing whatever fair enough BUT every Tory government increases unemployment and both relative and absolute poverty, they increase child poverty and also introduce policies that hurt the poor and vulnerable.

By voting Tory you are also voting for the "poison pill". You may consider the effects of the poison pill a price worth paying or maybe you dont care about those affected by the "poison pill" as there people dont count, who knows.

That is why I despise Tories