What did we think of Martin Durkin's documentary last night?

[hobbgoblin]

I'm pig politically ignorant when it comes to Economics so may well have been brainwashed by this programme, so wanted to see what y'all thought...

I think you might struggle on "The programme was not signalled as a personal or authored view" - I recall a section in the middle where he said something like "I'm MArtin Durkin and this is my film about the psychotically enormous debt we are in.."(not a direct quote obv.).

I bet there is a similar rebuttal to each of the sections you have referred to.

trice, had it been clearly labelled as biased polemic, I'd agree. When I see people saying that they don't really understand politics but that this programme makes it all much clearer, I worry. I think plenty of people won't recognise this for what it is. There are stacks of people who will happily swallow whatever the Daily Fail or the Grauniad tell them.

They have to state it up-front at the beginning - they didn't.

I bet at least one complaint is upheld against this prog on the grounds of partiality.

Plenty- I didn't agree with a lot of what was said on the programme but I wouldn't complain to OFCOM about it. It didn't endorse or show any bias towards any particular political party so I would be surprised if OFCOM did anything at all. It provided an alternative view of events and did make a few interesting points as well as some highly dubious ones.

Takver, I agree with you on the economy. You know much more about it than me.

I would try to change our reliance on the City. I would nationalise many of the failing banks and make sure that they prioritised investment in British industry. I would increase taxes on speculation and on foreign investment and give tax breaks and grants for investment in British industry. I would improve our education system and increase standards. I would commission lots of TV programmes about science and industry. I would have the fabulous Royal Institution Christmas Lectures all year round. I think what Harold Wilson did was great when he created the Open University and created an investment bank for investment in new technology. I would give extra money for universities that taught science and business. I would try to change the climate so that our brightest students choose industry rather than finance, law and media.

I would try to roll back some of globalisation and try to build up new nationalised industries to supply the basics for the country.

I would commission studies on how the Germans do it and why they are in the top tier of world exporters.

'why do we always get the damned incompetent ones in power, whether from the right or left'

I think we get them, because we get the ones that the bankers like.

'I didn't agree with a lot of what was said on the programme but I wouldn't complain to OFCOM about it.'

Don't then. I wasn't suggesting everybody should, just providing a link for those who might want to.

WRT party politics - I can't find anything on the Ofcom site that partiality only refers to this. Plenty of people complained on these grounds about the Great Global Warming Swindle, which wasn't a party political issue. The complaints weren't upheld, but only because global warning was no longer considered a controversial issue. We'll see though - either they'll uphold it or not. I've made a complaint and am now happy for Ofcom to do their job and investigate. Either way, nothing bad will happen and I don't think I've done anything wrong.

Interesting suggestions, claig. I'd be keen to see lots more employee controlled businesses, my feeling being that it is only when employees are in control rather than shareholders that there is a genuine incentive to deal with inefficiencies. Not necessarily meaning that the employees should run the business themselves directly, in lots of cases of course they would choose to employ professional managers to do it (though I suspect high level pay packages would be looked at a lot more closely).

PlentyofPockets - you (and others) might be interested in this piece about Martin Durkin. Despite the greengrocers' apostrophes it is worth a read.

Takver - if you're looking at the Livng Marxism references in that link, here's another facet:

"Political affiliations
Critics and supporters of Durkin's programmes have claimed he is closely involved with the Revolutionary Communist Party and its later offshoots Living Marxism (or LM magazine) and Spiked, a magazine and associated political network that promotes libertarian views.[19][20][21] [22][23]

Durkin has denied this, asserting that The Guardian newspaper has accused him of being on the far right, the far left and of being a 'classic liberal'.[citation needed]. RCP member Brendan O'Neill of Spiked has defended him, stating:

In fact, a few people who contributed articles to LM appeared as talking heads on Against Nature. That?s all. Not as exciting as the crazed and wide-eyed web conspiracy theories make it sound, I know. Sorry.[24]" from wiki

Agree very much with Takver and Claig on this