Public Broadcasting Services (PBS) has made public its Guidelines on the Obligation of Due Impartiality, which came into force on June 1. (The Times, April 4).
Far too frequently the PBS news bulletin is not only weak professionally, if not outright unprofessional. It is also biased, at times blatantly so- Lino Spiteri
According to the guidelines, PBS journalists and presenters of current affairs programmes aired on TVM will not be allowed to express public support for any political party, not even off air. PBS now holds that it is important that those associated with news and current affairs do not engage in off-air activities that can lead to any doubt about their objectivity on-air and towards what is transmitted.
That is all well and good, as far as it goes. It does come a bit late in the day. But with the general election looming it is timely to demand political objectivity from PBS journalists and presenters, though they will and should remain entitled to their personal convictions and opinions.
In the case where these are well known, the assessment mesh will now be tighter and will no doubt give rise to occasional claims that the guidelines were broken, flagrantly or with subtlety. Bear in mind, though, that good current affairs programmes and reporting that involve interviews cannot be anodyne. Interviewers have to be tough enough if necessary to make their interviewees squirm with discomfort as they exact answers from them.
The overriding measure of objectiveness and impartiality will lie in whether presenters of current affairs will be equally tough with all their interviewees, whichever side of the political, religious or other spectrums they come from. The essence of a good interview is to strip the interviewee bare. To make him/her cut out the waffle and fudge and focus on what one really stands for.
It is not an easy task. Politicians are trained in the devious art of wriggling away from a question to switch it to and focus on what they intend to say according to their partisan agenda. That is bread and butter to them. Their interviewer should not let them get away with it. Not anyone of them. If they do it would not necessarily be due to lack of objectivity. It would essentially mean that the interviewer is not good enough, should be retrained and if scratch remains out of sight, unceremoniously axed.
That, I believe, is the main problem with some of the reporters and interviewers who toil on PBS. They tend to handle politicians with a mixture of sweet syrup presented with kid gloves, asking soft or even “put” questions, or allowing their actual or would-be interviewees to get away with misleading answers or to avoid the point of the questioning.
Out of self-respect and respect towards their profession – and job – interviewees should, without being insolent, be hard, starting with a refusal to supply the questions they intend to put in advance. Where they are not answered properly they should not hesitate in saying, Sir, you are avoiding my question! It won’t be easy.
Our political class, particularly that part of it in office, has been pampered ever since TVM went on air. The time has come for that to end. The PBS guidelines ought to be as much about professionalism, as objectivity.
That will also require a change of the camouflaged culture at PBS. The guidelines should not apply merely to journalists and presenters. They must target content as well. The news content is frequently unacceptable. Far too often it is anything but news. It is template means of regurgitating what politicians have uttered in their ritual outings on Sunday, or on occasions structured specifically with an eye on a docile media.
News should be about new issues, or new angles to ongoing issues. Instead PBS religiously report what the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition have said, in that order. That is not journalism. Much less is it journalism to turn the news programme into a notice board of government events.
There is also a deeper malaise. Far too frequently the PBS news bulletin is not only weak professionally, if not outright unprofessional. It is also biased, at times blatantly so. Bias can lie in what one leaves out as much as in what one reports. Perhaps not much leaving out is done but the manner of reporting government activities is not infrequently obnoxious.
At this point the usual knee-jerk retort will come up – PBS was blatantly biased during the Labour rule in the 1970s and 1980s, under Socialist governments. Nor was it an angel during the 1996-98 Labour interregnum. There is no need to argue the point. It is a given. Nor should it be necessary to suggest that 18 years of bad PBS under Labour have been outweighed by 23 years under the Nationalists.
The essential point I am making is to look forward. With the political stations so frankly and obviously biased in their reporting and current affairs programmes it is not simply the case that there is a dire need for objectivity by TVM and the PBS radio stations, in the name of truth. I would add that there is an opportunity for the PBS journalists and presenters to walk, even strut taller than their colleagues in the political media. The PBS stations should earn the admiration of the general public.
They can do that not merely by being objective but with vital dynamism – they need to be totally committed professionally. There are very good human resources at PBS. They should not just be given guidelines to be objective and refrain from off-air political proclivities.
They should be given their head and encouraged to use it.
• A serene Easter to readers, the editor and staff.