Golliwog’s Race Talk

So the media machine has sparked a fresh BBC row, this time over Carol Thatcher’s supposed off-air racism during The One Show towards a tennis player at the Australian Open last Thursday.

I say ‘row’, but that seemed like too strong a word on Tuesday. Thatcher had been dropped from The One Show for remarks which offended colleagues. Case closed.

But the red tops and Daily Mail were soon all over it, accusing the BBC of axing the 55-year-old ex-prime minister’s daughter.

Far from being brutally axed, Thatcher was employed on a short-term contract, which the BBC decided not to renew. She appears as a guest on a range of other BBC programmes including the Andrew Marr Show, Question Time, the Daily Politics, This Week and Woman’s Hour, and had not been ‘axed’ from them.

At this point, The Mirror hadn’t quite cottoned onto the dizzying potential of the story. Meanwhile, Paul Dacre and his team were compiling a whopper story, regularly updated and enlarged until 6.41pm on Wednesday, when they had created this beast.  

Yes, the golliwog teacup storm was well brewed by Wednesday, with Melanie Phillips in the Mail making noises over the Orwellian nature of the Beeb.

Today, the Mail was all too happy to announce that – plan successful – the BBC has been bombarded with over 2,000 complaints. Whether Thatcher should have been fired or not, this was an opportunity too good to miss for those with an ‘axe’ to report.