Do Sky News edit their broadcasts politically ? : Wed Apr 16, 2014 7:15 am  

You will only have seen this live as I doubt whether or not they will host it online for catch-up but i was idly watching the Sky News live broadcast of the Hillsborough families memorial service at Anfield yesterday and as will have been reported Roberto Martinez gave an address which started off describing how he was affected by Hillsborough as a 15 year old etc etc etc...

Then he started to speak of the campaign for justice and he repeated the line which I believe Bill Kenwright had quoted when referring to the original inquest as a whitewash and "the authorities took on the wrong city if they thought they were going to get away with that."

As soon as he said that phrase the sound was cut and a studio presenter (it may have been Ms Burley, sounded a bit like her) started to talk to a different pundit about something completely irrelevant, they left the images of Martinex speaking and of the crowd applauding whatever he was saying but would not broadcast his words, eventually when he was finished the presenter said that "Sky News did not associate itself with opinions of Roberto Martinez" and there was some mention from the reporter in the ground that he had gone "off script", no other speaker was edited live in such a way and today on Sky News' web site they only report Martinez up to the point at which they cut him off.

I still find it very strange that they should edit him in this way and am still intrigued as to what he said and if he was speaking "off script" who thought it necessary to pull the plug on him, presumably some Murdoch lacky was listening to the live feed and deciding when it was politically safe to reconnect ?

Does it still hurt the Murdoch Group to hear criticism of their coverage 25 years ago ?

Re: Do Sky News edit their broadcasts politically ? : Wed Apr 16, 2014 7:55 am  

Have just found his full speech on Youtube, he speaks for just over 5 minutes and Sky News cut him off at 2mins 15sec and only picked up the live sound again when he walked away from the podium - what he says in those missing minutes is pretty innocuous really, praising the support group, mentioning their quest for "the truth" but not openly critical of a government or a media.

Twitchy fingers in the editing suite I think, a "oh my god his not sticking to the script" moment, not really what you expect from a news reporting channel who's only function is to report news and show advertising and a little hypocritical of a channel who are quick to report any element of left or right wing bias (depending on what week it is) on the BBC.

Re: Do Sky News edit their broadcasts politically ? : Wed Apr 16, 2014 8:13 am  

I think they still have Kelvin MacKenzie on sometimes don't they? And he still sometimes appears on the BBC and other media. If Murdoch was that sensitive of Hillsborough and that absolute travesty of a man/journalist I think he'd have dropped McKenzie years ago.

IMO MacKenzie's The Truth lead was utterly appalling not just for the fact it hammered Liverpool fans right after many dozens of them died, but mainly because he went with that angle on such poorly sourced material. If you're going to make such inflammatory allegations then you simply can't be taking agency quotes and then running with them, you surely need to be getting these quotes directly, making sure the people agree with your conclusions. Even then you need to get as much evidence as possible to make your case. IMO MacKenzie seemed to take the news agency source and run with it quickly. For that he pretty much deserved to never work in journalism again. The NOTW eventually got shut down over hacking Mille Dowler's phone, I think The Sun should have been shut down after that.

While the campaign against The Sun in Merseyside still runs very strong, it's not like Sky and Murdoch particularly suffer from it. I mean, why isn't there a huge backlash against Sky Sports because of Murdoch's involvement? I just think Murdoch has got off relatively lightly over it with regard to Sky, so I don't think he'd be putting any pressure on Sky News really. I haven't particularly noticed any difference to the way Sky are reporting the phone hacking trial with the way the BBC are.

Re: Do Sky News edit their broadcasts politically ? : Wed Apr 16, 2014 5:42 pm  

How exactly did it affect him, as a 15 year-old kid, in Spain? Who wrote him that script?

Re: Do Sky News edit their broadcasts politically ? : Wed Apr 16, 2014 6:25 pm  

100% Wire wrote:

How exactly did it affect him, as a 15 year-old kid, in Spain? Who wrote him that script?

He used the words "I was a football mad kid in a football mad family" so I'd guess he was affected by the news coverage on TV just like 99.99% of the population of the UK was affected by the TV news coverage - don;t forget the game wasn't live on TV and most of what was first reported was done so via audio reports only, the video reports came later via TV news reports (not 24 hr news channels).

I'm assuming they had TV in Spain when he was 15 of course, or he may just have read The Sun.

Re: Do Sky News edit their broadcasts politically ? : Wed Apr 16, 2014 8:17 pm  

The game itself wasn't live on TV (FA Cup Semi Finals weren't back then) but the tragedy itself as it was unfolding most certainly was. I still remember watching Grandstand that day as it cut to what it considered a newsworthy live feed at Hillsborough because the game had been suspended with players returning to the dressing rooms. Although not immediately apparent, it became increasingly obvious after about 5 minutes of that live feed that people were being crushed, dying or already dead.

I prefer to take in the news via a wide range of news agencies and then form my own opinions. I don't include Sky News in that range for the same reason I wouldn't consider it's even more objectionable cousin Fox News. Both reside under the TV-tabloid banner whose output consists mainly of right-wing shiyte. Anyhow, the mere sight of the vile, malevolent and reactionary Kay Burley ought to be sufficient reason to turn anyone off Sky News for life!

Re: Do Sky News edit their broadcasts politically ? : Tue Apr 22, 2014 3:49 pm  

100% Wire wrote:

How exactly did it affect him, as a 15 year-old kid, in Spain? Who wrote him that script?

I was in France on the day as part of my degree (teaching to high school kids) and all anyone talked about for days after was Hillsborough and English hooligans. So it wasn't just the UK that it was covered in. Or people over 18

Re: Do Sky News edit their broadcasts politically ? : Wed Apr 23, 2014 2:19 pm  

William Eve wrote:

Anyhow, the mere sight of the vile, malevolent and reactionary Kay Burley ought to be sufficient reason to turn anyone off Sky News for life!

And she's from Wiggin