ABSTRACT
He described a conversation he had had with Tony Benn, MP, in the course of which Mr Benn had re-stated his well-known criticism of the BBC’s coverage of politics, claiming it concentrated on personalities rather than politics; that the BBC traditionally inhabited the old centre ground of the man of good will and intent; and that it portrayed this centre ground as being held by people like Jim Prior, Ted Heath and Shirley Williams who were the good guys and girls with whom most of those who worked for the BBC sympathised on a personal level. In doing so, Tony Benn claimed that the BBC was taking sides in a battle going on within the two main parties themselves. [Our correspondent] said he had countered these suggestions vigorously but he had wondered whether there was not a grain of truth in some of them somewhere.
