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Newsnight suffers mental roadblock
BBC2's Newsnight is one of the best current affairs magazine programmes on British TV at present, though one is not exactly spoiled for choice. It is widely celebrated for the forceful interviewing of politicians especially by Jeremy Paxman. Yet beneath the surface, the basis of its reportage is as shallow as that now characteristic of BBC1'sPanorama and equivalent programmes on commercial television.
Typical was its response to the latest government White Paper on the gridlock gradually engulfing Britain's road network. Here we had the minister in question, John Prescott, three other 'representatives' of specific interest groups, including a 'member of the public', and, of course, someone to chair the proceedings.
The 'green' voice was represented by Sara Parkin of Forum for the Future. She adopted that lame refrain so common these days. It goes like this: "so-and-so's aims are all very well and good but are there the means to ensure they will be achieved". In other words, it starts off with the concession that the government's heart is basically in the right place but worries that there might be not be sufficient resources to deliver the goods.
The 'let's-be-positive-and-reasonable' stance of groups like Forum for the Future is based on a strategic choice, namely that this is the best way to win friends and influence people. Parkin performed poorly, partly because, one suspects, her adopted stance means that she was fighting with one hand tied behind her back. Prescott brushed her off like some harmless moth. The only thing that political deadheads like him understand is a threat to their power and mild admonitions make no impression (though, since it might win a few votes, they will offer a few social stokes back in return, simply for the sake of appearing reasonable themselves).
The only thing likely to move the government has been the protest movement against new roads and the fact that it has rallied large sections of middle class England to its cause, hence threatening the loss of too many votes at election time. Mealy-mouthed nit-picking at what Prescott says is scarcely a rallying call to action. What is needed is a bit of road rage-at the death and injuries caused by our car-crazed culture, the destruction of wildlife habitat and farmland the land it destroys, the fragmentation of communities, the pollution it dumps into the air, the resources it guzzles, and so on.
Some solid logic might help too. The current volume of people and goods now moved by cars and lorries cannot be shifted to buses and trains, without reproducing the damage now being done by private vehicles. Transportation levels in total must come downradically. This is especially true when strategies are assessed in a global context, in the light, for example, of projections by bodies such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climatic Change. Once such factors are included, the hopeless inadequacy of Prescott's plans become startlingly clear.
In reality, the Blair government is still committed to more roads and more vehicles. The Independent on Sunday, for example recently revealed (12/7/98) the extent to which motorway madness still grips politicians and civil servants. In some cases, as with the Birmingham orbital road, the plans are disguised by being split into seemingly smaller schemes. With regard to other modes of transport, there is still the same stupid fetish of speed, be in the form of high speed trains (in the case of the new Heathrow link, mainly for the business classes while the rest of us have to make do with somewhat less smart trains) or new airports (Mr Blair does love to be photographed opening the latest airport expansion). Mr Prescott is vulnerable to exposure on all such matters but the Nice Greens will not unveil the Transport Emperor's new clothes.
Now there is, of course, that great big hurdle, public opinion. Both government and its loyal opposition are quick to protest that the masses want their private motor cars, to drive when, where and, in the case of all too many nutcases, as fast as they like. Newsnight duly dragged in a member of the said motoring public to sit on its panel. She turned out to be a mother of three who drives her kids to school. In due course, she pleaded that their family simply needed their cars.
It is true that, at this point of time, there are lots of people whose jobs and other aspects of their lifestyles depend on car driving.The panel discussion singularly failed to get to grips with this issue. No-one challenged the underlying assumption that individual wants ipso facto create rights, in this case to more roads, more cars, more buses and so on. No-one emphasised just how many other people, the old and the young, the poor, the pedestrians and cyclists, lose their rights because of the selfish demands of motorists and the infrastructure construction industry. No-one distinguished trivial desires (e.g. the right to drive to a golf course or park right next to their doorstep) from genuinely difficult circumstances (e.g. the absence of buses). No-one distinguished between socially unnecessary jobs (sales reps. and legions of others)) and socially valuable ones (e.g. visiting doctors).
Furthermore, no-one stressed the extent to which car dependency is encouraged by other aspects of government policy-its support for economic integration (and therefore more commuting and long distance transport), its failure to stop out-of-town developments, its weak planning controls over new housing (a lot of which is of the single or semi-detached variety, sprawling over the land, with American-style big grass lawns and garages for two cars), its unwillngness to encourage a truly public education system (one aim of which might be to enable all children to walk safely to local schools, instead of growing up with the belief that one simply drives everywhere) and so forth. The week before Prescott's paper was published, the Safeway chain announced a 1,000 new storesto be opened at garages. This alone will encourage more and more road movements. But no-one on the panel made this or any other link.
People like the lady who represented Mr and Mrs Public need to be told where to get off (politely, of course). Yet how many would dare to question her lifestyle. By having three children, she had multiplied the number of journeys she makes. By the sound of it, those kids go to private school, again necessitating, in nearly all cases, long journeys by car. Indeed the media can even endorse such lifestyles (listen to Henry Kelly's School Run slot on Classic FM each wekday morning around 8.10 am.).
Som of the above points could have been raised by the Newsnight
chairperson. But as with so many of his ilk, it is presentational style
that matters. Knowledge of the substance is surplus to requirements.
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