It’s too easy to bash the BBC over Naga Munchetty. Personal reflections have no place in news, even in the face of racism

The broadcaster’s co-host would never have asked for the views of a white colleague on Donald Trump’s racist remarks. They both overstepped the mark

The guy serving coffee at my station turned from the television as he handed over the cup, shaking his head. “What do they sound like?” he asked. Shouting, catcalling and insults spewed out of the live coverage from the House of Commons. He shrugged; even his customers during the rush hour never behave like that.

Language and tone has never been more important as we inch towards a momentous decision for our country, but, just like Brexit, is it possible to rein back? To take a collective deep breath and think before we comment?

In the US, and now in the UK, leaders use language as a weapon – a highly tuned device to make the maximum impact. One premier might have been schooled in the classics and the other has primary-school level literacy, but both instinctively know how to achieve maximum impact, generally at the elevated level of hyperbole. In Trump’s lexicon, even the word “nice”, as applied to eco-activist Greta Thunberg, can be an insult.

When even the prime minister’s sister indicates she finds his combative tone unhelpful, when MPs leave the House to face verbal abuse from bystanders on their way to the underground, when they have to instal panic buttons and anti-explosive bags for their mail, things have gone way too far.

The public is exhausted by the in-fighting at Westminster. People just want to move on and discuss health, education, and the lack of funding for social care – but with deadlock in the Commons, how to find a way to compromise, when the PM seems to equate the word with castration of his giant ego?

Macho-man rhetoric prevails, and it’s depressing that some female MPs have felt the need to stoop to that level to get themselves heard about the din.

In this febrile atmosphere, was the BBC right to issue a ruling against the Breakfast TV presenter Naga Munchetty for comments about President Trump on the programme last July?

He had just told four ethnic minority congresswomen (who all happen to be Democrats) to “go back” to “their crime-infested countries”. Munchetty said: “Every time I’ve been told as a woman of colour to ‘go back to where I’ve come from’ that was embedded in racism”. When asked by her co-host Dan Walker how she felt about Trump’s remarks, she replied: “Absolutely furious.”

There has been widespread outrage at the BBC’s decision to reprimand Munchetty for breaching the guidelines on impartiality, following a single complaint. David Jordan, the BBC’s director of editorial policy and standards, tried to clarify the reasoning on the Today programme, saying it was not wrong to describe the president’s tweets as racist, but Munchetty “crossed the line” relating to impartiality guidelines when she went on to discuss Trump himself and what his motivation for making these remarks might be, and in expressing her fury at hearing them when asked by Walker.

BBC guidelines categorically state the audience should not be able to tell the personal opinions of journalists and presenters on “a matter of public policy or political controversy”. He added that “it’s not about calling out the racist comments … (that’s) perfectly acceptable when things are framed in racist language ... It’s about how you go on to discuss the person who made them and make assumptions”.

It’s a fine line, but was the decision worth making?

Unfortunately Naga was encouraged to express her opinions; would she have made them public otherwise?

Night after night, Laura Kuenssberg and Katya Adler report on the latest Brexit shenanigans and as they do so they are forced to walk on eggshells. There might be speculation on social media about their personal political leanings, but they do a commendable job in very difficult circumstances.

According to Jordan, his decision has been widely misrepresented, “perhaps wilfully misinterpreted in some respects”.

He has tried to maintain a strict line in a climate of name-calling and disrespect on all sides. Of course Trump’s remarks were revolting, but did it add anything to know what Naga personally thinks, because any viewer with two brain cells could work that out for themselves?

I co-present an ITV programme, Loose Women, in which four of us discuss the issues of the day and these tweets by Trump got a full condemnation. But the difference is not the colour of my skin but the fact that we are paid to comment, not impartially present the news.

Of course, what constitutes news in the new downmarket BBC is debatable, (the broadcaster that pays Towie’s Gemma Collins for her often crass opinions on a podcast), but news still has to be presented in a neutral way by our national broadcaster.

Journalist Afua Hirsch organised an open letter of complaint to the BBC, and says she was “shocked and horrified” by the decision to “censure” the newsreader. According to Hirsch, the ruling “suggests that racist views should be treated impartially” and it will have “a chilling effect on people of colour who work in broadcasting”.

I beg to differ. Racism is repugnant and illegal. So is sexual discrimination and gender-targeted violence. If newscasters and presenters were allowed to comment based on their own sexuality or ethnic background, then news would just become even more indistinguishable from light entertainment. That’s not to demean the issues involved, but news is news. Frankly, would Dan Walker have asked the question “how do you feel?” of a co-host if their skin was white? Can white people not be as revolted as people of colour? Either way, these reflections are not for a news bulletin.

It’s too easy to bash the BBC. We should be asking instead why John Bercow did not exercise more muscle and shut down debate in the House of Commons? Maybe a three-day recess would have been a good idea; the time could have been used to instal a bleeping buzzer or off switch on the parliamentary sound system.