Thought for the Day explicitly excludes non-religious contributors.
The BBC should move away from biased religious programming. That should begin with a rethink of Thought for the Day.
The BBC has a long history of pro-religion bias in its output, which is typified by Thought for the Day.
Thought for the Day is a daily slot on BBC Radio 4's flagship news programme, Today. For nearly three minutes, religious leaders offer "reflections from a faith perspective on issues and people in the news". Nonreligious people and leaders of less popular religions, no matter how well-respected their views, are not allowed to contribute.
Despite being within such a prominent discussion slot, Thought for the Day is outside the programme's editorial control. This means there is no right to reply when the slot is used for political or religious proselytising.
- Fewer than one in five British people think BBC Radio 4's Thought for the Day should exclusively feature religious content.
- Religious radio programmes are the least popular and least well received according to the BBC's own research.
Public apathy towards Thought for the Day is even shared by Today's former presenter, John Humphrys, who described the slot as "inappropriate" and "deeply, deeply boring" in 2017. His colleague Justin Webb has also criticised it.
Reforming Thought for the Day to include speakers of any religion or belief would improve overall quality, make it relevant to Today's audience and remove the unjustifiable discrimination. Contributors should be picked without reference to their religious or non-religious identity.
There is a place for high quality, critical religion and belief programming on the BBC – but not one-sided promotion of religion.
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Latest updates
BBC cuts religion on radio by 37 per cent
Posted: Mon, 9 Feb 2015 12:12
The latest BBC Annual Report indicates that although religious broadcasting on radio has declined by 37% over a year, the amount of religion on TV has increased.
The 2013-14 report shows that there were 611 hours of religious programming on radio compared to 975 the year before.
The BBC explained that this is because the Asian Network dropped its daily religious programme.
Religion on BBC One showed a drop from 99 hours in 2012-2013 to 80 hours in 2013-14. Over the same period BBC Two increased its religious hours from 47 to 69.
BBC Four increased its religious output to 21 hours, from 5 hours the year before.
The BBC's apparent downgrading of religion has been creating alarm among religious bodies who complained when the post of commissioning editor for religious programmes was axed and merged with other factual commissions. The BBC says that it has been forced into this by the need to make drastic cuts to its budgets.
A group of 'faith leaders' wrote to the Daily Telegraph this week expressing dismay at the BBC's actions, saying:
"Religious literacy is essential to the diversity we treasure in Britain – and an antidote to the extremism and intolerance that threaten it. The BBC plays a key role by its robust and rich coverage of religious life. We call on it to reinstate independent religion and ethics programming."
But Terry Sanderson, president of the National Secular Society, said: "The claim that we all need to study religion in order to function in the world is at best questionable and at worst manipulative. Most people in this country are completely indifferent to religion and happy for it to play no part in their lives. It should not be the job of the BBC to promote ideologies, particularly ones that are creating conflict and mayhem around the world."
Mr Sanderson said that the NSS had no objection to religion being thought of as an important part of our history and for it to be looked at objectively in documentaries. "But these religious leaders seem to think that the Corporation should act as some kind of propaganda arm for them – as indeed it has been doing for the past seventy years."
Mr Sanderson said that overtly religious programmes attracted audiences so small that sometimes they couldn't even be measured. Ofcom gave ITV permission to drop its religious programming after it emerged that they could not attract advertising to pay for it.
"If the BBC is making cuts, then this seems like a sensible area to consider," said Mr Sanderson.
BBC Trust upholds NSS complaint over conflation of race and religion
Posted: Tue, 20 Jan 2015 15:12
The National Secular Society has welcomed a ruling from the BBC Trust upholding its complaint over the way in which the BBC framed a story concerning the allocation of places at a Sikh faith school as a 'race issue', rather than as an issue of religious freedom.
A news package aired by BBC Asian Network on 23 April 2014 focused on children of non-Sikh parents being allocated places at a Sikh faith school against their parents' wishes. In the piece, which featured NSS campaigns manager Stephen Evans, several non-Sikh parents expressed their unhappiness about their children being allocated places at Khalsa Secondary Academy, a Sikh ethos free school in South Buckinghamshire.
The NSS had no complaint with the news package itself, but was concerned about the way in which the story was trailed on social media, and in broadcast introductions, with BBC Asian Network repeatedly referring to the non-Sikh parents as "white parents."
In a formal complaint to the BBC, the NSS argued that the repeated reference to "white parents" left the clear insinuation that those parents had racial grounds for objecting to their children attending the school, when in fact the issue was one of religious freedom in education.
An initial complaint from the NSS was rejected by the BBC's Editorial Complaints Unit after BBC Asian Network's Head of News, Kevin Silverton, argued that the word "white" was used to make it clear the parents involved were "not Asian." He said an alternative such as "non-Sikh" would have been inappropriate because that would usually be taken by the audience to refer to Hindus and Muslims. On appeal, the director of the BBC's Editorial Complaints Unit said he was "persuaded by Mr Silverton's reasoning."
However, after an appeal to the Editorial Standards Committee to review the ECU's decision, the BBC Trust has upheld the complaint, agreeing that the story was about religious freedom in education and not about race, or racial prejudice.
Communicating its findings to the NSS, the BBC Trust said; "The impression was given that white (rather than simply non-Sikh) parents objected to their children being sent to Sikh schools. This did not present an impartial account of the reasons for the parents' position. The Committee concluded that there had been a lack of due impartiality (albeit unwittingly and accidentally) in that it was implied that the parents' objections to faith education were on the grounds of race."
The Trust therefore upheld the NSS complaint on grounds of impartiality and accuracy. The Committee did not uphold a complaint "in relation to Fairness, Contributors and Consent", but the central premise of the NSS criticism has now been recognised by the BBC.
Responding to the finding, Stephen Evans, NSS campaigns manager, said; "The conflation of race with religion is highly problematic in that it seeks to stifle reasonable debate by equating criticism of religious ideas with racism and xenophobia.
"The repeated references to non-Sikh parents as 'white parents' inaccurately framed the story as a 'race issue' and unfairly insinuated that the parents had racial – possibly even racist – reasons for their objections to their children attending this school.
"The current shortage of school places, coupled with the spread of religious free schools, means more and more children can expect to be allocated schools with a faith ethos against their parents' wishes. It's vital that parents can raise legitimate objections to their children being allocated places at minority faith schools without being portrayed as 'racist'.
"Desiring a secular education for your child has nothing to do with your ethnicity. I am pleased that the BBC has now recognised this."
