[fault_lines]

The right wing in the UK has been inserting their own people into top BBC positions for years. The BBC has a history of working with the security services to deny employment to anyone 'too left wing'. Some of the most well known faces on the BBC are Conservative supporters - Nick Robinson was chair of the Oxford University Conservative Association, Andrew Neil was the editor-in-chief of the Conservative supporting fascist rag The Spectator and remains chairman of its publisher. Its function over the last 10 years of government has been increasingly, and highly visibly, to propagandize for the Conservatives and smear the left.

[pasabagi]

I'm aware of this, which is why I said 'about as independent', rather than 'independent'. I think the point is, the BBC is representative of a certain group of people, many of whom are from the same milieu as parts of the conservative party, and parts of the labour party.

However, that could be said of most (all?) large media organizations in the UK.