Complaint
This edition included a debate about a Church of England poster campaign organised in response to an event held by Unite the Kingdom which had aimed to “put Christ back into Christmas”. A viewer complained the contributors to the debate used the programme to promote migration by exhorting the audience to “welcome newcomers to the country indiscriminately”. The ECU considered whether the programme complied with the BBC’s Impartiality Guidelines.
Outcome
The focus of this piece was a Church of England campaign which set out to challenge what it saw as the inherent anti-migrant sentiment of the Unite the Kingdom event. It did not set out to explore the pros and cons of mass migration, but rather why the Church of England was taking this stance and whether Christianity was being exploited for political ends. Having listened to the contributions from all three guests, the ECU could not find anything which matched the complainant’s description.
Not Upheld