the brilliantly leaping gazelle

The media backlash over BBC presenters pay is yet another example of the ‘Debbie McGee factor’ at work. If you are unaware of the ‘Debbie McGee factor’ – what it is and the purpose it serves is – don’t be. I made it up for a blog I wrote a while ago, when I made the point that,

As every magician knows, if the audience is paying too close attention to them, then there is every chance that they will spot the sleight of hand or other chicanery they are is engaged in. (For the purposes of this argument all magicians are therefore less than handsome men, and it thereby follows that their assistants are attractive younger females wearing as little as the audience will permit). The purpose of the magician’s assistant is to distract the audiences’ gaze away from the magician and to focus instead on something more appealing. In essence the audience looks the other way, so that the trick can be successfully executed.

Debbie Mcgee was magician Paul Daniels’ assistant/ distraction and performed her role admirably, so admirably in fact that most people didn’t realise she had she was there to distract them.

When I remarked to someone yesterday that I was at a loss to understand the media’s over-reaction to the publication of the list, her response was that it was public – i.e. taxpayers – money and that therefore it was in some unspecified way justified. Which is true, up to a point. The point being the point at which sober reflection intrudes and gives chase to simplistic reaction.

Yes it isn’t fair that the BBC pays a lot to some of it’s employers. But whilst we focus on that, the media ignore the scandal that is the pay awarded to private companies by the government. That’s taxpayer money too, but it is very rarely front page news. This, for example, appeared in the Guardian,

Two private firms have earned more than £500m in taxpayers’ money for carrying out controversial disability benefit assessments.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) paid Atos and Capita £507m for personal independence payment (PIP) tests between 2013 and 2016, despite fierce criticism of their services by MPs.

And this little nugget, on economia with the intriguing headline,

Government paid Big Four more than half a billion pounds

The UK government has paid PwC, Deloitte, EY and KPMG more than half a billion pounds in fees over the past three years

Oh. And this, from who else? Your favourite and mine,  the reliably hypocritical Daily Mail which fulminated earlier this year that

All aboard the gravy train: Bill for Britain’s high speed rail link advisers is £180MILLION despite not a single piece of track being laid

Whilst gushing yesterday, with the unbridled sycophancy we’ve come to expect,

The look of love: Duke and Duchess of Cambridge can’t keep their eyes off each other as they join artists for a glittering reception in a Berlin ballroom

That would be the grandson of a pensioner who recently trousered an £82 million bonus to help with the refurbishment of her houses. Whose wedding we paid for. Enjoying a another taxpayer funded first class holiday. That one!

These things are related. By all means complain about what the BBC pay it’s staff and the gender bias it reveals, yes but whilst the public are busy being whipped up into wrongeous  indignation they are missing even more egregious abuses of public money. It says something none too edifying about the way in which the media both orchestrates and fuels public resentment over one issue, yet ignores others.

Debbie McGee!