The far from impartial past of the new boss of the BBC's flagship political show



The BBC is facing fresh concerns about political bias after appointing an outspoken left-winger as the editor of Question Time. The corporation yesterday announced that Glasgow-based Nicolai Gentchev has been handed the role after the previous editor quit over the decision to move the show to the Scottish city.

But last night it emerged that the BBC employee had written a series of book reviews and articles for left-wing publications such as Socialist Review and the International Socialism Journalism.

MPs already concerned about left-wing bias at the BBC immediately raised concerns about the appointment, saying it would do nothing to convince them the BBC was addressing the problem.

Book reviews by Mr Gentchev for Socialist Review up until 2003 are still available on the internet and include him writing about class and power in communist Russia and looking at a book about ‘Labour Party Plc’.

He also wrote for the International Socialism Journal in 1995 about welfare dependency. In it, he claimed that even capitalist supporters ‘do not see an end to mass unemployment and low wages’. Mr Gentchev wrote: ‘Short of a new expansion in the system which provides jobs and rising living standards, all they offer is to make living on welfare so unbearable that even more people are forced off benefits and into conditions which were common in the last century before the creation of the welfare state.

‘While we fight to make sure such plans never become a reality, we have to get rid of the system which has brought us to this.’

Last night a BBC spokesman said that Mr Gentchev joined the corporation in 2006, ‘long after the pieces were published’ and it was ‘nonsense to suggest they have any bearing on his impartiality’.

But Conservative MP Philip Davies who sits on the culture, media and sport select committee said: ‘It sounds like an ideal choice for the BBC. ‘To be perfectly honest, we’ve come to probably expect Question Time to have a less than representative audience and to be hostile to the Government and to have a left-leaning panel. It seems to be that we can expect more of the same.’

Mr Gentchev replaces Ed Havard, who quit the show because he did not want to relocate from London. Presenter David Dimbleby, who was upset by Mr Havard’s departure, is yet to sign another contract.

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