Thanks to Iain Dale for Making the Following Post #1 on his Daley Dozen
I watched both the UTV and BBC NI coverage of the Peter & Iris Robinson “affair” story on the evening bulletins and the difference in style could not have been more stark. I’ll ask some rhetorical questions about why that should be the case later in this post.
But let’s focus on the style of reporting, first of all. UTV had Ken Reid and Darwin Templeton – Ken being the station’s old hack and Darwin being the DUP apparatchik Editor of the News Letter. At one point I was half expecting Soviet broadcasting mood music to be played over Ken Reid’s narration of the story as UTV used still photos of the couple in their early years as they doted on each other – contrasting with the contrite statement from Iris admitting her affair and her husband’s near-tearful public expose of their marital problems. Ken and Darwin gave the DUP leader an easy ride. There was scant sign of any hard-nosed journalistic rigour.
Meanwhile the BBC’s approach was much less reverential. Mark Devenport made clear, in interview with Noel Thompson and Donna Traynor, that the BBC Spotlight team had been conducting an investigation into financial impropriety surrounding Iris. Her own statement made clear that she had encouraged friends to support her lover in a business venture. Peter Robinson, when responding to questions put to him re. financial impropriety, stated that he had no involvement in any shady dealings – but he failed to clear his wife of any wrong-doing in his responses. It would appear that the BBC Spotlight team is still awaiting formal responses from the Robinsons re. written questions that have been submitted.
Hanging in the air, therefore, is why have the Robinson’s taken so long to go public with this story? According to Peter he was made aware that his wife was having an affair back in March last year – and it was at this point that his wife became emotionally unstable. However, according to unconfirmed reports the Robinsons were made aware of the BBC investigation around 10 days ago. This may explain why the story about Iris’ affair has broken now – so long after it was made known to her husband.
Peter Robinson’s humiliation in coming clean about his wife’s impropriety was clear in this evening’s news. The couple has set themselves up as God fearing, and Iris, in particular, has hectored homosexuals about their sinful behaviour while she has been having extra marital sex that, on her own admission, “had no emotional or lasting meaning” to her. In less Godly circles that might be referred to as no strings sex. But the strings they are aplenty.
Had this couple been less judgemental, less morally interfering, and less money-grasping in their multi-jobbing political lives we may have been able to muster more sympathy. They have made their marital bed.
I look forward to the next episode.
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