BOTH the BBC and the Tories were in a state of meltdown over the weekend following the decision of the BBC bosses, urged on by Tory MPs and the right-wing media, to ban Gary Lineker from presenting Match of the Day.
Lineker was subjected to a mass pile on by Tories and the press following his tweet last week standing up for migrants and refugees and denouncing the Tory Illegal Migrants Bill as ‘an immeasurably cruel policy directed at the most vulnerable people in language not dissimilar to that used by Germany in the 30s’.
With demands for Lineker to be immediately sacked reaching a crescendo, Tim Davie, BBC director-general, demanded Lineker either make a grovelling apology or be sacked.
Davie, an enthusiastic Tory member, was a shoe-in for the job with a mission to make sure not a word of criticism of Tory government policies should ever be uttered by BBC staff or freelancers like Lineker.
Sacking Lineker would enforce a regime of fear across the corporation’s employees and would cement the BBC as an open propaganda organ for the Tories and the capitalist state with no pretence to impartiality.
Things came badly unstuck for Davie and the Tories when Lineker’s ‘suspension’ from presenting resulted in a refusal by every football presenter to step in to act as scabs for the BBC bosses.
Solidarity with Lineker meant that the entire TV and radio coverage of football had to be scaled back or cancelled with Match of the Day reduced to 20 minutes with no presenters or any of the post-match interviews with players, many of whom had announced they would refuse interviews in solidarity with Lineker.
By Saturday night, it was not Lineker who was on the ropes but Davie and BBC chairman Richard Sharp – the man appointed by then Prime Minister Boris Johnson to the job, just weeks after helping Johnson secure an £800,000 loan.
Davie in an interview backpaddled like mad insisting he wants Lineker ‘back on air’ and he wanted to ‘see a reasonable solution to this’ crisis.
The Observer paper yesterday reported that both Davie and Sharp were under ‘growing pressure to resign’ and that the Tory government were also running scared of ‘being seen as the reason’ for his suspension.
Tory PM Rishi Sunak joined the retreat describing Lineker as ‘a great footballer and talented presenter’ and that he hoped that the crisis ‘can be resolved in a timely manner’.
The Tories, who pose as the all-powerful masters of not just the BBC but of the entire working class, have been shown for what they are – a weak crumbling government that has been brought to its knees by a handful of sports presenters and footballers acting in solidarity.
The lesson for the working class couldn’t be clearer – if the Tories can be driven back by them, then what could the 6 million workers organised in trade unions achieve if they took the same solidarity strike action?
The answer is any general strike would bring this weak Tory government, with all its plans to ban unions and illegalise strikes, down in a matter of days.
The strength of the working class is massive, far greater than this pathetic Tory government, the only thing that holds it back is the outright refusal of the TUC to demonstrate the same solidarity with workers fighting the government and the bosses in defence of their living standards and public services.
Today, junior doctors at every NHS England trust will strike for 72 hours over pay and the appalling conditions they are forced to endure – low pay and conditions that are driving junior doctors out and threatening the existence of the NHS.
Workers must now demand that the TUC leaders either call an immediate general strike in support of the junior doctors and all those millions of workers taking strike action or be removed and replaced with a leadership that is prepared to take action.
A handful of commentators have brought the Tories to their knees, now the working class must finish them off by kicking them out with a general strike and bringing in a workers’ government and socialism.
