THE BBC’s Question Time has been hit by fresh accusations it is biased against independence.
The claims have been made by the Scottish Greens and follow complaints made against the programme over the repeated appearance in the audience by a former Ukip candidate and arch-Unionist.
The pro-independence party believe they should appear on an edition coming from Elgin this evening. However, their attempts to get one of their MEP candidates on the show were rejected in favour of a LibDem.
The last time the Scottish Greens appeared was in January 2018, while the LibDems have been regular panellists, with leader Vince Cable appearing in April and MP Layla Moran in February.
A Scottish Green insider said: “It’s ridiculous the Greens are being excluded while the Unionist parties all get a chair. The Greens have more MSPs than the LibDems, got more votes than them in the last Euro election and are more likely to win a seat than them this time around, yet Question Time choose to leave them out.
“It’s been over a year since the Scottish Greens were on the programme and excluding them means there’s likely to be an anti-independence bias on the show once again.”
The party’s MSP John Finnie said: “It’s extremely disappointing that just one week before the most important EU elections ever, my constituents in Elgin and viewers across the country will be denied the opportunity to hear from the talented Green MEP candidates.”
It is understood the Scottish Greens were told they were not invited on because Caroline Lucas, of the Green Party of England and Wales, has been on during the election period.
However, the Scottish Greens insider says the Green Party of England and Wales and Scottish Greens are different parties, with the former neutral on independence.
A spokeswoman for the BBC said: “Question Time is not a single issue programme and we aim to represent a wide variety of views and opinions. We carefully consider levels of political party representation on the programme based on a number of factors which include current and previous electoral support.”
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