THE BBC has confirmed that there has been a delay to uploading SNP conference footage to iPlayer.
The three-day conference, held at The Event Complex Aberdeen (TECA), concluded yesterday with a speech from First Minister Humza Yousaf. And while the speech has been uploaded to iPlayer, the rest of the conference hasn’t.
The BBC confirmed to The National that there was a delay.
The public broadcaster has previously been accused of showing bias against the SNP.
Current SNP president Michael Russell previously told The National that the BBC’s treatment of Scoltand was an “open sore”.
He added: “Certainly, some of the written press is a cauldron of SNP-bad vitriol but – to put it bluntly – it is entitled to be so. There is no regulation that forces impartiality on written news ... but broadcasting is another matter.
“There are laws regarding balance and there is a particular obligation on the ‘state broadcaster’, the BBC, contained in its charter and enshrined in its history.”
Alistair Bonnington, the broadcaster’s former in-house lawyer, accused the BBC in 2022 of “reverential” treatment of (then) Nicola Sturgeon’s party.
Bonnington complained directly to the broadcaster – which said it had rebutted all of his claims – and also lodged a grievance with Ofcom.
The lawyer, who worked for the BBC from 1992 to 2008, said he would expect the BBC to lose a court challenge on impartiality “comprehensively”.
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