Channel 4 News acts as a spokesman for Ford

Channel 4 News led last night with a story by Ford that Brexit would cost the company $1bn a year. It might indeed. Their business correspondent, Siobhan Kennedy, demonstrated how Ford cars are partly made in Britain and are then shipped to Germany to be finished after which they come back to Britain as imports. All without any cost to the poor company because of EU membership (tariffs, etc. although they presumably pay for the transport of the half-made cars to Germany and for the transport of the completed vehicles back to the UK), whatever about the cost to the poor British manufacturing base. Kennedy also demonstrated how the components of the cars partly assembled in the UK come from various EU countries. As no doubt they do. All this, Ford says, would be put at risk by Brexit and the poor company would lose money. Did it not occur to Channel 4 News that it is not their job job to worry about a US multi-national company (or to speak for them) or that after Brexit the components might be made in Britain and the car assembled entirely in Britain? It was as stark an example of stakeholder capture as I have ever seen. No attempt to critique what Ford was saying. No comment from an opposing point of view. No attempt to see the plus side from the point of view of British manufacturing. Quite extraordinary.

It was a classic demonstration of the liberal media backing global capital: something that would have been far less likely thirty years ago. Except, of course, today’s “liberal” media are not liberal. They are about as liberal/left of centre as Harvey Weinstein is a genuine supporter of women’s rights. They are supporters of the new global ruling class, which has contempt for states, democracy, people and their rights. However, they continue to be portrayed as liberal.