Ed Davey has met with BBC boss Tim Davie to complain about the amount of coverage Reform gets.
The Liberal Democrat leader met with the BBC Director-General in Parliament just weeks ago in June to express the party’s “frustration” regarding its media coverage to Nigel Farage’s outfit, according to PoliticsHome, which broke the story.
Despite now holding 72 seats in the Commons, the Lib Dems have been allocated 13 appearances on the BBC’s flagship political programme Question Time, an increase from four in previous years.
The party argues that the exposure it receives is disproportionate when compared with Reform UK, which has just four MPs – 18 times fewer than the Liberal Democrats.
“Previously, the BBC had always said: ‘We will cover you more if you get more MPs, but right now, you’ve only got 11,’” a Liberal Democrat source told outlet.
“Now it really feels like they’ve moved the goal posts and they’re just giving Reform massive amounts of coverage based on their poll rating, whereas we were always told it’s number of MPs, not poll rating.”
Davey also raised concerns with Davie about the BBC’s use of breaking news alerts, which the party is now monitoring in order to gauge its coverage.
“That’s another area where it feels like Reform are getting a lot of mentions,” the source said.
“Something else we’re picking up the BBC is: how do they ensure political balance when it comes to things like breaking news alerts – that we know are really, really influential – in the same way that they would be really careful about balance when it comes to news criticism?”
The meeting came shortly before a live on-air outburst from Davey last month, in which he criticised the BBC’s reporting on Reform UK.
“You cover the tittle tattle around Reform – you don’t look at their policies,” said the Lib Dem leader.
“When I look at the broad BBC coverage, he gets such an easy ride, and he gets covered when he says horrible things that aren’t producing solutions for people’s problems.”
“I have to say the BBC has got to raise its game to expose Nigel Farage,” he added.