A former attorney general has said the BBC’s decision that the term “Moneybags Rothschild” was not antisemitic was “irrational and judicially reviewable”.
The JC revealed that the corporation’s highest complaints authority, the Editorial Complaints Unit, concluded that the reference to the Jewish banking dynasty – made by horticulturalist Bunny Guinness during a February edition of the Radio 4 programme Gardeners’ Question Time – was not antisemitic.
The ruling followed a lengthy complaints process after a Jewish listener from the east of England had her initial complaint rejected by the BBC.
Now Sir Michael Ellis, the former Conservative MP for Northampton North and former attorney general, has told the JC that the BBC’s decision could be challenged through judicial review.
“The decision is irrational to the point of it being susceptible to judicial review.
“If a public body made a decision that no rational person would make – which is a high test, it means to be in defiance of logic – there can be a judicial review,” he explained.
Sir Michael said the BBC’s decision was irrational because “it is blindingly obvious” that, in that context, a reference to the Rothschild family was also a reference to their Jewishness.
“It has been a metonym for Jewish parsimony for centuries,” he said.
Rothschild has “often been that reference to Jew,” he added, arguing that “there was no logic in a gardening programme to the use of the word Rothschild in that context. It was to denote the stinginess of Jews”.
The BBC ruling has also drawn criticism from the shadow attorney general, Lord David Wolfson, who said: "The point of a racial trope is that the protected characteristic can be left unstated. ‘Moneybags Rothschild’ invokes an ancient stereotype without needing to spell it out. I assume the BBC thinks a dog whistle is just fine if you don’t identify the dog?”
Judicial reviews can be costly, and Sir Michael said the complaint should first be escalated to Ofcom.
Given that the listener has been unsuccessful through the BBC’s own extensive complaints process, Sir Michael - as well as Danny Stone, the chief executive of the Antisemitism Policy Trust, said an Ofcom complaint should now be pursued.
Stone told the JC: “It is absurd to think there were no antisemitic connotations in the phrase that was used.
“I hope the complainant will now take this to Ofcom and that the regulator will take appropriate action.”
Alex Hearn, director of Labour Against Antisemitism, also condemned the BBC’s ruling.
He said: “The Nazis literally made a propaganda film called The Rothschilds. It’s been a racist theme for nearly 200 years now. It doesn’t even need to be explained anymore.”
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