WE pay Lineker’s wages, so WE get to tell him to shut his mouth

Mis-match of the day? Gary Lineker does not speak for the licence payers (Image: Getty) Why is the BBC so scared of Gary Lineker? Why, for years now, has it gone running scared every time he says boo to them? Why do the bosses, whose job it is to cater for an entire corporation, acquiesce to the whims of an ageing football pundit like he’s the God who keeps them all afloat? Because he isn’t. It’s the British people who pay £159 a year for their licence fee who do that. Yet time and again what WE want is ignored in favour of the uniformed rantings of an overpaid, gobby football pundit who operates in a social media echo chamber where his acolytes tell him he’s their political saviour, their voice. And because of his gargantuan ego he believes it. Lineker believes himself to be a true humanitarian because he sends out a few tweets from his multi million pound mansion when back in the real world the rest of us think he’s a bit of an arrogant wassock, an intellectual void, who if he was put in front of one of the Tory politicians he despises so much would be ripped to shreds. And terrifyingly politically naïve. However, back to the Corporation which this week had the chance to redeem itself with its review of its social media rules- ordered after Lineker’s disgraceful remarks earlier this year when he equated current Government policy on immigration to Nazism and 1930’s Germany. At the time, his tweet sickened most right thinking people. But it was especially horrific and painful for Jewish people whose families were tortured and killed by the Nazis and who really don’t need lessons on 1930’s Germany from this faux politico . Even when it had been made clear to him the offence his tweet had caused Lineker still refused to delete it which is a measure of his arrogance. He writes ‘compassionately’ about migrants but apparently doesn’t give a stuff about upsetting relatives of the Holocaust dead. When wannabe political commentators like Lineker fling around their perceptions of Nazism, having seemingly no clue of what Nazism actually means, it hurts and damages those whose families were murdered by the Nazis. It hurts and damages them. Maybe he used the Nazi comparison because his knowledge of recent history and 1930’s Germany is non-existent. Maybe in his rush to incite hatred against the Tories he wasn’t seeing the people he was hurting. Or maybe he’s just a bit thick. But whatever his motivations were in tweeting out that garbage – he should have been sacked under the BBC ‘s impartiality rules. So what did his weasley bosses do at the time? You might remember they said he’d crossed a line. They then suspended him from Match of The Day after which his presenter mates boycotted the Corporation’s shows in ‘solidarity’ (solidarity’s easy when you’re on a six figure salary or in Lineker’s case a seven figure one). So what was Lineker’s punishment for crossing the line? Er nothing. Instead bosses ordered a review of its social media rules in an effort to make it look like they were actually doing something. And now the results of that review are in – and guess what? Instead of doing what it should have done – imposed a blanket ban on ALL presenters expressing political views – this farcical review has actually empowered Lineker and his stroppy ilk and given them carte blanche to carry on tweeting whatever the hell they like – as long as ‘they don’t endorse or attack a party.’ Well Lineker did. And he’ll continue to do so. And so will all the others like him. And the BBC will do nothing. Former head of the Corporation’s Editorial Policy Richard Ayre, says the new guidelines are so open to interpretation that comparing a Government minister’s rhetoric to Nazi propaganda (which is what Lineker did) may well be allowed under new rules. So how’s that for a result for Gazza? The BBC has now legitimised what he did. And made it possible for him to do it again. So now he’s going to be worse and more arrogant than ever because his bosses have actually made it easier for him to attack the Tories in whichever disgusting way he chooses. So, one ageing ex -footballer has made a monkey out of the once great British Broadcasting Corporation. How he must be laughing. Lineker has already said he welcomes these new guidelines. Of course he does because they’ve given him the power to do whatever he wants. Although, in truth, he already had that. All this idiotic review has done is made it official. I really hope in the face of this latest betrayal more people desert the BBC and decide not to have a licence. Why watch a channel which speaks with just one voice and no longer even pretends to be impartial. The BBC has made it clear in recent years it doesn’t give a stuff about the views of the people who pay for it to exist. We’re just irrelevant minnows who despite the fact we pay the obscene wages of BBC bosses and their ‘stars’ – we just don’t matter. The BBC has been on the State gravy train for so long it’s forgotten what it actually exists for. The consequence is we now have a State broadcaster that is in no way representative of the State and which only speaks to a Left wing liberal elite – of which Lineker is a Gold Card member!