What goes around...

The BBC has landed itself in a whole heap of trouble through a joint ‘investigation' by BBC2's Newsnight programme and an outfit called the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. (The investigation was so poor that the director-general of the BBC has had to resign.) This was not the first occasion on which the two organisations had worked together. In June 2011, they published an investigation into the accounts of the European Commission whose conclusion was: “EU Commission Expenses: Cocktail parties, private jets, luxury away-days and limousines.” At the time, the Commission disputed the report, complaining that the BIJ was making  “totally misleading claims”, and had ignored its “countless” and “lengthy” explanations of “the legitimate expenses that it incurs”. Could that be a faint whiff of Schadenfreude in the Commission's corridors?