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Reply from BBC complaints ref Ed Miliband promoting formula

“Thank you for your email regarding ‘BBC News at Ten’ on BBC One broadcast on 25th November.

I understand you felt the BBC was promoting a product by showing Ed Miliband referring to a formula he feeds his child. I also note you feel this is also biased against women who breast feed.

We forwarded complaints on this issue to Editors for the ‘BBC News at Six’ and ‘BBC News at Ten’ and they explained in response that:
“In the report we were spending the day with Ed Miliband and when he arrived at Tesco he pointed out the milk. The clip was used as it was topical because of his recent baby and the fact that it showed him engaging with supermarket staff and talking about real life issues.”

Although this explains the context in which the clip was broadcast, they also specifically acknowledge that the full screen shot of the tin of Aptamil was unnecessary.

On the issue of breastfeeding it is up to Ed Miliband’s wife to decide if she wants to breastfeed or not and we are not advocating one option over the other. Our reporting in this instance was simply on Ed Miliband engaging with staff at the supermarket by pointing to a product that is used in his household.

We’re guided by the feedback that we receive and to that end I’d like to assure you that I’ve registered your complaint on our audience log. This is a daily report of audience feedback that’s circulated to many BBC staff, including members of the BBC Executive Board, programme makers, channel controllers and other senior managers.

The audience logs are seen as important documents that can help shape decisions about future programming and content.

Thank you for taking the time to contact us.

Kind Regards

www.bbc.co.uk/complaints

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