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'''Norman Beresford Tebbit, Lord Tebbit of Chingford''' (born 29 March 1931) is a right-wing British politician. He was a key member of the second Thatcher government and was Secretary of State for Trade and Industry from 1983 to 1985 and chairman of the [[Conservative Party]] from 1985 to 1987. <ref>''Debrett's People of Today'', [http://www.debretts.com/people/biographies/search/results/3889/Norman%20Beresford%20Tebbit%20TEBBIT.aspx The Rt Hon Lord Tebbit, CH, PC], [Accessed 5 January 2009]</ref>

==Biography==
Tebbit worked as a journalist from 1947 to 1949 and then joined the RAF for two years before spending a period working in publishing and advertising (1951-53). From 1953 to 1970 he worked as an airline pilot before being elected as a Conservative MP. <ref>''Debrett's People of Today'', [http://www.debretts.com/people/biographies/search/results/3889/Norman%20Beresford%20Tebbit%20TEBBIT.aspx The Rt Hon Lord Tebbit, CH, PC], [Accessed 5 January 2009]</ref>

In the first [[Margaret Thatcher|Thatcher]] government Tebbit was appointed under sec of state for trade (1979-81) and then Minister of State for Industry (1981) before being appointed Secretary of State for Employment (1981-83) during the highest period of unemployment since the 1930s. <ref>BBC -On This Day 1950 - 2005 [http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/26/newsid_2506000/2506335.stm 1982: UK unemployment tops three million, 26 January 1982]</ref> He was Secretary of State for Trade and Industry from 1983 to 1985. 

In 1984 Tebbit was elected a member of the [[Other Club]], a secretive dining society made up of powerful establishment figures from politics, business and to a lesser extent journalism and academia. <ref>John Lloyd. 'Secret members of the Other Club', ''The Times'', 29 July 1997; p.13</ref> The Home Secretary [[Leon Brittan]] was also elected a member that year. <ref>Ibid.</ref>

In 1985 he became Chairman of the [[Conservative Party]] and was also appointed Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster by [[Margaret Thatcher|Thatcher]] <ref>''Debrett's People of Today'', [http://www.debretts.com/people/biographies/search/results/3889/Norman%20Beresford%20Tebbit%20TEBBIT.aspx The Rt Hon Lord Tebbit, CH, PC], [Accessed 5 January 2009]</ref> – a position involving no official responsibilities but used to keep favoured figures in government.

Tebbit took up a number of corporate appointments after leaving politics. From 1987 to 1996 he was a director of the industrial conglomerate BET plc and the telecommunications group [[BT plc]], which the Thathcer government had privitised. He was a director of the industrial conglomerate  Sears plc until 1999 when it was acquired by Philip Green, and a director of the [[JCB]] subsidiary JCB Excavators Ltd from 1987 to 1991. <ref>''Debrett's People of Today'', [http://www.debretts.com/people/biographies/search/results/3889/Norman%20Beresford%20Tebbit%20TEBBIT.aspx The Rt Hon Lord Tebbit, CH, PC], [Accessed 5 January 2009]</ref>

From 1989 Tebbit took up a number of media positions. From 1989 to 2004 was a director of The Spectator (1828) Ltd, the publisher of the right-wing weekly ''[[The Spectator]]''. He was a political commentator [[BSkyB]] from 1989 to 1997 and a columnist for ''[[The Sun]]'' from 1995 to 1997. <ref>''Debrett's People of Today'', [http://www.debretts.com/people/biographies/search/results/3889/Norman%20Beresford%20Tebbit%20TEBBIT.aspx The Rt Hon Lord Tebbit, CH, PC], [Accessed 5 January 2009]</ref> Both were controlled by the media tycoon [[Rupert Murdoch]] who had been supportive of [[Margaret Thatcher|Thatcher]] throughout the 1980s. He was columnist for the Mail on Sunday from 1997 to 2001. <ref>''Debrett's People of Today'', [http://www.debretts.com/people/biographies/search/results/3889/Norman%20Beresford%20Tebbit%20TEBBIT.aspx The Rt Hon Lord Tebbit, CH, PC], [Accessed 5 January 2009]</ref>

==Attacks on the BBC==
[[Image:KATE ADIE - speaking from Tripoli tonight.JPG|thumb|280px|right|Still of the ''9 O'Clock News'' on 15 April 1986. The report can be viewed [http://www.bbc.co.uk/historyofthebbc/resources/pressure/fla/libya_adie.html here]]]
Tebbit has a particular preoccupation with the media – especially the [[BBC]] – which he regards as having a left-wing bias. In 2003 Tebbit wrote that the BBC, ‘Of course it is institutionally Labourist and badly needs counselling and retraining to understand what political neutrality entails.’ <ref>Norman Tebbit,  ‘[http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/norman-tebbit-the-bbc-doesnt-invent-lies-against-the-government-542272.html The BBC doesn't invent lies against the Government]’, ''Independent'', 30 June 2003</ref> 

Tebbit’s most high profile attack on the BBC was in 1986 when he was Chairman of the [[Conservative Party]]. Tebbit attacked the BBC over its coverage of the US bombing of Libya that April, for which the Americans were granted use of British air bases, accusing the [[BBC]] of ‘uncritical carriage of Libyan propaganda’ in its reporting.  Years later Tebbit wrote: ‘to tell the truth, I was probably as strident as I was partly because I had reservations (which I think were justified) about the Government process which led to our involvement, and some unease (which proved unjustified) about the policy itself.’ <ref>Norman Tebbit,  ‘[http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/norman-tebbit-the-bbc-doesnt-invent-lies-against-the-government-542272.html The BBC doesn't invent lies against the Government]’, ''Independent'', 30 June 2003</ref>

Tebbit’s attack was based on a document produced by Conservative Central Office, which he later described a ‘factual dossier comparing news bulletin by news bulletin, line by line, the reports broadcast by [[BBC]] and [[ITN]].’ <ref>Norman Tebbit,  ‘[http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/norman-tebbit-the-bbc-doesnt-invent-lies-against-the-government-542272.html The BBC doesn't invent lies against the Government]’, ''Independent'', 30 June 2003</ref> The BBC's ''9 O'Clock News'' was compared unfavourably with ITV’s ''News at Ten'', and said to be ‘riddled with inaccuracy, innuendo and imbalance’. <ref>The BBC Story – [http://www.bbc.co.uk/historyofthebbc/resources/pressure/libyan.shtml The Libyan Bombing 1986] [Accessed 7 January 2009]</ref> It claimed that:

<blockquote style="background-color:ivory;border:1pt solid Darkgoldenrod;padding:1%;font-size:10pt">''News at Ten'' was able to preserve an impartial editorial stance, while the [[BBC]] took a number of editorial and journalistic decisions the effect of which was to enlist the sympathy of the audience to the Libyans and to antagonise them towards the Americans. <ref>cited in Alisdair Milne, ''DG: The Memoirs of a British Broadcaster'' (Hodder and Stoughton, 1989) p.253</ref></blockquote>
 
The dossier was sent to the BBC on 30 October 1986 with a cover letter from Tebbit which read:
<blockquote style="background-color:ivory;border:1pt solid Darkgoldenrod;padding:1%;font-size:10pt">In the light of our evidence, you may feel that the BBC news reporting, in this instance at least, fell short of the high standards which the Corporation espouses. Indeed, you may conclude that far from being balanced, fair and impartial, the coverage was a mixture of news, views, speculation, error and uncrtiical carriage of Libyan propaganda which does serious damage to the reputation of the BBC. <ref>cited in Alisdair Milne, ''DG: The Memoirs of a British Broadcaster'' (Hodder and Stoughton, 1989) p.252</ref></blockquote>

==Affiliations==
[[The Other Club]], member since 1984

==Resources==
Glasgow University Media Group [On Norman Tebbit] '[http://www.spinprofiles.org/images/a/ae/The_List.pdf Columnlist]', ''The List'', 14-27 November 1986

==Notes==
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[[Category:MP|Tebbit, Norman]][[Category:BBC|Tebbit, Norman]][[Category:Propaganda|Tebbit, Norman]]