Lord Singh joined Though for the Day in the 1980s TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER RICHARD POHLEWhen Lord Singh of Wimbledon joined the Thought for the Day team in the 1980s, he was encouraged to stir things up. Now he claims that the BBC is so scared of complaints from religious listeners that it expects contributors to make anodyne broadcasts. “We had people like Brian Redhead who almost used to encourage you to say something provocative,” Lord Singh told The Times. “He would egg me on: ‘Say something outrageous!’”The culture has turned around so completely that John Humphrys two years ago told Radio Times that the slot was often “deeply, deeply boring” apart from the days when a speaker made a provocative point. The veteran inquisitor is said to have approved of his Sikh colleague’s contributions to the two-minute, 45-second…

Source: The Times October 03, 2019 23:03 UTC