Conservative MP Phillip Davies has questioned the backlash Fiona Bruce is experiencing for referring to a Question Time audience member as “the black guy”.
The presenter, 59, was attempting to choose someone to contribute to the debate on Thursday’s show, pointing them out while saying: “The guy there in the middle, the black guy in the middle. Yes, you sir.”
The BBC iPlayer version of the show has opted to omit the controversial moment.
The broadcaster, along with Bruce herself, has offered an apology for the incident, with the latter adding she was “wrong”.
Phillip Davies has defended Fiona Bruce
GB NEWS
In a defence of the BBC host, Phillip Davies questioned what was “wrong” with her comment.
“If there is a lot of white people in an audience, and not a lot of black people, why can she not say that?” He asked.
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“Am I missing something here? I just don’t understand it.
“I’m obviously in the wrong I presume, but I have no idea why that is offensive.”
GB News’ Esther McVey waded in on the discussion by saying she found the decision to edit the episode “strange”.
“They edited the two words out they didn’t want in”, she said.
Fiona Bruce is facing backlash
BBC“All of a sudden that makes it a story, when most people would never have known there was an offence.
“The BBC has lost their way.”
Fiona Bruce has since explained that she has spoken to the audience member directly.
“I explained that usually I can see and describe an item of clothing or otherwise to help sound engineers with a microphone find people in the audience”, she said.
“Last night that was not the case as my view was obscured.
“In the split second I had, the easiest thing to do would have been to ignore the audience member and move on, but I felt strongly that his voice should be heard.”
A BBC spokesperson said: “We regret the choice of words used to identify the audience member.
“The intent was to ensure his voice was heard, however we recognise we should not have identified him in this way and apologise for any offence caused.“
As such the recorded version on iPlayer has been edited to remove this.
“The show had been broadcast live at 8pm on Thursday on BBC iPlayer, and the recorded version, which was edited to remove the words, was broadcast on BBC One and is the version now available on BBC iPlayer.”
Bruce has hosted Question Time since 2019 and took over from long-serving presenter and journalist David Dimbleby.