A9 safety campaigner Laura Hansler claims she was blackballed by BBC Scotland’s flagship political show Debate Night
A leading A9 safety campaigner has claimed she was ‘blackballed’ from attending BBC Scotland’s Debate Night show when it was hosted in Inverness last night.
The snub comes despite Laura Hansler being the leading community advocate for the dualling of the A9 and her local MSP Fergus Ewing (SNP) requesting that she be included in the show’s audience at the city’s Eden Court at the very least.
BBC Scotland said it does not bar people from its audiences and has guidelines which were adhered to.
The Kincraig campaigner has scored some notable successes including securing the first dedicated debate on the A9 at Holyrood.
The Scottish Parliament’s public petitions committee upgraded her A9 petition to a formal committee inquiry greatly expanding the scope of its investigations following massive public support, paving the way.
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Ms Hansler, of The A9 Dual Action Group, had applied to be in the studio audience of the BBC Scotland’s flagship political debate show.
The corporation actively encouraged the region’s residents to apply for free tickets to partake in the hour-long topical show hosted by Stephen Jardine.
Ms Hansler said: “I had put in for general tickets in the standard fashion. In addition I messaged the producers via their Facebook page and I also emailed directly regarding this .
“Fergus Ewing MSP was keen that I should been on the panel and at the very least be in the audience.
“Both Fergus and his office backed this up with two direct emails to the producers and I can say without hesitation that Ed Mountain would have wanted me there also.
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“There was not one bit of correspondence received in return regarding any of this…
“There could have and should have been proper open debates that fully represented the people of the Highlands but this was not the case.”
Posting in the A9 safety group forum ahead of the show, Ms Hansler said of her snub: “This is utterly disgraceful considering how important the A9 dualling is let alone the campaign and the fact it will be one of the hottest topics tonight.
And she added: “It is especially galling with the amount of work I have previously done for the BBC.”
Mr Ewing confirmed he had specifically asked for an invite for Mrs Hansler.
The Inverness and Nairn MSP said: “I did write to the programme - twice - to ask that Laura be included pointing to her hard work in campaigning tirelessly for the dualling including lodging the petition with the Parliament which led to the inquiry into the whole sad dualling - or non-dualling history.
“I was pleased that the issue was raised in the programme but Laura had a unique position from which to put forward the views of the local communities in Badenoch and Strathspey.
“Her campaigning has been unstinting and successful in that she helped to make sure that this issue is on the political agenda here-and indeed throughout Scotland,
“It was really disappointing that she was not invited but the media are of course rightly independent of politics and must answer for themselves.”
Mr Mountain (Scottish Conservative) said: “I am disappointed to learn that Laura was not include in the Debate Night audience.
“Laura has been a strong and effective campaigner in highlighting the failure of this Government in dualling the A9 and forcing them to now get on with it.
“I wasn’t surprised the A9 was raised by the audience and whilst Laura wasn’t there in person there is no doubt her interventions have been considerable.”
Torcuil Crichton MP (Scottish Labour), former chairman of Inverness Caledonian Thistle Alan Savage and broadcaster Lesley Riddoch joined Mr Ewing and Mr Mountain on the panel.
A BBC Scotland spokesman said: “Every Debate Night audience is selected for balance, in line with our editorial guidelines, and we do not bar applicants.
“The A9 issue was debated as part our programme in Inverness.’
The official 53-page report from the Scottish Parliament’s Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee concluded a lack of agreement on the availability and type of funding significantly contributed to the failure by the Scottish Government to achieve the 2025 dualling target.
The committee remains concerned about whether funding will be available when it needs to be in order to meet the revised 2035 deadline.
Debate Night broadcasts every Wednesday in a new timeslot of 9pm on BBC Scotland and straight after the 10 o’clock news at 10.40pm on BBC One Scotland.
Last night’s show is available on BBC iPlayer.
