BBC unleash The Stig

The Stig is possibly one of the UK's most loved television charachters

. The Stig is a tame racing driver whose identity is supposed to be a secret, and has strange and often effeminate taste in music.

With the power off the internet it is progressively difficult for such secrets to last forever. Various gossip blogs and newspaper exposed the Stig's identity as racing driver Ben Collins. Is it surprising that this terribly unimportant secret leaked out given that millions of people were dying to know who he was? Quite frankly, no.

Ben Collins, also known as The Stig was in the process of putting together his memoirs and writting his autobiography.. The book was full of stories about his time as the Stig.As soon as the Top Gear team and producers at the BBC came to realize that The Stig's identity was no longer a mystery, he was "let go".

Whether or not you agree with that decision, or the extreme importance connected to keeping the Stig's identity a secret is beside the point. What is essential to take on board in regard to the law is that the BBC tried and failed to impose an injunction against Ben Collins to try and prevent the information becoming public.

There is some appropriate legal precedent that needs to be raised at this point, as we can't all be solicitors in West London. Perhaps not everyone is mindful but the government can censor confidential information that is due to be made public, provided it is not already public knowledge.

Given that prior to Ben Collins autobiography there were already keen Top Gear fans insisting that he was indeed The Stig, in hinds sight it was completley ludicrous to try and prevent this book being published. Any lawyer in London would have come to the conclusion that the BBC's legal case was poor at best.evaluation, and ruled against the BBC|Fortunately the High Courts also believed that the BBC was over stepping the mark and in the end ruled against them}.

The absurd lengths the BBC went to in an attempt to block the publication of the book were a massive waste of taxpayers' money and the government's time, two things that seem to be in short supply these days. It seems like the government could be doing something more constructive with taxpayer money than paying solicitors in London to fight the publication of a celebrity's autobiography.

Even worse than wasting public resources, however, was the attempt by the BBC to needlessly control the free speech of a man who had been made to hide his identity or years. So when the BBC tries to enforce a gagging order when they are international ambassadors for freedom of speech, many were disappointed. After spending decades promoting civil rights and freedom speech it seemed that the BBC got this one very wrong.

Some pundits have pondered that the BBC was trying to stop book from being published because Rupert Murdoch owns Harper Collins, the company publishing Ben Collins book. Rupert Murdoch is no friend of the BBC (and the free world), and his media empire and the BBC have been fighting it out for some time. The above explanation is more understandable, but still not excusable.

BBC unleash The Stig

By: Greg Jacobs

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