Originally posted by the Voice of America.
Voice of America content is produced by the Voice of America,
a United States federal government-sponsored entity, and is in
the public domain.


Britain's Boris Johnson Takes on 'The Blob'

Jamie Dettmer

   LONDON - It could have been a scene taken from "The Thick of It," the
   internationally acclaimed British comedy series satirizing the inner
   workings of the British government.

   The country's top political reporters, collectively known as the Lobby,
   were summoned last week to No. 10 Downing Street for a special
   post-Brexit briefing, but once they had arrived, those considered
   hostile to Brexit or Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservative
   government were excluded.

   That provoked the fury of the entire Lobby with all reporters walking
   out in protest. Britain's main national newspapers reacted in anger --
   with even pro-Johnson tabloid newspapers criticizing the rare upset of
   the well-established protocols of parliamentary reporting and the
   Conservative government's seeming determination to pick and choose who
   receives briefings.

   "Information which should be available on the record, and of a type
   which was briefed freely in the past, is now being handed out as a
   favor to selected journalists in the expectation of favorable
   coverage," said Adam Boulton, political editor of Sky News. "No. 10 is
   trying to control the media, and everyone in our democracy should be
   afraid," he tweeted.

   Last week's spat came just days after Cabinet ministers were told to
   boycott a flagship BBC morning radio news program, which has a
   reputation for criticizing government officials. The squabble is being
   seen as an opening skirmish in what's likely to turn into a
   long-running Johnson campaign to try to refashion key British
   institutions in ways more favorable to the ruling Conservatives, also
   known as Tories.

.