From email to BBC Trust,
15 March 2017:
"Trustees' text
as a whole misleads. In reality, Trustees have no evidence to support the impression they
give, that somehow the BBC's errors are less serious because there was a
"commitment" in 2001 to 1990-2015 targets.
1. It was not the "UN", in the sense of member states, who
published the easier targets in a "road map". It was the
Secretary-General, merely making proposals. The United Nations General
Assembly responded on 14 December 2001 by asking UN staff to publicise the
actual 15-year commitments: "widespread publicity to the Millennium
Declaration and to increase the dissemination of information on the
Declaration".
https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N01/479/63/DOC/N0147963.DOC
2. The mention of one target understates the complaint. It was not only
the target for "under-five child mortality" which was more ambitious
in the actual pledges by world leaders than the BBC has give the public to
believe. The BBC has basically failed to report the actual 15-year
commitments even after complaints. In those complaints is ample evidence
that the BBC has in effect understated the pledges on poverty, hunger, maternal
mortality, and water.
3. There was no "commitment" in 2001 by member states to the
easier 1990 baseline (see link above).
4. Even if Trustees had been right that there was such a
"commitment", it would still be true that BBC output has been highly
misleading over many years, in a way damaging to the democratic process.
The BBC has persistently given a wrong impression that the agreement of 2000
had a 25-year time frame.
Even if Trustees had been correct that there was a "commitment" in
2001 to a 25-year timeframe, it would not excuse the BBC's failures to report,
or its wrong reporting. This is because the actual 15-year pledges were never
rescinded. A commitment is not removed by a lesser commitment.
Even more difficult for the BBC position is this: Right up until 2015,
nations specifically recommitted to the 15-year pledges. For example: "The
EU and its Member States remain strongly committed to the Millennium
Declaration" (Delegation of the European Union to the UN, 8
January 2015, http://eu-un.europa.eu/articles/en/article_15930_en.htm).
After 2001 member states kept reaffirming previous commitments, which included
the more ambitious pledge by the 1996 World Food Summit.
Had the Trustees given a proper account of the basic facts, their
response to this and subsequent appeals, and BBC output at the time of the 2015
Summit, might have been significanly different."