Today programme

   The BBC’s long-running early-morning flagship news and current affairs programme, broadcast on Radio 4 every day from Monday to Saturday. It comprises regular news bulletins, serious political interviews and in-depth reports. Its discussions are often thought to set the political agenda for the day, leading as they do to follow-up analysis on later radio and television programmes. Ministers, their shadows and other politicians are often listeners and are keen to go on the programme and air their views. However, some male interviewers have attracted criticism for excessively tough interrogation, even bias. In the past, Brian Redhead and more recently John Humphrys have been viewed as unduly confrontational and hostile to the government of the day. In 2003, controversy arose after a report by correspondent Andrew Gilligan included the allegation that – with the active connivance of Alastair Campbell – ministers had deliberately exaggerated the case for war with Iraq, including in a dossier information they knew to be untrue.

   See also: Iraq war