Benedict Brogan (inadvertently) hits upon an interesting point when considering David Davis and his contiuning mission “to debate anyone, any time, anywhere”1. Quoting Keith Vaz, he says:
I understand that Tony McNulty last week agreed to a request from Sky News to debate you and others on these issues, but was told by the channel that they had to cancel the proposed debate as it would have breached the broadcasting rules governing by-elections. Apparently, they would have been required to give an equal voice to your main opponents.
So who are David Davis’ main opponents? Typically, the broadcasters pick the top three, so we need to find the contenders who are most likely to come second and third. The 14 independent hopefuls can likely be discounted2, and I’m fairly certain that the BBC will decline to consider the Official Monster Raving Loony Party or the Miss Great Britain Party as main political opponents. National Front (Britian [sic] for British) will surely be considered ‘beyond the pale’ sufficiently to completely ignored by most broadcasters… So we’re left with, what? Green Party and Make Politicians History, I suppose.
Of course, I’m sure we could all enjoy the spectacle of the BBC trying to give perfectly equal airtime to 26 different candidates…