Do you remember Thursday 16th May 2013? It was by and large a pretty ordinary day with nothing much happening. In the evening the same old programmes on TV, including of course Question Time. But apparently this was no ordinary Question Time - oh no! For this was the programme when, not for the first time, Philip Hammond chose to voice his opposition to "gay marriage." It turned out that this was such a monumental piece of news that his comments were endlessly being reported the following day on the BBC News channel - and even after 24 hours it was still getting coverage on BBC One's News at Ten.

Clearly BBC news bosses believe that a few words on a late night current affairs panel discussion merit hours of coverage.

However, last Wednesday evening Channel 4 screened an enormously significant investigation into the shocking treatment of gay people in Russia. You would be right to expect that information to receive at least as much coverage as Philip Hammond's negative views on marriage equality. But you'd be very mistaken, because Liz MacKean's documentary was ignored by the Corporation.

Newsround, the following morning -


Newsround on Thursday 6th February 2014 at 7.40am

Perhaps the BBC didn't fancy licence-payers asking how much of our money is being spent on the Sochi games coverage. Because you can be certain that some of that money is finding its way to help prop up the Putin regime and, in so doing, is helping to brutalise Russia's LGBT population.

Did I mention that the Philip Hammond news was broadcast on 17th May - i.e. International Day Against Homophobia?