As Britain faces a crucial general election, its second in two years, one of its most venerable institutions has been busy demolishing what’s left of its reputation. The BBC has long been admired internationally for its well-resourced drama and documentary programs, and respected for the professionalism of its journalism. But its hollowing out by a series of neoliberal governments looks to have finally caught up with the once august institution. Whatever the merits of the BBC’s educational and cultural output — a large proportion of which anyway come from private companies — its political journalism, which is at the heart of its public service remit, has failed in the most important test it faces.

For those of us familiar with the politics of the BBC, it has all been fairly predictable, even if still a little depressing, and sometimes even shocking, to watch. Let’s start with the prime minister. As a number of critics have noted, the public persona of “Boris” was partly honed on the BBC in a series of appearances on its tired satirical show, Have I Got News for You , and the institution has since proved for the most part either unable or unwilling to puncture the performance and hold the politician to account.

Like his friend Donald Trump, Johnson has displayed remarkable arrogance and dishonesty. But while the US president is a crass bully, Johnson disguises his narcissism and ambition with a practiced self-depreciation and convivial manner that allows him to be both evasive and domineering with journalists. A revealing moment came last year shortly after his resignation as foreign secretary. Upon returning to the backbenches, the Old Etonian quickly secured the highest private income of any MP: among his various side hustles was a return to the Telegraph as a weekly columnist, for which the Conservative-supporting newspaper paid him almost £23,000 a month (which he failed to disclose to the appropriate authorities).

In one of his first articles in that post, Johnson described Muslim women who wear the burka as “look[ing] like letter boxes.” The calculated racism was widely condemned, including by the Muslim Council of Britain and by the then-chair of the Conservative Muslim Forum, Mohammed Amin. At the height of the short-lived controversy, the media gathered outside Johnson’s home. When the future prime minister finally emerged, he approached them with no comment, but armed with plenty of boisterous charm and a tray full of mugs of tea. It was enough to disarm the group of reporters who laughed along with Boris. The BBC later posted a clip of the encounter on its YouTube channel.

Johnson, of course, emerged politically unscathed, as he has from every outrage. When he was elected Conservative leader earlier this year, Mohammed Amin resigned in protest, charging that Johnson was “morally unfit” to be prime minister and “does not care whether what he is saying is true or false.”

Part of the reason these traits have helped rather than hindered Johnson’s rise is that his vices are shared by institutions at the heart of British politics. Not just the Conservative Party itself — which has conducted what is likely the most dishonest campaign in British political history — but also the country’s utterly unscrupulous right-wing press, which has polluted and corrupted British public life for decades, but which BBC’s managers and senior journalists still treat as if they were vital components of democratic life.

Many journalists do find Johnson objectionable, and one reporter who stands out in particular is Peter Oborne, a conservative critic of political “spin” in the Blair era who resigned from the Telegraph over its dropping of an investigation into a major advertiser, HSBC. Early on in the election campaign, Oborne raised concerns that the British media as a whole were not holding Johnson or his ministers to account, and were too often relaying unsubstantiated claims from anonymous government sources. Not only did Oborne point in particular to the role of the BBC’s most senior political reporter, Laura Kuenssberg, he also revealed that senior BBC executives had told him they thought it would be wrong to expose lies told by Johnson, since it might undermine trust in politics. The BBC’s director of editorial policy and standards responded with a statement insisting that its journalists would challenge all “lies, disinformation, or untruths,” but stressing that the BBC would never label a prime minister a liar. This, he said, was a judgment for the public to make.

In fact, one of the first significant challenges to the prime minister’s dishonesty on the BBC was to come from the public rather than its journalists. As part of a series of broadcast events, the BBC hosted a special edition of its weekly TV show Question Time , in which party leaders were in turn questioned by a selected studio audience. It was an unusually engaging program, during which all the leaders faced sustained and challenging questions, suggesting perhaps the potential of a more participatory public media. During the discussion, one member of the audience asked the prime minister: “How important is it for someone in your position of power to always tell the truth?” Sections of the audience burst into laughter and applauded, while Johnson twice replied that he thought it was “absolutely vital.”

When the clip of the exchange later appeared on BBC news bulletins, the audience’s reaction had been cut out, with the footage skipping to Johnson’s second reply made after the laughter had subsided. When this was brought to the attention of the BBC’s editor of live political programs, Rob Burley, on social media, he dismissed the criticism, noting simply that the original program had been broadcast on the BBC. The following day, after facing sustained criticism, the BBC put out a statement acknowledging that the audience laughter had indeed been edited out, and conceding that this had been “a mistake on our part.”

Following that unfortunate error, the BBC had a lot to prove in its next showcase piece of political television: The Andrew Neil Interviews , a series of broadcasts in which each of the major party leaders faces a grueling half-an-hour, one-to-one interrogation with the BBC’s toughest political journalist.

Andrew Neil comes from the hard right of British politics, having made his name as editor of Rupert Murdoch’s Sunday Times . He has fronted a number of prestigious BBC political programs over the years and, in addition to receiving over £200,000 a year from the corporation, also chairs the company that owns the Spectator , an influential conservative magazine formerly edited by Boris Johnson. Naturally, Neil is particularly hostile to the Left, but he has a reputation as a formidable interviewer for any politician to face.

The first to go head-to-head with Neil was the Scottish National Party leader Nicola Sturgeon, who faced fierce questioning over her party’s policies on the EU and her record on health policy. Sturgeon is an adept politician, but it was generally agreed that it was a difficult and likely damaging half-hour. Next was Jeremy Corbyn, and ahead of the interview being aired, rumors circulated that it was, as the journalistic cliché has it, a “car crash.” Though there was arguably some hyperbole from the right on this, it was indeed an uncomfortable half an hour for Labour. Neil was typically belligerent, focusing on the issue of antisemitism, which was once again dominating the news agenda following an intervention by Britain’s chief rabbi, as well as fiscal policy, which is said to be core to Neil’s own right-wing politics. “Is there no limit to what can go on the Corbyn credit card?” he asked derisively.

The wider media response focused on Corbyn’s supposed refusal to apologize for antisemitism (which he has done many times) and on Labour’s plans to abolish a £250 tax break for married couples. On the latter, the BBC joined the right-wing press in running a plainly misleading headline: “Corbyn admits lower earners face tax hike under Labour,” which was later amended to read: “Corbyn concedes lower earners could pay more tax.” The BBC’s Rob Burley once again took to Twitter after the interview was aired to note “almost a clean sweep of the front pages in the morning.” Still in a celebratory mood the next day, he reported that three million people had watched the program.

The Neil interview was damaging for Labour, but it was probably unavoidable, and quite proper given that all leaders would face the same level of scrutiny. Or so it seemed. A few days after it was broadcast, the BBC announced the dates of scheduled interviews with the Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson and the Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage. But there was no mention of the prime minister. In a follow-up tweet, the BBC press team stated that discussions with Johnson’s team were “ongoing” and that the BBC hadn’t “yet been able to fix a date.”

Labour supporters were incredulous, and it was subsequently reported that the party had been told by the BBC that interviews with all the other party leaders had been agreed (this is denied by Rob Burley). It soon became clear that the Conservatives had no intention of Johnson being interrogated by Andrew Neil, and instead offered to put the prime minister forward for The Andrew Marr Show , widely perceived to be a softer option. The BBC declined, publicly calling on Johnson to sit down with Neil, as the other leaders had, or had agreed to do. Meanwhile, BBC Politics put out a video of the prime minister eating a scone and commenting in his usual jocular manner about the technicalities of applying jam and cream.

Remarkably, the BBC’s neglect of its public service obligations did not end there. Following a terrorist attack in London — which the Conservatives shamelessly sought to politicize contrary to the explicit wishes of one of the victims’ family — it agreed to have Johnson on The Andrew Marr Show after all. It cited the “public interest” to justify the U-turn while emphasizing that it would “continue to urge Boris Johnson to take part in the prime-time Andrew Neil interview as other leaders have done.” There were then regular reports that negotiations over the Neil interview were ongoing, but Neil himself subsequently confirmed that this was another lie. There were no negotiations.

Facing an unprecedented deluge of criticism, the BBC’s Fran Unsworth wrote a piece for the Guardian affirming the BBC’s commitment to political impartiality. She was, she said, “as disappointed as our audiences that the prime minister, unlike all his fellow leaders, has not yet confirmed a date,” explaining that the “logistics of pinning down party leaders is complex.”

The complacency of the apologia is quite something. The BBC’s failure to secure an interview with the prime minister ahead of broadcasting politically damaging interviews with opposition leaders is a major political scandal, not a slightly unfortunate mishap. But what is more, the whole sorry episode is revealing of a systematic failing at the BBC. Here is a state broadcaster subjecting the opposition to relentless and damaging political interrogation, while seeming unable or unwilling to do the same when it comes to the government.