"For me, now as ever, there is only one real issue (the "meaning of traditional" bit is interesting but not relevant, to me). My question remains the same always: nine votes gets you a nomination worth a lot of money. If you've got five votes you control, you're in the pink. Is this a good thing?"

Greg - you have it bang on the nail.

No, it is NOT a good thing, morally or politically. It's not good for folk music, it's not good for the BBC (who look pretty stupid building such a huge concoction from such crumbs). It makes the winners look cheap, and the 'losers' seem even more cheated.

How Irwin can bring himself to support it defeats me, (unless of course he has some special reason for doing so).

The whole thing is a farce - but at least it's fully exposed as such now.