The format of Question Time is what it is. I think it fails at times because Dimbleby appears to think that he has to be combative towards the politicians on the panel (as distinct from keeping them on track, which is entirely valid) as well as doing his job as chairman. Not compatible. There are times when a panellist is scarcely allowed to get a complete sentence out. But, in order to prevent even greater chaos, Dimbleby has to try to get people to stick to the topic as he sees it. The intervention on Saudi Arabia got me cheering like mad but he saw it as straying off-topic. Quite often here, if we stray off-topic we are less-than-cordially (at times) invited to start our own thread. Unlike us, he is under a severe time constraint. The question about Saudi, a country whose behaviour I personally would love to see fully aired on Question Time, is how to get it up there for discussion at all. If there no current context for it, it hasn't got a chance. I went to a Question Time some years ago. Each member of the audience was allowed to submit two questions on scraps of paper, the injunction, apart from getting us to keep them pithy, being focus mostly on topics that were in the news. Then someone behind the scenes selects a shortlist of questions for the show. Likewise, newspaper and television news editors get to select which news items to include, how much time or space each item gets and where in the paper or bulletin it appears. All bias, all quietly applied before a journalist or reporter or a Question Time audience member gets to open his or her mouth.