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greg_sfc(2)
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) must have key personnel
and layers of management removed and the licence fee system should be
scrapped or, at the very least, greatly reduced. To understand why this
solution is necessary, it’s important to understand why the BBC has
become too removed from its roots, too arrogant, too immoral and too
bloated for softer solutions to save it.
At thirtysomething years of age, I’m just about old enough to remember the last golden days of the BBC. It was a time of great comedy, such as “Only Fools & Horses” which has spawned eternal comical moments, a time of quality sports coverage and – perhaps most importantly of all - news coverage that was breaking, accurate and admired across the world. The BBC truly was admired by media agencies across the world.
Fast forward to 2014 and that reputation is in tatters. The BBC may still have the occasional show of exceptional quality (‘Sherlock’ and ‘Dr Who’, etc.) but what’s left of its prestige is based on nostalgia and outdated information. The modern BBC is a monolith of arrogance, bias and greed.
To list the problems of the BBC in full would take too long, so let’s take one example that summarises its faults then quickly list other serious faults.
Sir Jimmy Savile was a tremendously popular character to the point of being a national British treasure. The ‘Beeb’ (an epithet for the BBC) were not solely responsible for his rise, but they were utterly instrumental to it. Savile rose to fame and fortune through association with the BBC in radio and televised form. I will assume readers are familiar with his remarkable career.
After Savile passed, serious allegations of sexual misconduct with underage girls snowballed into a full-blown scandal. The executives at the Beeb were accused of having prior knowledge of the allegations and failing to act on them. Despite denials, the serious allegations were covered in full in what appeared to be a remarkable act of self-investigation by the BBC’s ‘Panorama’ documentary team, which in turn discussed a previous documentary exposing Savile on another BBC documentary called ‘Newsnight’, which BBC management had decided should not air.
The outcome? Key journalists in both documentary teams have been for daring to discuss Savile. One has been fired, two have been moved to inactive posts and others accused of shoddy journalism. This is the modern face of the BBC. Licence-payers are funding management decisions to axe or isolate journalists who have exposed child abuse.
Other problems are legion. The ‘Beeb’ is governed by a panel trustees at the BBC Trust, by which it is duty-bound to be impartial in its news reporting. Indeed, impartiality has been a huge part of the reason for the BBC’s worldwide. Yet the modern BBC has not only strayed from its moral and professional bounds of impartiality, it has dived headlong into a pool of politcal bias and arrogance that has become so transparent that it is accepted almost universally amongst observers. Its own investigations have confirmed political bias, yet no changes have been made. Independent studies have confirmed the same and this year’s general election coverage by the Beeb was so dismissive of right wing parties that it became in danger of violating instructions from the government’s independent media monitor. The BBC have become so arrogant and self-assured in their political bias that, like FIFA, it could become the black hole that eventually secured their downfall.
The last point I wish to make in this opening round is the licence fee and the manner in which it is “secured”. Licence fee collecting for the BBC is outsourced to a group that have become so infamous for their methods, manner and shoddiness that whole websites have been set up to film, observe and report on them. In short, their letters are aggressive, some (but by no means all) of their collectors are deeply unpleasant or at least uniformed and misleading and the whole licence fee system has decayed from a fee which British citizens took pride in paying for a s great value to something akin to a shoddy cartel, sending out vaguely threatening yet somehow comical and unhelpful letters, backed up by obnoxious commercials.
This is just my first round of complaints with the BBC but the question at hand is: what future do we want?
My answer to the opening question again leads me to make a comparison with the executives at FIFA. We want fairness, value for money, respect for consumers and integrity. We can achieve these aims via two methods, but we need both methods to be implemented. Firstly, we must remove unnecessary or untrustworthy layers of management, including the Trustees panel which, I believe, have failed in their role. Secondly, we must remove the licence fee and allow the BBC to perform like all quality broadcasters: surviving (or not) on their merits, quality and appeal.
At thirtysomething years of age, I’m just about old enough to remember the last golden days of the BBC. It was a time of great comedy, such as “Only Fools & Horses” which has spawned eternal comical moments, a time of quality sports coverage and – perhaps most importantly of all - news coverage that was breaking, accurate and admired across the world. The BBC truly was admired by media agencies across the world.
Fast forward to 2014 and that reputation is in tatters. The BBC may still have the occasional show of exceptional quality (‘Sherlock’ and ‘Dr Who’, etc.) but what’s left of its prestige is based on nostalgia and outdated information. The modern BBC is a monolith of arrogance, bias and greed.
To list the problems of the BBC in full would take too long, so let’s take one example that summarises its faults then quickly list other serious faults.
Sir Jimmy Savile was a tremendously popular character to the point of being a national British treasure. The ‘Beeb’ (an epithet for the BBC) were not solely responsible for his rise, but they were utterly instrumental to it. Savile rose to fame and fortune through association with the BBC in radio and televised form. I will assume readers are familiar with his remarkable career.
After Savile passed, serious allegations of sexual misconduct with underage girls snowballed into a full-blown scandal. The executives at the Beeb were accused of having prior knowledge of the allegations and failing to act on them. Despite denials, the serious allegations were covered in full in what appeared to be a remarkable act of self-investigation by the BBC’s ‘Panorama’ documentary team, which in turn discussed a previous documentary exposing Savile on another BBC documentary called ‘Newsnight’, which BBC management had decided should not air.
The outcome? Key journalists in both documentary teams have been for daring to discuss Savile. One has been fired, two have been moved to inactive posts and others accused of shoddy journalism. This is the modern face of the BBC. Licence-payers are funding management decisions to axe or isolate journalists who have exposed child abuse.
Other problems are legion. The ‘Beeb’ is governed by a panel trustees at the BBC Trust, by which it is duty-bound to be impartial in its news reporting. Indeed, impartiality has been a huge part of the reason for the BBC’s worldwide. Yet the modern BBC has not only strayed from its moral and professional bounds of impartiality, it has dived headlong into a pool of politcal bias and arrogance that has become so transparent that it is accepted almost universally amongst observers. Its own investigations have confirmed political bias, yet no changes have been made. Independent studies have confirmed the same and this year’s general election coverage by the Beeb was so dismissive of right wing parties that it became in danger of violating instructions from the government’s independent media monitor. The BBC have become so arrogant and self-assured in their political bias that, like FIFA, it could become the black hole that eventually secured their downfall.
The last point I wish to make in this opening round is the licence fee and the manner in which it is “secured”. Licence fee collecting for the BBC is outsourced to a group that have become so infamous for their methods, manner and shoddiness that whole websites have been set up to film, observe and report on them. In short, their letters are aggressive, some (but by no means all) of their collectors are deeply unpleasant or at least uniformed and misleading and the whole licence fee system has decayed from a fee which British citizens took pride in paying for a s great value to something akin to a shoddy cartel, sending out vaguely threatening yet somehow comical and unhelpful letters, backed up by obnoxious commercials.
This is just my first round of complaints with the BBC but the question at hand is: what future do we want?
My answer to the opening question again leads me to make a comparison with the executives at FIFA. We want fairness, value for money, respect for consumers and integrity. We can achieve these aims via two methods, but we need both methods to be implemented. Firstly, we must remove unnecessary or untrustworthy layers of management, including the Trustees panel which, I believe, have failed in their role. Secondly, we must remove the licence fee and allow the BBC to perform like all quality broadcasters: surviving (or not) on their merits, quality and appeal.
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2
points
I’d like us to take this debate point by point so I’m starting by
addressing the questions about removing ‘key personnel and layers of
management’.
In fact, the executive and senior management of the BBC has been successfully culled during the last ten years. People and their posts like Mark Byford, Deputy Director General, and Caroline Thomson, Chief Operating Officer, are gone and not replaced. Gerald Main recently retired; originally he was ‘just’ Editor of BBC Essex; by the time he retired he was Editor of a number of BBC Local Radio Stations. This is an example of increasing the roles and responsibilities of posts making them more cost effective. As a result of these and other increased efficiencies, the BBC has already made savings of £480m and is on track to reach its target for savings of £1.5bn by the end of 2016. Inevitably there has been a lot of comment about executive pay and pay offs. There is no doubt that the BBC is a curious organisation. On the one hand it is a public organisation governed by a Royal Charter and seen as part of the establishment. On the other, it is the market maker in the media industry, an industrial sector which is highly commercial. It is also a major driver of the creative industries. It tends to be judged as a public body and the nature of the markets in which it operates is overlooked. We may well look later at why it is that the BBC gets such unbalanced coverage by others. For the time being I will just point out that the salaries and benefits of BBC executives, senior managers and talent have to be compared with those in the media and creative industries because that is where the BBC has to compete for its staff and performers. The salaries, packages and pay offs of BBC executives and staff and of its talented performers compare very favourably with those of similar people working for instance in other terrestrial broadcasters such as ITV, Channel 4 and Five, with those at Sky, BT, Virgin and Google and with those working in media groups including national newspapers and other operations. Generally BBC people receive 10%+ less than their peers working elsewhere because of the kudos of working for the BBC. So the BBC has already removed a lot of key executives and senior managers and has reduced layers of management. This is delivering huge savings and increased efficiencies whilst operating effectively in a highly competitive market. It also continues to provide good value by being able to undercut market remuneration packages. |
