There is no doubt the BBC is going to be reformed, but there is a real danger when it is that the baby will be thrown out with the bath water. There is much the corporation now does that is, or could easily be, replicated in the private sector. I would contend that when it does replicate what is privately provided there should be a business case for its doing so. I suspect that even in the post-Clarkson era Top Gear would be a programme that would sell around the world still, and bring in money for the corporation. So too would many of the dramas that are put out. But if the BBC is trying to ape the private sector and failing to do so commercially successfully, then it should not even try.
It is those things vital to the nation that the private sector cannot do — such as Radio 3, but also a substantial part of what goes out on Radio 4 and Radio 4 Extra — that the BBC must be encouraged further to develop. Similarly, on television there should be documentaries of a truly enlightening nature — as, from time to time, there still are — of a tone and expertise that the private sector simply seems to show no will to put on now. Television may not be a superior medium to radio, but it is one that does not inevitably have to behave in a way of which Lord Reith would have been ashamed.
Many Tories object to the BBC because of what they see as its institutional leftism. The weekend after the general election a number of newly-elected or re-elected MPs, who had not watched the BBC’s coverage of the unpredicted Tory victory because they were at their counts, sat down in front of their digital televisions and watched recordings they had made of the evening’s programmes.
Many of these felt that aspects of the coverage reflected first of all a sympathy with their political opponents, and exuded a disbelief that the Tories could possibly be winning. I watched the coverage live and, with the exception of one or two unfortunate misjudgments, felt it was reasonably objective. It has, however, become the latest stick with which to beat the corporation, and it will be used.
The BBC may have become an overmighty subject. But it has an important function still in our society, doing things the private sector either will not do, or will do only in a grotesquely inferior way. And I see no reason why the state should not, for strategic reasons, have a broadcaster. It is also enormously popular with the public, something its critics forget. It certainly needs reform; and I am sure Mr Whittingdale will see that that does not mean evisceration.
