BBC World Service and British Council

Lord Ramsbotham Excerpts

Thursday 10th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ramsbotham (CB)]

My Lords, I, too, congratulate my noble friend Lord Alton on obtaining this important debate. I am particularly glad that he mentioned the wider context of the soft power role of the World Service and the British Council in promoting British values and interests. I declare an interest as a member of the recent Select Committee on Soft Power and the UK’s Influence and as a member of the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy.

My own practical experience of the BBC World Service was honed in Kenya and it became an affection when I was commanding a base on the remote border between Borneo and Indonesia during confrontation. My appreciation of the British Council was warmed four weeks ago when, with the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Egypt, I visited Cairo. We were very impressed, first by the energy of the director of the British Council there, and secondly by the fact that he brought together some very interesting young students of English from Egypt who were able to explain to us the youth verdict on what was going on in Syria in a way in which we might not have otherwise realised.

I want to concentrate very briefly on three recommendations in the Select Committee’s report and say something about each of them. First, we stated:

“We are concerned that the Government are not currently doing enough to support the BBC World Service, and we urge the BBC and the Government to ensure between them that the BBC World Service’s budget is not reduced any further in real terms, and the opportunities for coordination across multiple platforms to deliver content are taken”.

The Government said that they disagreed with our recommendation but warmed us a bit by saying that they were currently working on a memorandum of understanding between the Government and the BBC.

Secondly, we stated:

“The Committee supports the use of DFID funding to assist the BBC's development work, and we urge further consideration of how this type of support can be expanded”.

We were very glad that the Government welcomed the support for DfID funding because that opens a much wider consideration of the way DfID funding is applied anyway.

Thirdly, on the British Council, we recommended:

“The Government must ensure that the British Council is properly resourced”.

The response we got was:

“The Government is firmly committed to the work of the British Council and recognises its significant contribution to the UK’s strategic interests through its work … and the Government will continue to work with the British Council on future funding”.

I took particular encouragement from the use of the words “United Kingdom’s strategies” because they suggest that soft power was being considered in wider terms than it had been before.

Reverting briefly to the committee, witnesses we had were effusive in their praise of both institutions. In particular I was very glad that the trust they both engendered was mentioned. I like to think that the tide is now flowing in favour of soft power and I am very glad that the momentum initiated by my noble friend’s debate today may be maintained both by the debate on the soft power report and in the national security strategy 2015 when that is produced.