BBC Charter

Earl of Glasgow Excerpts

Thursday 10th March 2016 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Glasgow (LD)]

My Lords, the BBC is not perfect. I have worked for it as a documentary film-maker and have been the subject of one of its programmes. That programme turned out to be very different from what I had been led to believe, so I know that the BBC is capable of doing things in bad faith.

However, the BBC is an institution admired and trusted throughout the world. One of the reasons it is trusted is because it is independent of government, yet when its charter is up, like now, the Government of the day see their opportunity to influence it. Although the licence fee, the main source of the BBC’s funding, is paid by the British public, the Government control the licence fee and can decide how and where it will be spent and, indeed, whether it will continue to be financed by the licence fee in future. They are in a position to cajole the BBC to make programmes to their taste or to punish it if they perceive its news coverage to have an anti-Government bias. These powers are a threat to the corporation’s independence and many at the BBC today are nervous of the Government’s present intentions. As long as the BBC sticks to its remit, set out in detail in the excellent new charter review, the Government should not be allowed to interfere.