BBC World Service Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
Lord Birt
Main Page: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Birt's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
BBC World Service
Lord Birt Excerpts(2 days, 14 hours ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)
My Lords, that is a very good question. At the moment, 75% of those who listen to the World Service live in places that do not have good levels of media freedom, so we need to work with the World Service to promote what it does, both around the world, as the noble Lord says, and here in the UK. I think more people would benefit from and feel pride in knowing what the World Service has done to counter disinformation around the world.
Lord Birt (CB)
My Lords, I declare an interest as a former director-general of the BBC. For nearly a century, the BBC World Service has been a key element of the UK’s soft power globally. For almost all of that time it was directly and completely funded by the FCO. Can the Minister articulate any justification at all for the World Service being funded in whole or in part by the UK licence fee payer?