BBC Charter Review (Communications Committee Report)

Lord Selsdon Excerpts

Thursday 21st April 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Selsdon (Con)]

My Lords, I have been in your Lordships’ House for only 52 years but I used to do media research, and I think that I am really only here because of my grandfather. In May 1934, the Government appointed a committee under the guidance of my grandfather, Lord Selsdon, to begin inquiries into the viability of setting up a public television service, with recommendations on the conditions under which such a service should be offered. The result was the Selsdon report. I had never heard of it—I was not quite sure for a time why I had a different name from my father, which is often the case with peerages—but I did media research, quite thoroughly, for a period of time. At home, we were allowed to listen only to the BBC, as everything else was banned, and that included the early days of television.

I have a tremendous affection for the BBC—I cannot help it. In the days when I did media research, we tended to be influenced primarily by characters. Here in your Lordships’ House, we have a remarkable depth of knowledge and experience, but we do not necessarily know each other. There was and still is a BBC advisory council, which goes on and on, but the BBC is a global institution, not a British one. If you have been in parts of Africa where, to encourage local communities to co-operate in mining or other things, you hand out a little pay phone to workers so that they may listen to the BBC, you realise the extent of its coverage and the respect in which it is held.

What the BBC does next is another matter. Television is a fairly difficult and doubtful exercise. We had the television advisory councils, we now have everyone guiding us here and there, we have the script-writers, but we do not necessarily have the media research and the depth of marketing that one would expect globally. I do not see why there should not be a special relationship with every Commonwealth country for broadcasting programmes daily and constantly right the way around the world. The technology and the expertise are already there.

I would like to make a very simple suggestion. We need to have a programme, a business plan, so that we may all look at the BBC. I know that I am here entirely because of my grandfather; I know, too, that I was never allowed to listen to any programme that was not BBC—they could not, however, teach me languages and I was sent off to various countries in order to speak the foreign languages. With this level of respect, I find myself unable to be of much assistance to your Lordships but I would like the Government to give a little more attention, in developing British relationships on a global basis, to the much more important role that the BBC can play than it does today, not least in the production and syndication of television programmes across the world, and its value in the learning of English.

I thank noble Lords for coming here today. I am so surprised that, in looking up the BBC, I found out more about myself than I would have deemed possible and wonder why my grandfather never told me anything about it or why I was never allowed to watch television until I reached a certain age. I wish the BBC well—I have a great affection for it and that affection will remain with me until I die.