Soft Power and the UK’s Influence (Select Committee Report)

Viscount Colville of Culross Excerpts

Tuesday 10th March 2015 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Colville of Culross (CB)]

My Lords, I apologise for being late for the beginning of the debate, but I was detained. I declare an interest as a producer at the BBC. I praise the noble Lord, Lord Howell, for his extremely impressive report and was especially pleased to read paragraph 268, which states:

“While we understand that the BBC World Service’s budget has been protected in the move to licence-fee funding, we are concerned that this protection might be more difficult to maintain in the face of future budget pressures and challenges to the principle of the licence fee”.

In their response the Government say:

“The Government remains fully committed to the BBC World Service”.

My concern is that these could remain warm words at a time when, as many other noble Lords have said, the BBC World Service has never been more important, a sentiment which is echoed in the report of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee of the other place.

In the 1990s, at the end of the Cold War, we saw a liberalisation of the media across the world. As the noble Baroness, Lady Suttie, said, Russian television channels were broadcasting brave programmes investigating the role of their own Government and military. The rise of democracy across much of Africa and Asia saw a similar opening up of the media. But in the last five years, we have seen a closing down of the free media globally. Increasingly warlords, political and religious parties are setting up or taking over television and radio stations and websites in order to pump out propaganda which supports their view of the world.

As my noble friend Lord Hannay pointed out, along with the report, the Russian and Chinese Governments have dramatically increased their communications budgets to spread their views across the world. It is easy for us sitting here in the West to imagine that audiences are sophisticated enough to ignore such propaganda, but even here in the west, “Russia Today”, which has already been mentioned, a well funded global propaganda arm of the Russian Government, is the second most watched foreign news channel in America, and in this country it claims a quarterly audience of 2.5 million people. Noble Lords can imagine the power of these channels in the less sophisticated Russian-speaking areas of the former Soviet Union. Daily we hear of the fears of the Baltic states and parts of the former USSR of the power of President Putin’s state media to foster anger and resentment among the Russian-speaking populations. It is not surprising that in the ghastly battle for control of eastern Ukraine, the BBC’s Ukrainian and Russian language services have become a crucial source of impartial information.

I talked to one of my colleagues on the Russian service, who gave me a rather good example. Last month, LifeNews, the Russian state media outlet in the region, reported unequivocally that a hospital in Donetsk in eastern Ukraine had been hit and people killed by shells fired by Ukrainian forces stationed to the north-west of the city. The BBC Russian Service reporter arrived shortly afterwards and reported the shelling, but said that it was not clear from which direction it had come—whether from the Ukrainians or the Russian separatists. The BBC reporter added that each side blamed the other. In fact, shortly afterwards, the OSCE observers visited the damaged hospital and decided that the shells had come from the separatist troops in the south-east. The findings were reported by the BBC, but not by Russian LifeNews. It is no wonder that the online traffic for the BBC’s Russian service has increased by 8% during the course of 2014. By giving the world a source of impartial news, we are presenting across the globe British values of truth, justice and democracy, portraying our country in the finest possible light.

Furthermore, the soft power of the World Service has another crucial role: it actively helps to stabilise fragile states. We are seeing hundreds of thousands of people fleeing from their own failing states for the political and economic security of Europe. The values of the BBC can encourage democracy and nurture civil institutions in the countries from which they are fleeing.

The report mentions the work of the wonderful BBC Media Action, which uses both the World Service and local media partners to build democratic institutions and encourage populations to engage with them. Media Action is a charity, not part of the World Service, and is well supported by DfID and international donors. It draws on the expertise of the staff of the BBC world services and transmits programmes jointly on its language services and with local partners.

In Afghanistan, we have seen a wholesale takeover of the airwaves by political groupings and warlords wanting to pump out their own propaganda. One of the very few places where Afghans can receive balanced information is on the “Open Jirga” programme, supported by BBC Media Action and based on BBC1’s “Question Time”. Afghan Ministers and Opposition leaders sit side by side answering questions from an eclectic audience representing a carefully selected range of Afghan society, including 50% women, who ask half the questions. Media Action is expanding and introducing similar programmes in the countries of the Arab spring and in Iraq. I hope that your Lordships will draw from the success of Media Action that it deploys the inspiration and values of the BBC World Service.

In April last year, the BBC World Service was folded into the licence fee. At the time, the head of news, James Harding, announced an increase in funding for the service of £5 million, so that next year its funding will be £250 million. However, he warned that there would have to be savings as part of the three-year investment plan. This is against a background of a 26% cut in BBC funding over the five years of the licence fee settlement.

We are now beginning to focus on the future funding of the BBC, with the negotiations for charter renewal due to start in a matter of months. This will be the first time that the funding of the BBC World Service has been dependent on the licence fee. I am concerned that commercial and political forces are gathering to ensure that the BBC’s severely reduced funding will affect the World Service. The Government’s response to the committee’s report points out that it is up to the BBC Trust to manage the funding and operation of the World Service within the wider BBC family. Indeed, the World Service’s operating licence states that the BBC Trust must ensure that the content and distribution budget are protected, while also ensuring that operational efficiencies can be achieved. However, it also says that the trust has to be consulted only if there is a 10% or greater cut in its budget. At the moment, that could mean £25 million, or the budget for several language services.

The International Broadcasting Trust has already warned us of its concern that, while the BBC licence fee is paid for by a British audience, the World Service is aimed at a global audience. I fear that the people of Britain, who pay for the BBC, might wonder why their money is being spent on a service which is not aimed at them.

The committee’s report urges that future commercial sources of income be studied, and suggests support from central taxation for the World Service. The Government, in reply, said that they would support the BBC World Service’s global role and ensure that it remained the best international broadcaster, but they did not respond to the idea of support from taxation. Will the Minister say whether there is any possibility of taxation support for the World Service, and if not, what are the Government going to do to ensure that the World Service’s funding is not cut after 2016?