BBC Budget - Backlash or Buckle Down?
The BBC is going to have to cut it cloth. With Lord Patten, the new BBC Trust chairman about to appear before the DCMS Select Committee, Therese Coffey MP assesses the task ahead of him.
3 Jul 2011, 19:55
Can Patten persuade the BBC bureaucracy to cut costs?
I should declare an interest – I worked for the BBC up till the 2010 election though only for just over 6 months. One presenter suggested to me it was enough time to get to know Auntie Beeb but perhaps not to fall in love. On the contrary, I thoroughly enjoyed my time there but I didn’t become blind to some of its faults and was able as a newbie to keep asking why something was so...usually the response was, “Ah yes, you’re still new to here aren’t you?” I saw everyone working there who wanted to put out the best radio, the best TV and great online. Sometimes cobbling together sets with sticky tape (the spirit of Blue Peter is alive and well) but also frustratingly bureaucratic in its compliance and counter-checking with additional bureaucracy of the Trust.
When Lord Patten became Chairman, I offered to share my insights. He hasn’t taken me up on it but after our first meeting across the committee floor (I am a member of the DCMS Select Committee), I will enjoy our end of term session on 19th July to see what he has been able to implement so far.
One of the questions I asked him, previously, concerned the Director-General. In his interview at the weekend, Patten talked of consideration of the Will Hutton recommendation on capping top salaries vs lowest paid (though Patten referred to median pay). That would certainly price out the current DG and perhaps the next DG will be asked to take a significantly lower salary, just as happened with Channel 4’s David Abrahams. Our committee issued a report on the BBC settlement, which was decided in extremely quick time. In some ways, that saved a lot of BBC management and civil service time – compressing a process that could take many months to just a few days, however, as well as the freeze, the BBC agreed to take on funding for the World Service and BBC Monitoring.
I became a pariah at breakfast in the Tea Room when I challenged why the license fee payer was being asked to stump up for the total cost of BBC Monitoring and the BBC World Service. After some spluttering, I was assured that my constituents enjoyed listening to World Service when abroad and that who knew about Monitoring. I want to assure readers that I understand the value of the BBC World Service in our soft diplomacy around the world, it allows an impartial news service that people in the BBC also value delivering but it strikes me as a “nice to have” for the average licence fee payer. The co-funder of the BBC Monitoring is the CIA so perhaps MI6 could be stump up some cash. The Committee has encouraged DfID to chip in but I have been told the direct service provision is not allowable funding. Somehow, I would think we could find a way through on that score with enough determination.
Lord Patten also has to digest their Lordships’ report on The Governance and Regulation of the BBC. I have had a quick look and I don’t agree about the future governance suggestions but there is plenty of time to build up to the ideas for the next Royal Charter. I’ll save that for another day. Now back to iplayer...
Comments (0)
Subscribe to this posts's comments feed