A terrific post on ConservativeHome highlighting David Cameron's comments today at a regional newspaper lunch on the BBC."We've all seen in our own constituencies small internet businesses, often involved in education or other information provision, working away to create a market, to make some money, and then the BBC comes along and squish, like a big foot on an ant, and that business goes out. And I think that we need to look at ways of actually making sure that the BBC doesn't over-extend itself."
I used to present a very successful programme on the digital station Oneword, which was a specialist radio station concerned with books. The programme was called Planet Politics. It was their highest rated programme and moved from being monthly to weekly. But all good things come to an end, and Oneword ended very soon after the BBC launched BBC7, which effectively mirrored what Oneword were doing. The BBC ran countless advcerts for BBC7 and it wasn;t long before Oneword was driven out of business. It's returned in a very much emaciated format with very little live programming. The sooner the BBC
It is also true that the BBC forces the other channels to keep their standards up. Our American cousins produce some good programming (and much of the best of it ends up being bought by one of the terrestrial UK channels), but their TV stations are almost unwatchable thanks to the frequency of advert breaks.
ReplyDeleteWithout the break-free BBC available for contrast, the other channels will slowly creep towards an American advert density. I would call that a bad thing.
Yeah, absolutely. I was interested that (the real) DC mentioned education provision.
ReplyDeleteHe's clearly never had to use educational software, much of which is overpriced hokum that wouldn't last a minute if the clued-up were responsible for purchasing it. But since it's mostly paid for by Gordon Brown's "e-learning credits" (because, after all, the Treasury is so well suited to decide how schools should spend their budgets), the hokum survives and makes a few clueless companies very, very rich.
In contrast, the BBC's educational resources are universally accepted as being rather good. So the money to pay for it is coming from one "poll tax" rather than the general taxation which funds e-learning credits. So what?
Personally I reckon that taxing television viewing to pay for school resources is a much more enlightened way of doing things, but recognise that this might not gain favour on a Conservative blog.
also,As most licence payers haven't even discovered Seven the the crushing competition must be kept in perspective.
ReplyDeleteDon't you realise the Cameron Tory party will cite the BBC and the NHS as as the two most unifying organisations they support.
Every time I hear someone say we should keep the telly tax because the BBC is good value for money or because it has no adverts I want to scream. Whether you like it or not is completely irrelevant. The question is: "Is it right?"
ReplyDeleteWhichever way you look at it, it is completely wrong. Can you really argue with a clear conscience that (primarily poor) people should be forced to pay for the middle classes to watch telly free of adverts?
So you want adverts on the BBC? Or do you have a new radical funding policy?
ReplyDeleteAnd how does this correllate with your desire for state funding for political parties?
Ian, I would be very happy to have adverts on the likes of Radio 1, Radio 2, all the BBC digital channels. And I am not sure where you get my "stated desire" for funding of political parties. I am against the principle of state funding for political parties but I do believe that all these scandals are bringing the day closer when it is introduced.
ReplyDeleteI agree with David Cameron (the one on here!) - the BBC is possibly the best value for money we could hope for from £120. I challenge you to find something that offers so much content for the same price.
ReplyDeleteBut it is true that important broadcasters such as Oneword are 'trampled' by the BBC. The answer seems to me that the licence fee should pay for 'public service television', whether that is on the BBC or elsewhere. The obvious difficulty here (especially for anyone with even remotely liberal tendencies) is that this requires someone (i.e. government) to decide what is worthy of funding and what is not. In short, an awful idea.
But to simply scrap the fee altogether would be a mistake. You need only look at any other country which doesn't provide some publicly-funded 'public-service TV' to see that the quality of programming would decrease rapidly.
Bishop Hill said: "Can you really argue with a clear conscience that (primarily poor) people should be forced to pay for the middle classes to watch telly free of adverts?"
Well yes. Because there is much in the BBC's broadcasts which isn't inherently 'middle class', and I think it's hard to argue that one class gets much better value for money than any other.
I'm afraid to say that I feel much BBC-bashing comes from thoughts of bias rather than efficiency or justice.
Iain, isn't your suggestion that:
ReplyDelete"I would be very happy to have adverts on the likes of Radio 1, Radio 2, all the BBC digital channels"
simply a subjective and arbitrary one, based on personal preference rather than any useful reasoning?
Would you be as keen to see adverts on Radios 4 and 5?
Chris, with respect, that's rubbish. Everyone has a different definition of quality. Strictly Come Dancing? National Lottery Jet Set, don't make me laugh. This is not public service tv, it's called chasing ratings. Sure, there are some excellent public service programmes on the BBC - many of them made by private sector independent production companies. Clinging on to the licence fee is the last refuge of those who find all public sector reform difficult and think it will all end in tears. If enough thtought is put into it I am sure it is not beyond our wit to come up with a formula for truly excellent public service TV. And while we're at it, let's put adverts on Radio1, Radio 2 and the BBC digital channels and make them pay for themselves.
ReplyDeleteOh come on, Oneword was (and still is) largely just talking books end to end, broadcast at bizarre times and inadequately trailed - and for ages their website didn't tell you anything useful about what was on when. They could hardly have made it harder to find things.
ReplyDeleteChris, any argument is a subjective one, but this suggestion is based on the pemise that there is very little that you could call 'public service' about these stations - especially Radio 1. It's anti competitive. As a Conservative I believe in fair competition, and as a huge state monopoly the BBC by its very existence distorts competition. That doesn't mean I advocate its abolition - but it does mean that after 60 years or so we ought not to be frightened of a debate about how best to reform its structures and financing.
ReplyDeleteJohn, It Is, but it wasn't. It had a substantial amount of original programming each day - although I admit it wasn't the majority. The amount was on the increase but then along came BBC7.
ReplyDeleteMy memory is clearly playing tricks on me, re: Funding of political parties. I retract that.
ReplyDeleteHow come Classic FM has survived despite the presence of Radio 3?
The joy of BBC radio and television used to be the absence of adverts. One can only say now that you don't get adverts halfway through a programme, but between programmes there is a sustained assault of trailers for future broadcasting items. God knows how many minutes are lost each day on these "forthcoming attractions", but I actually think they're counter productive. Most of them seem to promote second-rate TV drama, usually involving an actor called Robson something or other. The excerpts always include a stressed out woman shouting at her husband/lover. The ads say to me, at least; "This is what's on tomorrow at 9pm. You have been warned".
ReplyDeleteIf we could restrict ads on commercial and BBC stations to two minute slots between programmes, I would cheerfully ditch the BBC poll tax.
BH/H's G - here here.
ReplyDeleteIn a parallel life I have done some consultancy (at one remove) for the BBC, and if I was queasy beforehand, now I am doubled up. If the BBC is so great, then doubtless its fans would happily stump up whatever it would charge for a subscription service. At the very, very least let us have top slicing of the licence fee - is anyone going to seriously suggest that the populist 'stuff' it airs on a Saturday night is more worthy of taxpayer support than that which C4 airs on a random Wednesday evening?
croyadonian...too true.
ReplyDeleteit's a regressive tax which my lefti frineds justify on numerous grounds to do with unbiased reporting(ha!),education etc etc
What ever!!!why the hell should an old lady on a pension pay the same licence fee as Johnaton Ross on £300,000 p.a.---of her money.
It ain't good value and whilst I have no problem with a subsidised public service broadcaster,Al BBC have only two interests and they are hiring their mates at top hourly rates to do fuck all and then sucking up to TB.
My, how the oppressed love their chains. It is not the quality of the BBC that is the issue, though it has dumbed down a great deal and it is disgustingly biased towards Labour. The issue is that you are all willing, absolutely lemming like, to fork out what amounts to a poll tax on television. It is laughable and absurd and yet almost all of you solemnly justify it. It is not a public service, unless you consider the likes of slimy Jonathan Ross and cretinous Chris Evans edifying presences. C'mon slaves, throw off your shackles!
ReplyDeleteand as I sit here unable to hose my car down in central(ish) london thanks to lack of investment by a privatised water company,
ReplyDeleteSorry but the water companies have invested huge sums in meeting EU water directives. Unfortunately that wasn't the investment the customer wanted, but the company had no choice.
If the water business were a real market, we would all be metered and pay for what we used. The rationing shows that this is still a business that is run by socialist rather than capitalist rules.
Oh, for god's sake. Cameron doesn't mean it - he's just trying to scare the BBC into being more pro-Tory. It's a thinly veiled threat of what might happen to the BBC under a Tory administration if they don't start cosing up to his agenda.
ReplyDeleteI couldn`t agree more with this post Iain. A core Tory issue this.
ReplyDeleteAt risk of defending the indefensible, I believe the large BNP vote was partly motivated by the sneering liberalism of the BBC, as exemplified by the Dimbleby interview with Nick Griffin. I have no doubt Griffin is a contemptible man, but the sneering liberal tone of the interview(together with Nick Robinson`s pathetic giggling in the background) almost made me sympathise with Griffin. I am sure many working class people watching did sympathise. Entirely counter-productive.
The BBC and Scotland should be the first two issues tackled by the next Conservative Government. Both indefensible.
micahel,very true except the bit where you say scotland isn't defensible.
ReplyDeleteIf we build a wall big enouhg etc
Bishop Hill:
ReplyDeleteI'm not much of a fan of the license fee either, and your "forcing poor people to pay for middle-class advert-free telly" is one reason why. It's also woefully inefficient to collect. The efficient way to fund a public service broadcaster would be to fund it from general taxation. There are no marginal costs for collecting the tax, and your poor people, by virtue of not paying much tax, won't pay much for the BBC. The danger, of course, is that placing the BBC's funding source any closer to the likes of Gordon Brown seems to invite political meddling, but I'm not convinced that that's a real worry. The Government has to agree the BBC's licence fee periodically anyway - it seems trivial to instead agree that the BBC gets X million quid from the treasury, rising at the rate of inflation and guaranteed for the next 10 years, or whatever.
"Why can't people who don't want adverts just pay more to not have them?"
The simple answer is that the "market" in television is almost non-existent. There is no current method for purchasing terrestrial television. One could, I imagine, do a deal with Sky or a cable company to carry your TV channel, but you would have to persuade them to offer boutique per-channel pricing, rather than the channel bundles that they currently offer.
If television moves away from a broadcast distribution to an internet-based scheme, these things become possible. One could easily imagine a "broadcaster" who would offer 3 hours of evening programming for a price, or that same programming spread over 4 hours with adverts interspersed for a lower or zero cost.
In America, you see the evidence of this lack of market. A number of people wish to purchase TV programming without adverts, and are willing to pay a premium to do so. They are unable to purchase such programming, so instead pay the money to TiVo in exchange for a TV recording device that allows them to easily skip the adverts. The response of the TV companies is to try to buy legislation to make skipping adverts illegal.