John Ward September 14, 2010 BBC Trust, Hutton Report, Iraq War, Sir Michael Lyons resigns, vindictive .

BBC: Lyons led by donkeys to the guillotine.

Obviously, it’s not a good idea for the BBC to argue with the Government….any government.

We are just a few months into yet another New Start, and already the dirty old politics are creeping in. For those moving among the media cognoscenti, it came as less than a surprise yesterday when Sir Michael Lyons (left) the chairman of the BBC Trust, reversed his recent decision to stand for a second term, and told the government that he will stand down early in 2011. There was much wailing and popping of Champagne corks in the Tory Party.

Only last week, Sir Michael was telling the Chancellor George Osborne where to get off, explaining to whomever wanted to listen that the government should continue to invest in the World Service. His most enthralled audience was a committee of MPs to whom he said that the Beeb was engaged in “robust” discussions with the government about a reduction in the service’s £272m Foreign Office grant.

“We’re talking about an audience of 180m in the last year,” Lyons thundered, “a very modest expenditure for Britain to have its voice heard by that large an audience, when seeking to influence global opinion. Far from spending less, it’s an area where you should be spending more.” At £1.50 per influenced brain, it’s hard to argue with that: and a much better deal for everyone than useless, conscience-salving aid.

Sir Michael heads the BBC Trust, which is the sovereign body of the UK’s biggest broadcaster. It acts both as an intermediary between programme-makers, journalists and the government, and also as the regulator. Which, in a way, makes it two quangos for the price of one.

But Lyons was doomed before he started kicking up a fuss about World Service cuts: way back in February this year, the Daily Mail ran a piece predicting that, in the event of a Conservative Government coming to power, ‘The chairman of the BBC will be the first to face the axe under radical Tory plans to transform the corporation….senior Tory sources said they would scrap the BBC Trust, led by Sir Michael Lyons, if they win the general election…’

Most people call Sir Michael Lyons ‘feisty’, which is pretty much the personality one wants in control at the Beeb when the politicos start chucking their weight around. He’d clashed with the last lot before the Coalition: they didn’t want him, given that the Trust was set up by Royal Charter following the Hutton Report into Campbell’s gangsterism I do beg your pardon, I meant as a reform to its old system of having governors….under which, you’ll recall we went to war in Iraq in search of destructive weaponry – or was it regime change, I can never quite recall.

Sir Michael’s resignation letter continued to poo-pooh the rather daft idea that the BBC Trust is ‘an unviable form of governance’ for the BBC. In truth, what the control freaks don’t like about the Trust as run by Lyons is that it’s inviolate.

I’m no defender of Auntie in her current life, but Sir Michael Lyons is nothing to do with programme content policy; rather, his job is to ensure that governments butt out of the issue. Mark Thompson’s role is that of taking it up the butt and delivering content-free programming at a level enjoyed by two vital classes – Under and Political.

This is a blunder by the Coalition, and its members are lessened in stature as a result of it. It also opens the Government up yet again to charges of favouritism towards the Beastly Digger and his Infernal Sky Machine.

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1

Bankrupt Taxpayer on September 15, 2010 at 9:36 am

Barncactus: A few years ago I heard a brief debate about how the BBC collected and calculated its global listening audience figures for BBC World Service, and IIRC it was a nonsense with the method used intended to produce figures much higher than they really are on a regular basis.That said, I listen to the WS a fair bit and it is quite interesting – much more than Radio 4 IMO – but I have noticed a fall in its impartiality since it became a closer part of the BBC Domestic News/Current Affairs empire. I always suspected that a major reason for the merger was to deviously facilitate cross-funding of WS operations from Domestic monies without telling the licence taxpayers.

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John Ward on September 14, 2010 at 4:40 pm

BarncacI never watch CNN either – and you know why? It has no authority.But throughout India, the Southern Hemisphere and even China, the BBC means Truth. That is worth more than any media analysis.Incidentally, why does CNN always show the weather forecast for where you aren't? This is what put me off it: Americans swear by it, but I don't care a hoot that in Madagascar they're about to have drizzle….which is what it told me last time I watched it.

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Barncactus on September 14, 2010 at 4:06 pm

You still haven't addressed the 'how often and for how long'. Far too many easy generalities in the broadcasting business. Influence is fine, if in fact our £272m really buys any. Frankly I think that all foreign audience broadcasters are wasting their time except in those cases where the locals are suppressing the truth, and there the BBC cannot usually be received as the crafty local autocrats remove repeaters, take down satellite dishes and jam the short wave.Anyhow, the amount in question is really quite trivial compared with licence fee income, so perhaps we should tolerate the BBC's defence of it at the same trivial level. And I never, ever watch CNN!

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KG on September 14, 2010 at 1:35 pm

Barncactus,There is always a need for countries to spread their own agendas around the world.Have you ever seen news items in English from RT or France24? They make a refreshing change from CNN and their ilk. More sources for a more balanced view is good.Radio is more accessible in less developed countries and where it may be more politically sensitive or impossible to get foreign news and views from TV.You will never get the average British viewer or listener to care about the wider coverage of news available to them when all they want is sport, talent and celeb. By the same token the foreign target for World Service will never be the masses in any country so the listening figures of 2.7% seems remarkably good.The cost will mainly be down to the need (open to debate) to run in so many languages. Perhaps if the BBC scrapped Welsh and Gaelic it may help.

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Barncactus on September 14, 2010 at 12:22 pm

The Beeb is notoriously loose with numbers. Consider what the stat quoted means. 180m listeners. How often and for how long? Are they listeners to the news (perhaps relatively unbiased, of course a benefit in itself in some places) or are they 'receiving opinions'. In the latter case, whose opinions are they receiving? What is the political line that the Beeb is transmitting to all those people? Soft Left? Aligned with the recipients' needs (as perceived by Beeb managers)?I have a stat of my own for the retreating Lyons. 180m is about 2.7% of the world's population. 'That large an audience' Huh! Will his successor be trying a bit harder to reach the other 97.3%? Or is the present performance indicative of rather a low level of global interest in the UK World Service's expensive multilingual output?

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