With just three years to go until the renewal of its charter, after 14 years of political assaults and in a time of convulsive change, the BBC has to prove its fitness for the next 10 years of public service broadcasting. Hence a wide-ranging speech this week by its director general, Tim Davie, outlining the way forward. Opinions vary as to whether this was a timely show of mettle or a once great institution gasping its last. What was clear was that the path ahead will involve yet more swingeing cuts on top of the £500m annual reduction already forced on the corporation by a two-year licence fee freeze – which ends next month – compounded by inflation.
The breadth of the challenge facing the corporation was underscored by a trio of core objectives designed to sprinkle reassurance in all political directions: the pursuit of truth with no agenda; an emphasis on British storytelling; and a mission to bring people together. All three may be admirable, but the latter two were somewhat undermined by a podcast interview with the showrunner of Doctor Who, for decades a standout example of British storytelling that brings people together. Talking about the value of a production partnership struck with Disney two years ago, Russell T Davies said that it was crucial to the show’s survival, because the end of the BBC was “undoubtedly on its way in some shape or form”.
This sort of fatalism is widespread within the corporation. Added to external grumbles, which have been cynically stoked by successive Tory governments, they create a mood music that does not help the case that the BBC is going to have to build in negotiations for the renewal of the charter. Both internally and externally, hearts and minds need to be won if one of Britain’s greatest – and most globally influential – 20th-century creations is to be saved for future generations.
On a more positive note, the research company Enders Analysis recently observed that the mischief-making of Boris Johnson’s time had finally subsided, leaving a political consensus that was broadly appreciative of the BBC’s contribution to public life. This will be crucial if Mr Davie is to succeed in one of his wilder ambitions: to persuade the government to take back responsibility for funding the World Service, on the basis that it is in the national interest to maintain it, but unreasonable to expect financially strapped licence fee payers to foot the bill for content they will mostly never see or hear.
On the licence fee itself, Mr Davie pointed to reform rather than abandonment, promising the BBC’s biggest-ever public consultation on the best way forward. He will doubtless be hoping that the public notes the effect of an advertising drought on competitors such as Channel 4. Such pressures are not unknown to the corporation itself. While licence fee funding is entering a period of stability, BBC Studios, the commercial arm, is having to make its own painful economies.
Among the jewels in the crown of BBC Studios is the natural history unit (NHU), which makes David Attenborough’s agenda-setting nature programmes. At 97, Mr Attenborough remains one of the corporation’s most charismatic champions. The NHU, he said in a preview of his latest series, Mammals, had changed world opinion – “Nobody else can hold a candle to it” – and originated in a tradition of publicly funded broadcasting. Mr Davie can only hope that the world is listening.