The World Ahead 2022
In its centenary year, the BBC looks vulnerable
The British government and American streamers are the main causes
THE FIRST radio transmission by what was then known as the British Broadcasting Company came on November 14th 1922: “2LO, Marconi House, London, calling.” The call-sign, 2LO (lo was short for London), was the number of the broadcasting licence awarded to it by the Post Office. Arthur Burrows, director of programmes at the BBC, read the news and weather twice—first quickly, and then slowly, for those taking notes.
In the hundred years since, the corporation, as the BBC was later renamed, has become a £5.1bn ($7bn) per year operation that runs eight national tv channels, more than 50 radio stations, a sprawling website and suite of apps, as well as a World Service that broadcasts in 43 languages. Yet in the year of its centenary it will find itself vulnerable, both at home and abroad.
Start at home. Two Tube stops south of the BBC’s headquarters, the current occupant of 10 Downing Street, Boris Johnson, is intent on taming what he calls the Brexit-Bashing Corporation (though some Remainers say it is not critical enough). The government has indicated that it would like to trim the licence fee, the levy on all homes that provides most of the BBC’s income. And it has installed bosses it likes: Richard Sharp, the BBC’s chairman, is a Conservative Party donor and Brexit supporter; Sir Robbie Gibb, the latest government appointee to the BBC’s board, was head of communications in Downing Street under Theresa May. Nadine Dorries, the new culture secretary, once described the licence fee as “more in keeping in a Soviet-style country”.
In the year of its centenary, the BBC will find itself vulnerable
The year ahead will offer more opportunities to shape the corporation’s values. Ofcom, the broadcasting regulator, needs a chairman. Mr Johnson is keen on Paul Dacre, a former editor of the Daily Mail who has accused the BBC of exercising “cultural Marxism”. After an independent panel rejected him in 2021, the government is re-running the process. The BBC’s head of news, Fran Unsworth, will step down in January. Editorial appointments are notionally an internal matter, but that did not stop the government from lobbying against a recent candidate for another BBC news job.
In January there will also be a change in the chairmanship of Channel 4, a publicly owned, advertising-funded station, which in 2022 will also celebrate an anniversary—its 40th—a couple of weeks before the BBC’s big birthday. Channel 4’s current chairman, Charles Gurassa, opposes the government’s plan to privatise the broadcaster. His successor, jointly appointed by Ofcom and the government, will probably be someone more open to the idea.
For all the challenges from Downing Street, the bigger ones come from abroad. Video-streaming means the BBC is competing directly with Hollywood and Silicon Valley. Netflix has overtaken the BBC’s iPlayer as Britain’s most-used streaming service—no mean feat given that iPlayer is free to licence-fee payers. Among under-18s, Netflix is twice as popular as iPlayer, which also lags behind Amazon Prime Video and YouTube. The global streaming platforms have economies of scale the BBC cannot match. Whereas iPlayer has about 11,000 hours of content, Netflix and Amazon have 40,000 each. And the streaming landscape is becoming steadily more crowded.
Amid this onslaught, the BBC is emphasising its public-service role. During the lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 it quickly produced online-learning resources, while Netflix and YouTube were serving up giggles and misinformation, respectively. The BBC hopes to press that advantage with its centenary celebrations, which will involve a push into schools.
Like Channel 4, its other main card to play is its fostering of a TV-production industry in Britain. The expansion of Hollywood’s streamers is leaving local production houses less reliant on British broadcasters (Netflix is now the biggest commissioner of new scripted content in Europe). But the streamers make only what works globally, not distinctly British creations. Those include wholesome services like Alba, the BBC’s Gaelic-language channel in Scotland, and raucous hits like Channel 4’s “Derry Girls”.
Those examples highlight another strength of the public broadcasters: maintaining a shared culture for the fractious nations of the United Kingdom. John Reith, the BBC’s first director-general, described how broadcasting was “making the nation as one man”. As Mr Johnson tries to hold together a fraying union, that is something for him to consider.
Tom Wainwright: media editor, The Economist■
This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition of The World Ahead 2022 under the headline “Broadcast blues”