[James2001]

Possibly a levy on taxation. Which would REALLY wind up the "scrap the licence fee" campaigners, as they'd be obligated to fund the BBC no matter what. Which makes me appreciate the idea.

[Larry the Loafer]

For the life of me, I can't remember where or who I heard the idea from. But they suggested the idea of some kind of tax that would raise funds from other productions, broadcasters and platforms. Essentially, if you operate something in the UK that could threaten the BBC, you pay a tax to contribute to the BBC.

I never see anyone mention this idea, so unless there's a major flaw about it that I'm overlooking...?

[Brekkie]

Not a UK thing but I suspect it happens here too but there can be agreements to not run this story and be compensated in favour of another juicy story, etc... etc... Just as there can be agreements for exclusives to not use certain language/tone in agreement for getting it. The 'regular basis' thing regarding the website headlines does seem rather unusual.

I do think the BBC should be above and beyond all this though as a public broadcaster. Though there is the obvious flipside, in the context of threats to scrap the license fee at the time, that upsetting the govt would probably not be in their best interest which is an issue which private broadcasters/press would not have to contend with.

Would be interesting to see whether those who did use the term 'lockdown' also got similar messages from Downing Street or not.

When I read these kind of posts about getting rid of the license fee I always ask myself "what can replace it?"

Exactly - and those in charge of the decision and announcing they will scrap the licence fee are very quiet about what they intend to replace it with - likely a European model as in Germany and Finland where instead of it only being compulsory if you have a TV (so technically there is a way out) it will become compulsory for all households and possibly business premises too, and whilst some may end up paying less others will end up paying more.    Don't want to go to far off topic but when you look at the licence fee in the context of broadband/phone companies raising fees annual by inflation + 4% and Sky adding a quid per month onto each package on an annual basis it's no surprise the BBC has lagged behind.


Also worth mentioning in the budget today several tax incentives for TV production have been combined into one, which is actually good news for the industry with 34% rebates on high end TV and 39% on childrens TV production.  


Anyway - feel like we digress but it would be nice to see the BBC get as much support from the government of the day as the goverment of the day expect from the BBC - without it being conditional on said support.

[Kojak]

Interesting article, Brekkie. I hadn't seen this. I don't know whether 'shutdown' sounds any less severe than 'lockdown' personally, but that's really not the point of the article.


I'm afraid I'm simply not knowledgeable enough in the field to know whether this is common practice politically or not. Would, for example, in the days of Thatcher, someone from Downing Street routinely call around the news outlets to try to influence what the BBC / ITN / newspapers etc cover in this way? In Blair's day? In Cameron's? Is it seen as a run of the mill part of politics/journalism? Or is the suggestion that this interference was a completely newfound thing at the outset/during the pandemic?

In any case, to me - admittedly as a complete layman - it should be entirely up to each individual broadcaster/publication which stories they publish and what (if any) angle they come from and they should be able to simply say 'no' if any such unwelcome coercion on which stories to push and which stories to dampen comes in from any outside agencies. (I accept I'm probably seeing things far too simplistically so I'm genuinely interested in the responses from those who have more experience.)

Political communication staff have always applied pressure on media on choice of language.

This went into overdrive with the 97 Blair government,  Alistair Campbell and team were notorious.

Most of the 'exclusives' you see in newspapers are setup by offering one story in return for not going on another

You'd be surprised how much lobbying on even story selection, wording,  choice of contributions ans pictures goes on. You'd be even more surprised to learn how much is agreed before appearing.

It's an all party and governments thing,  disingenuous to paint it as a Tory thing

Peter Sissons recounted a particularly egregious (IMO) example of this in his memoirs. The day of the OJ Simpson verdict was also the day Tony Blair made his keynote address at the Labour conference. Alastair Campbell phoned round the news organisations asking them to 'not lose sight ... of the importance to the country of Mr Blair's speech' - in other words, lead your bulletins with it, or else! ITN studiously ignored him... but the Beeb didn't. Blair's speech led the Six. (Though the Nine, which Peter presented that night, did lead with OJ.)

[Humphrey Hacker]

I don't know if anyone saw this but the Daily Mirror ran an article about MOTD not being on last week. While it was a well-written piece they did use the word "scab" when describing how no-one from MOTD would work. Whilst I understand the context of using the word I also thought it inflammatory.

[Kojak]

Possibly a levy on taxation. Which would REALLY wind up the "scrap the licence fee" campaigners, as they'd be obligated to fund the BBC no matter what. Which makes me appreciate the idea.

I don’t really like this idea. The reason is this: the Australian Broadcasting Corporation is funded through general taxation, and successive Liberal  governments (their Tories) have continuously interfered, or tried to interfere, with the ABC’s independence. The ABC’s headquarters were even raided by police in 2019, over a report on alleged Australian war crimes in Afghanistan. So if you think what’s going on at the BBC is bad - which it is! - be grateful it’s not quite as bad as Australia.

[Humphrey Hacker]

Possibly a levy on taxation. Which would REALLY wind up the "scrap the licence fee" campaigners, as they'd be obligated to fund the BBC no matter what. Which makes me appreciate the idea.

I don’t really like this idea. The reason is this: the Australian Broadcasting Corporation is funded through general taxation, and successive Liberal  governments (their Tories) have continuously interfered, or tried to interfere, with the ABC’s independence. The ABC’s headquarters were even raided by police in 2019, over a report on alleged Australian war crimes in Afghanistan. So if you think what’s going on at the BBC is bad - which it is! - be grateful it’s not quite as bad as Australia.

I don't know about Australia but in my life time both Labour (Iraq) and Conservative (Falklands, Zircon and Ulster/Northern Ireland) governments have caused the BBC a lot of strife.

[Johnr]

Gary has been sensationally axed by the BBC today and replaced by Alex Scott (if you're a Daily Express reader)

...in other words, he has lost his voice

www.bbc.co.uk 

Gary Lineker is not presenting FA Cup coverage after losing his voice - BBC News
He has just returned to BBC sports coverage after being taken off air in an impa…
  Source: www.bbc.co.uk

He did sound like he was heading that way presenting on Saturday!

[Andrew]

We are still in a strange period where Gary being REPLACED is not just a story in the Daily Express but one on the BBC News website as well. I’m surprised they didn’t send a breaking news alert

[News Engineer]

The OJ verdict was shown live during the Six, it hadn’t happened when they went on air, so leading on another story may have been due to other factors entirely.

Although given the verdicts were announced - if Wikipedia is correct - at 6:07pm (UK time), it couldn’t have been a lengthy package on Blair’s speech

(No memory of whether he’s right on what ITN lead their 5:40 bulletin on I’m afraid!)