Alan’s investigation into “Gibb-gate” continues. In a major article for Prospect, he sets out the influence and connections of a tight-knit and largely unaccountable clique which is undermining the political independence and regulation of public service broadcasting. At the centre of that group is Robbie Gibb, Theresa May’s director of communications when she was prime minister.
Alan and Lionel discuss the independence of the BBC and its journalism, as well as government appointments more generally, with Roger Mosey (former head of BBC TV News, controller of Radio 5 Live and Editor of the Today programme) and Dorothy Byrne (former head of news and current affairs at Channel 4).
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This transcript has been edited for clarity.
Alan Rusbridger
Hello, and welcome to Media Confidential, Prospect Magazine’s dive beyond the clickbait to analyse what’s really happening in the world of media. I’m Alan Rusbridger.
Lionel Barber
And I’m Lionel Barber. On this episode, has the government captured the BBC?
Emily Maitlis
Put this in the context of the BBC Board, where another active agent of the Conservative Party, a former Downing Street spin doctor, and former advisor to BBC rival, GB News, now sits, acting as the arbiter of BBC impartiality.
Rusbridger
We return to the subject of Robbie Gibb, Gibbgate, as I’ve called it, and my investigation into the tight-knit and largely unaccountable clique, that includes Gibb, which is undermining the independence and regulation of public service broadcasting.
Barber
Listen and follow us wherever you get your podcasts to make sure you never miss an episode. And follow us on X/Twitter. We are @MediaConfPod.
Rusbridger
My highlight of the week, Lionel, was watching the Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer doing a tour of the studios to discuss BBC impartiality, and being completely tied up in knots by Sky TV’s Kay Burley.
Lucy Frazer
And the evidence shows that there is a perception of bias in relation to the BBC.
Kay Burley
What do you think? Do you think, as Culture Secretary, that the BBC is biassed?
Frazer
I think that, on occasion, it has been biased, yes. And I think-
Burley
In relation to what?
Frazer
This report isn’t about incidents, but we have seen recently that it’s had to apologise for its own reporting, for example, in relation to the attack in the hospital in Israel. So, in Gaza-
Burley
There’s a difference between mistake and bias, surely?
Frazer
There is a perception amongst the public that the BBC is biased. And as Culture Secretary, it’s important that I look at that. I must say, these are issues that I have discussed with the BBC, they’ve taken that on board-
Burley
I’m asking you about the evidence of bias. Where’s the evidence?
Frazer
The evidence of bias is what audiences believe is the content of the BBC, and how they-
Burley
But that’s perception, that’s not evidence. That’s perception.
Frazer
Yes, that is evidence. That is evidence. Impartiality is about perception of the things that are being broadcast by the BBC, and the evidence in relation to that perception is that-
Burley
Perception and evidence are different things.
Frazer
The evidence from Ofcom, having done studies and questionnaires of the public, is that the BBC’s ratings, in relation to impartiality, have gone down. And I, and the BBC, think that there is more that BBC can do in order to improve that.
Barber
I think that was my lowlight of the week, actually, Alan, watching it. It was lazy. She was floundering in the face of an experienced journalist who just asked her, “Show me the evidence.” And of course all she had was the case where the reporter made a mistake in attributing, clearly, the bombing of the Gaza hospital to Israel. But this was a mistake. It’s not the same as an accusation of systemic bias.
Rusbridger
I think one of the problems is that I think there have now been eight culture secretaries in six years. So, it’s like a job now in government where you go for on-the-job training to discover how to do the job, and by the time you’ve learned how to do the job or what the issues are, a very complex department, you then move on. And Lucy Frazer’s a barrister, you’d think she’d know the difference between evidence and whatever her word was, the public perceptions of bias. But actually I read the report, I suppose she did too, but she showed no signs of having read the report, because the report actually didn’t have any hard evidence of bias by the BBC, and Ofcom, year after year, broadly gives the BBC a clean bill of health.
Barber
Indeed. And I must say, when I was chairing news conference at the Financial Times, any journalist who stood up and said, “Yes, but it’s the perception!” That person would be quietly told to think again. It’s an obvious way of attacking somebody, but without any real credibility.
Rusbridger
This is what we’re going to come on to speak about, but I think one of the problems the government has with Ofcom, they think, “How can you not be finding this organisation biassed? There must be something wrong with Ofcom.” And that leads down a road we’re going to be talking about in a second.
Barber
So, let’s focus on Gibbgate. You’ve written an extensive piece for this for Prospect Magazine. What did you discover, Alan?
Rusbridger
You remembered, Lionel, I kept on getting the brush off from the BBC when I was asked about what is obviously true, that Robbie Gibb, a BBC director, tried to interfere in the appointment of the BBC’s regulator. They’re clearly wrong. And I just wondered why the BBC was circling the waggons around this guy. And so I made lots of phone calls, and my conclusion is that Gibb is now the most important journalist at the BBC, even though he doesn’t work there, and therefore he’s one of the most important journalists in the country. And I think the headline we put on this, is “How the government captured the BBC”, is not too strong a way of putting it.
It takes a bit of time to explain why that’s so, but it comes down to the fact that a lot of the BBC board are now not journalists. The director-general is not a journalist, the chairman at the time that Gibb was appointed was not a journalist. And there‘s a four person committee which now looks at all issues to do with impartiality, the thing that Lucy Frazer and the government is hot on their tails about. And on that committee, if you discard the two internal people, Davie and the Head of News, Deborah Turness, you’ve got Nick Serota, who’s an art gallery curator, and Gibb.
Barber
Chairman of the Arts Council as well.
Rusbridger
Now Chairman of the Arts Council.
Barber
Nick Serota, yeah.
Rusbridger
But formerly of the Tate. And Gibb. So, Gibb is the only external journalist on this four person committee. Now, sooner or later, they’re going to be looking at Israel, Gaza and the BBC’s coverage of that. The BBC told me that themselves. And there’s this curious thing that Gibb, as well as being a self-confessed proper Thatcherite Tory, so he admits he’s a partisan figure, is also, according to Companies House, 100% owner of The Jewish Chronicle, which has been one of the BBC’s most bitter critics. Add to that the fact that Gibb was reportedly nominated for this role, he was appointed by the government, we think of the BBC as independent of government, but Gibb was appointed by the government at the say-so of a mysterious man called Dougie Smith.
Now, Dougie Smith is reported to be one of the most powerful people in the land, because he does all these appointments, he makes sure the “right people”, in inverted commas, get the right jobs.
Barber
The political patronage.
Rusbridger
Exactly.
Barber
Which has always been the case, but which, I think we’re going to talk about a bit, it’s got worse under the Conservatives.
Rusbridger
And he’s the figure who, supposedly, switched the advice note to Boris Johnson about who should chair Ofcom. They wanted to put a Tory apparatchik in charge.
So, I ring up number 10 and say, “I’m about to make this charge, originally made by former Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries, that Smith did this.” Number 10 says, “We don’t answer for him. Go to Tory campaign headquarters.” I go to Tory campaign headquarters. They say, “We don’t answer for him, go back to Downing Street.” Nobody would answer for him. And eventually, the Tory head office said, “Look, here’s a list of all the government employees, special advisors to Number 10.” Smith is not on it. So, here’s a man who doesn’t exist-
Barber
With no official role.
Rusbridger
No official role, appointing government people to the BBC. So, as I say, when I say, “Have the government captured the BBC?” I don’t think that’s an exaggeration.
Barber
And this committee that you mentioned, which is the editorial-
Rusbridger
It’s the Guidance and Standards-
Barber
Guidance and Standards-
Rusbridger
... Committee, yes.
Barber
That says a lot there, those few words, very important, was set up fairly recently, wasn’t it?
Rusbridger
Fairly recently by the Cameron government. And the one thing that we know from Lucy Frazer is that they want to give this body more power. They want them to be able to intervene more in editorial complaints. So, that will make Robbie Gibb, by the way, who’s about to be reappointed, I imagine, for another three years, even more power. And lots of people said it would matter less if there were more journalists on the board, as opposed to just him. It would matter less if Tim Davie had come up through the journalistic background. But because he’s the guy on the board who is the editorial figure, he’s managed to get himself a lot of power.
And also in the background is the whole question of government funding. So, a couple of journalists, senior people at the BBC said the one thing we thought of Tim was that he might be a marketing guy, but he sees Gibb as the link to the government, and therefore the link to the cash. So you’ve got to keep Gibb on board. Of course, he didn’t get all the cash in the end. But somebody, household name, said to me, what’s the point of getting the cash if you lose your independence? And that’s at the heart of this piece.
Barber
Yeah, I worry about the lack of the journalist representation on this important committee. That seems, to me, a fundamental mistake. And I suppose I am concerned too about the strength of the top editorial team around Tim Davie, because obviously he does have a lot of strengths. He does. I was on the Tate board with Tim for several years. He’s a very thoughtful, hardworking, energetic person. He does come with a commercial background, he’s a bit sensitive about not coming through the ranks, but I think it really is important when he got that appointment to have a very strong, if you like, inner cabinet around him, that he could draw on that support, but also use it as a counter to Gibb.
And one of the things that you bring out, and we’ve talked about, is that Gibb seems to think that he’s got an absolute hotline to Tim Davie, and raising every single issue under the sun, including Middle East coverage, and poor old Tim’s under bombardment over the weekends. That’s a bit of hearsay, a bit of sourcing at my end, but this is why it’s very important, I think, to have stronger editorial representation in these key positions, and to fight fire with fire.
Rusbridger
Couldn’t agree more. And the parallel I made is, can you imagine appointing Alastair Campbell, or the other head of Comms for Labour, David Hill, to be on the BBC board, within a year of stepping down? That would’ve been unthinkable at the time, and there would’ve been a huge stink if anybody had tried it.
Barber
I think the technical term is semi-trained polecat?
Rusbridger
We’ve been slightly asleep on this story.
Barber
No question. You’re waking us up. I’ve got the Prospect magazine here, straight off the presses, blue cover with the BBC... I better not give away too much here, but it’s an impressive front cover, and it’s quite long this piece, isn’t it, Alan?
Rusbridger
It’s a bit long.
Barber
It’s a few thousand words, but having read it, I think it has been edited, and it’s got a lot of information. It’s comprehensive investigation into this story. Let’s hear a bit more about who Robbie Gibb actually is. Here’s a clip from The News Agents podcast, featuring the former Newsnight policy editor, Lewis Goodall.
Lewis Goodall
When I was at the BBC, Robbie Gibb made my life really difficult, day after day.
Jon Sopel
Robbie Gibb is the former Director of Communications for Theresa May, who then went to be on the board-
Lewis Goodall
Of the BBC.
Jon Sopel
... of the BBC.
Goodall
Former communications-
Emily Maitlis
And also helped found a rival broadcaster, GB News.
Goodall
Yeah, exactly. And not really talked about this before, he made my life really, really hard at the BBC. Day after day, I would hear from people saying, “Just watch it. Robbie’s watching you.” Because they had created this sort of confection that somehow, I was Labour supporting, or doing Labour... By comparison to Robbie Gibb, my grand summit within the Labour Party was Vice Chair of Birmingham North Field CLP and Youth Officer when I was 17 years old. And I’m sitting there going, “Hang on a minute, I’m being lectured about impartiality from a man who until,” checks notes, “12 months ago, was literally Head of Comms in Downing Street.”
Rusbridger
So you can read this article online, and even better, take out a digital subscription to Prospect, and enjoy a one-month free trial to our digital content. You’ll immediately get full access to rigorously fact-checked, truly independent analysis and perspectives, and the sort of reporting that you’ll see in this Robbie Gibb piece. There’s no commitment, you can cancel at any time. To take advantage of this offer, visit our website, or go to your favourite search engine, and search for, quotes, “Prospect Magazine subscription”, quotes.
Barber
Let’s discuss this with two people who’ve held major roles in news and public service broadcasting, who understand the political pressures involved.
Rusbridger
So now we’re very pleased to be joined by Roger Mosey, who’s a former Head of BBC TV News, Controller of Radio 5 Live, Editor of the Today programme, and Director of BBC Sports. So, all the big jobs at the BBC. And Dorothy Byrne, the former Head of News and Current Affairs at Channel 4 Television. And they’re both appearing with us from their seats in Cambridge colleges, which they head. And welcome to both of you. It’s great to have you on. I suppose my opening question, you must have seen the Culture Minister Lucy Frazer touring the studios, talking about BBC bias. Do you think the BBC has a problem with impartiality? Dorothy, why don’t you go first?
Dorothy Byrne
I think that the BBC is remarkable in how it, overall, achieves due impartiality. Obviously, it makes mistakes sometimes, but I don’t see any major problem. What I do see at the moment, and hear, is that its news has become bland, or even blander, I’ve always thought it was a bit bland. And a number of broadcast journalists at the BBC have told me that many BBC journalists live in fear, and they’re always looking back over their shoulder to see if representatives of the government are watching them and about to pounce.
Rusbridger
Ah, well, we’ll come on to that. Roger, your perception, is the BBC biassed?
Roger Mosey
I think the BBC is very good on political impartiality. I think it’s been good on the big international conflicts. I don’t buy the argument it’s institutionally biassed to either Palestinians or Israelis. And I think on many of the big issues, it’s pretty good. I think what I’d tie in with Dorothy a bit is that I think it can be a bit lacking in imagination in its commissioning. And there is a slight liberal default, especially on domestic, political, and social stories, which I think is a bit problematic. I want to hear the widest possible range of voices about the way we live in Britain today, and I think the BBC can be a bit narrow in its approach, and a bit narrow in its choice of stories. But is it a tool of the government? I don’t think so. And I think on politics it does a decent job at steering through some very choppy waters.
Barber
Can we turn to the question of independence? The government now appoints five of the 13-strong BBC board, but the BBC, as we all know, is supposed to be independent of government. So is this a problem, the number of government appointees? And how do you think a public service broadcaster should be and could be genuinely independent? Dorothy?
Byrne
I think five appointed by the government, it’s probably too many. I think that the idea that the government should be represented, as we voted for it, I don’t have a problem with it. But I think that that sort of system has always depended on the government appointing reasonable people who journalists, within the BBC, and the public trust to not be too politically partial, and to represent the interests of people. They can be members of a political party, but they should be perceived to be people who can look at things from a broad perspective, and not just from their own narrow point of view.
Mosey
Yeah, I think it’s a bad idea in principle that someone who’s been the Downing Street spin doctor is a member of the BBC board. And I agree, again, with Dorothy, that it’s perfectly okay for the government of the day to have some appointees on the BBC board who can reflect the popular mandates of the United Kingdom. I think that’s perfectly okay. Of all the people available, someone who was the Downing Street spokesman is not the perfect choice, to put it mildly. And I think it’s always tricky, because it’s not wrong to have people who challenge the consensus, and you can’t let the BBC appoint all its own directors, because that wouldn’t be democratically appropriate either. But you need people who are absolutely guaranteed to be independent. And even if Robbie Gibb is the most independent person in the whole world in his thinking, his past job is a problem, because you get the kind of controversies we’re seeing now.
Rusbridger
Moving on to the makeup of the governance, you’ve got a BBC board which is increasingly full of people with no experience of news journalism or broadcasting. You’ve got this critical committee, the Editorial Guidance and Standards Committee, which has just been given new powers by the government, which has got four core members, only one of them with experience of journalism. You’ve got a director-general who hasn’t come up through a journalistic route. Until recently, you had a chairman who wasn’t a journalist. That has given Robbie Gibb tremendous power, because he’s the only one, the only non-exec, with editorial experience. Is this new way of governing the BBC fit for purpose? Perhaps I’ll turn to you, Roger, first, because your memory of the BBC governance goes back some way.
Mosey
First of all, I don’t think Robbie Gibb is Machiavelli. I don’t think he is running the BBC. I think he’s part of running the BBC, but he’s not the decisive voice, and I don’t hear people cowering in terror from the potential approach of Robbie Gibb. What I do think is very interesting is the appointment of Samir Shah, because in Samir Shah you have a chair who knows about journalism and knows about broadcasting. And we’ve previously had chairs in the BBC who knew nothing about broadcasting. And one of my former senior colleagues described working with one acting chair as being a bit like that scene in Aeroplane!, where you’re trying to get the passenger to land the jumbo jet. And it has been a very difficult relationship at times. But now you’ve got a chair who knows more about journalism and programmes than the director-general, who’s editor-in-chief, does, and more than most of the board. And I think that’s going to be a very interesting dynamic. And I’m personally rather in favour of Samir’s appointment, but it ain’t half going to shake things up a bit. It’s not what they’re used to.
Byrne
I agree that the appointment of Samir Shah is a very good thing, firstly because he is a journalist, and they need more journalists. That is a very good point. But also, I’ve worked a lot with Samir Shah, I’ve commissioned him to make programmes for me at Channel 4 over many years, and I think he is a very broad-minded person, open to views other than his own. So, I think he is a good thing. But in general, it’s a very weak system, where you have so few journalists, and it effectively gave more power to Robbie Gibb, because he could say, “I’m the journalist, I know about these things.” But now he’s got Samir Shah. But it’s a lot on Samir Shah’s shoulders, to be holding up the independence and due impartiality of the BBC all on his own. And I think as new members come up for renewal, we need to get other strong people in to support him in supporting BBC independence.
Barber
So, let’s talk about the other elephant, I better not say in the room, it’s “this elephant is in the studio”. It’s Ofcom, the very powerful regulator of telecommunications, broadcasting, and the government says that it wants to give more power to Ofcom, which is supposedly independent. On the other hand, we now know that Boris Johnson, as Prime Minister, tried to put Paul Dacre, the long, long time editor of the Daily Mail, he had 26 years at the Mail, a very partisan figure, big newsman, yes, in charge of Ofcom. And also, shadowy Downing Street fixers, along with Robbie Gibb, tried to put their own man in charge Ofcom. All the time, Ofcom gives GB News a more or less free pass. So question is, is Ofcom fit for the job? Roger?
Mosey
I always thought it was a very weird thing, among the many weird things that Boris Johnson did, to think about putting Paul Dacre into Ofcom. And I think Paul Dacre is a great editor of the Daily Mail, but Ofcom is more of an economic regulator. And we’ve seen, this week, it’s talking about the number of postal deliveries we might get. And a lot of what Ofcom does is really theoretical and economic. And sure, it’s got an ultimate role and arbitration on impartiality, but it really wasn’t a job that I could imagine Paul Dacre could doing, and I think it’s rather a misconception by Downing Street about what Ofcom does. And there’s a long gap between Ofcom’s regulation and processes, and what happens on the journalistic frontline. Paul Dacre would not have been editing the BBC and ITV, so I think that was a particular peculiar diversion they went into. Though you could see that their intention was to say to broadcasters and to other people, “You’ve got to get your act together in a way that we find politically acceptable.” So it was a bad idea on multiple grounds.
Barber
Wasn’t this just a very crude calculation by Johnson? That he didn’t care about the economic regulation or thinking at Ofcom, he didn’t much know about Ofcom. What he wanted was a top class BBC basher, somebody to get the BBC in line: Paul Dacre, because his record goes back years.
Mosey
That is almost certainly true. I think that is right. I don’t think it would’ve been an effective way of doing things. And the whole argument I completely get, and feel very strongly about the fact, there is a political attack on the BBC, which is unworthy and ridiculous, given the importance of the BBC to public life. And it has a range of political attacks. It has Lucy Frazer this week banging on impartiality, which she did without evidence and without any real sense that there is a great problem in the BBC. So the political attack on the BBC is real. The thing is that the levers somehow don’t quite connect for the government, and they haven’t managed to destroy the BBC, if that was their intention. And of course the public appointments process did work with Paul Dacre, as I understand it, in that he was just-
Barber
Just about.
Mosey
... not suitable to be the chair of Ofcom. So at that point, the system did work in favour of plurality and common sense.
Barber
Dorothy, a word on Ofcom, is it up to the job?
Byrne
You could view it, and I do, as part of their grand plan that went wrong. They would privatise Channel 4; that didn’t work. They’d put people like Robbie Gibb onto the BBC to take it over. They’d put their man into Ofcom. And then alongside all this, along comes GB News, potentially our new Fox News. And what we have seen there is that Ofcom has been absolutely pusillanimous about dealing with GB News when it has failed to be duly impartial, as is required. So those four things, you have to see them all as one.
However, they are not succeeding, because they’re so useless at everything, frankly, aren’t they? Some of this is like the Rwanda policy of broadcasting. They didn’t get to privatise Channel 4. They put up Nadine Dorries to argue for it, and she proved so ridiculous and ignorant, that even Tory’s voted against the idea, because it turned out she had to admit she didn’t even understand how Channel 4 was financed, but said that its financial model didn’t work. They didn’t get away with putting Paul Dacre in. Now, Samir Shah is going in with Robbie Gibb. So the next thing that we’ve got to do is all be insisting that Ofcom takes firm action about GB News, because we do not want a Fox News style broadcaster here, undermining our democracy.
Barber
This is Media Confidential, and coming up, more from our discussion about whether the BBC’s independence has been compromised by a powerful clique associated with the current Conservative government.
Barber
This is Media Confidential, with Alan Rusbridger and Lionel Barber. We’re discussing whether the government has captured the BBC, undermining the independence and regulation of public service broadcasting. Our guests are Roger Mosey, former Head of BBC TV News, controller of 5 Live, and Editor of the Today programme, and Dorothy Byrne, former Head of News and Current Affairs at Channel 4.
Rusbridger
Can I turn to the position of director-general? And I’d be really interested in both your opinions on this. So it’s a very, very large job. Lionel was a great editor of the FT, but he wasn’t also CEO, he wasn’t running the business side. And you’ve got, in Tim Davie, a very talented person whose background was in marketing, he’s now editor-in-chief of the BBC, as well as the CEO. I’m wondering, perhaps we could start with you, Dorothy, whether you think these two jobs can be done by one person effectively, or whether they should be divided?
Byrne
He’s not really, really editor-in-chief, is he? I believe the Chief Executive of Channel 4 is also editor-in-chief. How can you have an editor-in-chief who’s never been a journalist? It’s just a ridiculous idea.
Rusbridger
So, who is editor-in-chief then of the BBC, in your view? Or is that position vacant?
Barber
We might have to apply, Alan.
Byrne
I think we have to be honest, he cannot be an effective editor-in-chief if he has never been a journalist, and just face that fact. Do you then want to have a separate person, separate to the director-general, who is editor-in-chief, overseeing the Head of News and Current Affairs? I would fear what would that person do all day, other than interfere with the Head of News and Current Affairs? Which is an even worse idea.
Mosey
I disagree. I worked with Tim Davie in the pretty rocky area of the autumn of 2012, when we were dealing with the departure of George Entwistle as DG, and also the aftermath of the Savile affair. And Tim was acting DG and I, at the time, was acting director of television. I found Tim wise and sane, and I thought he discharged the responsibilities of editor-in-chief very well. And sure, he’s not a journalist, but he is a clever and sentient human being, who can make judgements on the big editorial calls. So, I don’t really have any doubts about Tim’s ability there.
I think there’s a slightly different argument, which is probably one of the worst things that Mark Thompson did, was get rid of Mark Byford as deputy director-general. And Mark was not always an uncontroversial figure, and people did feel, as Dorothy said, that having a deputy director-general there interfering at times was not always the right thing. But Mark was very good at reviewing, Mark Byford, very good at reviewing the waterfront of journalism, keeping track on the stories that were going to be troublesome, enabling the investigations to take place. And removing that role for rather cosmetic, cost-saving reasons, I think caused the BBC quite a lot of problems throughout the interim, and then in the Tony Hall era, where there wasn’t as much grip on the editorial as there should have been.
Barber
I’d second that, Roger. Dealing with Mark Byford, he’d have a drink, and very watch one. He was the sort of eyes and ears around the organisation. I’d like to zoom out a bit, and the general lessons from Gibbgate and this whole saga, if you think. And rereading Alan’s piece, you’ve got a whole cast of characters, Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson, this shadowy figure of Dougie Smith in Downing Street, and of course, Sir Robbie himself. What should we learn? Dorothy, you certainly alluded to the grand strategy, such as if you could call it that, the grand plan of the Conservatives towards the end of this period. But what are the lessons about public appointments, and what advice might you give to a future Labour government?
Byrne
What we’ve seen is the fragility of a system that relied on good behaviour by government, and it’s been quite frightening to witness. I don’t know how those appointments could be made better, but I think it is probably a good idea, when Labour comes in, to review how those appointments are made. We shouldn’t forget that people of this ilk have been appointed to a number of other public bodies as well. They’ve been seeded throughout our public bodies. And I think we need to have a bit of a review of them all. I know you’re just looking at broadcasting, but I am aware that there are a number of others. And the balance has gone wrong, and I do think we need to review how it’s done, so that these organisations cannot be captured again in the future.
Mosey
That’s right, and the transparency and openness of public appointments is absolutely crucial. And I know that when the previous round of appointments was done for the chairman, and when Richard Sharp got the job, that quite a number of candidates talked to me about, “What do you think I should be saying?” And they knew and I knew that actually you just read in the paper that Richard Sharp was going to get the job. So, it’s incredibly demoralising, and you deter good candidates coming forward.
I think also with the BBC, a wider and broader recruitment of a director-general is very important too, because the last four director-generals, there hasn’t been an outsider brought in, really, since Greg Dyke. And they’ve all been people who are BBC lifers, and even Tim Davie had quite decent experience as director of marketing, head of radio. So it’s all been rather close shop and internal. There still has not been a woman director-general of the BBC. There has not been a person of colour who’s been director-general of the BBC. And the idea that the people who’ve done it in the past are the meritocratic choice, I think, is just wrong. There is a broader world out there, and the BBC should be recruiting from it.
Rusbridger
My final question is, in writing this piece, I must’ve spoken to two dozen people. Some of them would be very well known to the general viewing, listening public. Some of them would be back room figures, but probably known to you. And they’re all figures who love the BBC, who have given their lives to the BBC, and they’re really worried by what’s going on at the moment, what’s been happening. How worried are you both?
Mosey
I’m not too worried, because I think one of the glorious things about the BBC is that people cheerily disregard what the chairman and the DG say, and there’s enough spark in programme teams. I’m a bit worried, in a way, that there isn’t as much spark in programme teams as there used to be, because one of the things they’ve done is erode the authority of editors. And I think the editors and commissioners need to be bolder and more imaginative. But what I pick up from people is not a terrible fear of individuals in the BBC in the sense of the journalism being curtailed, because we got used to it, over the decades, of not really paying that much attention to the board. And I think you’ve got to hope that that independence and spirit will assert itself in the BBC, and I’m pretty confident it will.
Rusbridger
Dorothy?
Byrne
I think what has happened is very worrying. As I say, I’m very pleased by the appointment of Samir Shah, but I think what went on was wrong, and it showed the fragility of the system. I honestly think that the BBC needs a much wider range of voices, but it also needs to be more daring. And a key reason for having a director-general who’s not a BBC person is I have never come across such a self-congratulatory organisation. In COVID, we all clapped NHS workers; I feel with the BBC, they’re all clapping themselves every day. Even sometimes when you listen to them on the radio, they’re so cosy and self-congratulatory. And they need to know you are duly impartial, actually, on the whole. You’re a fine body of men and women, but you’re not nearly as great as you think you are. And a lot of the very best journalism in this country is not in the BBC, although you think it is.
Mosey
That, I think, is also true.
Rusbridger
I’m just going to push you on the final thing, Roger, because it’s great that you have got a more sanguine take on all this. I suppose what’s changed at the moment is that certainly when you were at the BBC, your sources of income were fairly assured. And yet what we’re now seeing is really severe cuts, about 30% in the last 10 years. And so the BBC is shrinking. They thought they were going to get a big licence fee settlement, it didn’t happen. And there’s a sense of people who don’t wish well of the BBC poised with axes, and a sense that if the BBC doesn’t toe the line, they’re going to jeopardise their own funding. That is true, isn’t it?
Mosey
Yeah.
Rusbridger
That is different.
Mosey
I should say I’m not sanguine. I think there has been a serious attempt to subvert the BBC. Like Dorothy, I don’t think it has succeeded at this stage. The one thing that I’m allowed to do here in Cambridge, the one supervision I was allowed to do as a non-academic, was a paper about the history of the BBC, or an essay about the history of the BBC. And the one thing that I’d learned from that, and it gave me a perspective on the BBC, is that for the whole century or more that it’s existed, there have always been great threats to the BBC: the arrival of competition, the Pilkington review, Thatcher in government, Hutton and the Blair government. And all these times, there are these existential threats to the BBC, which the BBC survives, and somehow it usually comes out a little bit bigger, and a little bit stronger.
Now, at some point, that is going to change, and we may have reached the tipping point now. And the BBC could, if circumstances go badly, end up in a serious or maybe even terminal decline. I don’t underestimate that. I suppose at the moment, I think there is everything to fight for. And I think it’s also really important that the BBC, as Dorothy says, is bold and confident in what it does, massive in its range of voices, and that is going to be the best defence against politicians of all parties trying to interfere with it.
Barber
The problem, Roger, is that something new has happened in the last 10 years. It’s not just the concerted plan to subvert the BBC, which Alan documents in his article and which Dorothy has articulated, it’s also the way the economics have completely changed, and the alternative sources of viewing that you have through Netflix, video on demand, et cetera, which means that the BBC is facing a really serious, competitive challenge, which is nothing like it did in the ’80s, ’90s, or even ’00s. I don’t want to be a doomster. I think that the BBC needs to be a lot more robust, and it needs to find ways of standing up to the government, to these ridiculous claims made by Lucy Frazer. Not necessarily in public, but clearly in private.
Mosey
But Lionel, and Alan and Dorothy, you are all very distinguished editors or commissioners. If I gave you 3.8 billion pounds of public money in 2024, you could probably do something pretty good with it. And the BBC is still getting 3.8 billion pounds of public money. Compare that with a Channel 4 budget, or I don’t know what the FT or Guardian budgets were, but that’s not bad. They should be confident that they have that, and I don’t think that is going to vastly materially change, and they have a reasonable prospect of a Labour government, which is probably going to support it. So, the BBC shouldn’t be on its knees. It should be fighting and standing up firm. I do agree with that.
Rusbridger
Dorothy and Roger, it’s been great having you on the show. And watch this space, I think this will be a developing story. But it’s great to have such wise minds. Thank you for coming on today.
Barber
Alan, I’m going to ask you as an editor to put a headline on the discussion. What is it, the plot that failed?
Rusbridger
Yeah, I think Roger at the end said there clearly has been an attempt to subvert the BBC, so that would be the headline. But both of them, in different ways, wondered how successful it’s been. Roger, I think, was a bit too sanguine, of saying, “Well, the BBC’s been there for a hundred years, it’ll be there in a hundred years time. It’s seen off worse than this.” I think he underestimates the fear that I picked up from within the BBC. And some of these were old colleagues of Roger, who say what’s changed is now a determination to cut the BBC down to size, and cut its power, cut its independence. And they’ve got all those levers, and there is certainly a perception amongst Roger’s old colleagues that those levers are being pulled quite effectively. If you don’t toe the line, you’re not going to get the money.
Barber
For me, the big takeaway was really Dorothy’s crisp analysis, where she essentially says there’s been a three or four pronged strategy by successive Conservative governments or prime ministers, their administrations, to, one, subvert the BBC; two, squeeze the BBC on money; three, privatise Channel 4; and four, encourage GB News as the Fox News outlet. And I think that when you put it all together, it really makes a strong case for Dougie Smith being summoned before a parliamentary committee to answer some questions, perhaps.
Rusbridger
If they can find him. I have no idea where he lives or where he works. I think that the more you talk to Dorothy and Roger, the current governance of the BBC, which is something invented in the Cameron era, is a nonsense. The government talks about giving this crucial committee more power, but who’s on this committee? It’s chaired by Nick Serota, it has Robbie Gibb, and then the other two are Davie and Deborah Turness, both of whom, if you want to complain about the BBC’s journalism, they’re responsible for the BBC’s journalism. So, that really is marking your own homework. So therefore, you’ve got two people, one of them a government appointee, who are the ultimate arbiter. None of it makes sense.
Barber
They do have co-opted members to the committee, some outsiders. So, there’s some scope for bolstering the journalistic-
Rusbridger
How are they appointed? So-
Barber
Do my best.
Rusbridger
... one is an old colleague of yours, and the other is a guy called Michael Prescott, who, a long time ago, worked on The Sunday Times, but-
Barber
Political correspondent.
Rusbridger
... spent the last 13 years in PR.
Barber
That would be, my old colleague, being Caroline Daniel, who was op-ed editor, Weekend editor, and is now working as a senior executive at Brunswick.
Rusbridger
But you get my point, that the four... As a way of tackling these enormous issues to do with standards and impartiality, it doesn’t feel, to me, a very robust way of doing things.
Barber
No, and I think that you, again, in this piece, just expose how ridiculous it is that Robbie Gibb, who was a spin master... Okay, he was ex-BBC, but he’s clearly was in a very senior partisan role as Theresa May’s chief spokesman and spin doctor.
Rusbridger
He admits it when he went to talk to the Taxpayers’ Alliance, he said, “Look, I’m a Tory. I’m not a wet, Chris Patten style Tory, I’m a proper Thatcherite Tory.” And so he doesn’t pretend he is a impartial figure, but what he says about himself is, “I can leave my politics at the door.” But as we see when he tried to stop Jess Brammar, the editor of the Huffington Post, from getting a key job because it would shatter government trust in the BBC, absolutely explicit that this is not going to suit the government, he won’t give anybody else the benefit of the doubt that they can leave their politics at the door. So all this thing, the whole system, is very dependent on the personalities and their ideologies.
Barber
Yeah. Big picture though, I think that this saga that you have uncovered, I better not use the word scandal, but certainly there are numerous questions raised about the role of these individuals in a very senior and important public role, which is the chair of Ofcom, very powerful media regulator, which, as you say, we agree, the government wants to give it more power. This raises questions about the public appointments process as a whole, and I think that’s what a future government, whether it’s Labour, should be looking at. What are the different committees, and how does this work?
Rusbridger
I think that is the scandal at the heart of this. Lionel, probably you and I imagine a day when the person in charge of public appointments of this nature would be a rather grey suited figure, who would go around and take soundings from all the top head hunters, and their job would be to get the best possible person into the job. Instead of this person who, he's literally unac’ountable, Smith, thinking, “Who’s the best Tory we can get into this job? Who’s the person who’s going to do our bidding?” And that is a form of, I’m going to say it, corruption of public life. Now, I’m not saying it’s a corruption by Smith, but it’s a corruption of public life.
Barber
It’s no longer the good chap theory of government. It works very differently. I think that, dare I say it, Brexit, in the way it polarised people in this country, it ruled out a whole class of well-qualified people who, if they were the wrong side of that debate, were not considered as suitable candidates for these roles in public office. So, it’s a lot of big questions raised, Alan. I think I’ll tip my hat to you in your new role as investigative reporter.
Rusbridger
Well, that means a lot, Lionel. Now, if you enjoy Media Confidential, give the Prospect Podcast a listen to. In this week’s episode, contributing editor Tom Clark talks to a very special guest, Daron Acemoglu. Daron was voted Prospect Magazine’s Top Thinker of 2024 by its readers, and endorsed by the editorial team. He’s an economist, a bestselling author, and an all-round renaissance man. In his conversation with Tom, he talks about his latest book, Power in Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity.
Acemoglu
What I have been trying to do is really push the framework of how we should think about AI within this light, and also take a proactive view; how we can shape the future of work in a better way, how we can redirect AI efforts towards things that will be beneficial for workers, for citizens, for democracy. So that’s the agenda.
Rusbridger
That’s Daron Acemoglu, Prospect Magazine’s Top Thinker of 2024. And you can listen to Daron’s manifesto for the coming year in this week’s Prospect Podcast, which is available wherever you get your podcasts.
If you’ve got any further questions for us about the media, email them to mediaconfidential, all one word, @ProspectMagazine, all one word, .co.uk, and we’ll answer a few of them in a future episode.
Barber
Thank you for listening to Media Confidential, brought to you by Prospect Magazine and Fresh Air. The producer is Danny Garlic.
Rusbridger
Remember to listen and follow us wherever you get your podcasts.
Barber
And we’re on Twitter/X too, @MediaConfPod.
Rusbridger
Join us next Thursday for more insight and analysis on the media industry. See you there.
