(TV) BBC: Why Are The Tories Trying To Strangle The BBC?

While it’s no surprise that the Conservative party aren’t fans of the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) and are trying make cuts to the BBC wherever they can get them, it’s quite a surprise to see how brazen the Conservatives are in doing it.

Appointing an outspoken critic of the organization in John Whittingdale MP as the culture secretary two months ago sent a clear message that the conservative government are planning to gut the BBC and take no prisoners while they do it.

The BBC is arguably the most popular public institution in the UK save the NHS and the conservatives are already experiencing backlash as British starssuch Daniel Craig, Dame Judi Dench and Rachael Weisz sent a letter to Downing Street imploring the government not to attack and weaken the BBC.

Their pleas however are likely to fall on deaf ears as the BBC may a long term casualty of a Conservative Party emboldened by a stunning election victory and solid majority in the House of Commons which puts them in a position to take on and win public battles to cut popular institutions such as the BBC.

The conservatives have made no secret of their plan to gut the BBC and even privatize parts of the organization as they see the BBC as wasteful and inefficient. However, in their luster to cannibalize the BBC, they end up making arguments as to why the BBC should be left well alone. Whittingdale made the argument with a straight face that the BBC has no business making popular programs such as Strictly Come Dancing and The Voice when its competitors in the private sector could produce them which, needless to say, doesn’t make sense.

It’s no fault of the BBC that it makes shows the public love and if it couldn’t make shows the public loved, why would there be a need for it? While there is a solid argument that the BBC has exceeded its public service remit, if Whittingdale’s argument gets taken seriously the BBC will be reduced to a British version of PBS which would make the BBC culturally irrelevant and would rightly justify calls from Conservatvies to liquidate the beeb altogether.  

However, this argument will likely be the one repeated again and again on Newsnight’s,  Question Time’s, parliamentary committee hearings and every right wing newspaper or blog you can shake a stick at for months to come until the BBC’s Royal Charter is up.  Executives at the BBC see the writing on the wall and have already agreed to take on extensive costs at the hands of the Conservatives as according to the Guardian “BBC agreed to pay for free license fees for the over-75s from 2020 at a cost of £700m a year.”[1]  While the BBC has the public (who pay for BBC), the Labour opposition and just about every creative industry you can think of in its corner, there will be little in the way of organization’s powerful enemies taking it apart piece by piece as there will be nothing democratic about how one of Britain’s most loved institutions will be brought to its knees by a government dead set on weakening the BBC until it breaks.

The real question would be to ask why the conservatives are trying gut and raid the BBC despite it being one of the few public institutions that meets its stated ambitions and the answer is simple, the Conservatives are targeting the BBC because it is one of the few public institutions that meet its stated ambitions. The BBC has served as a public reminder that public institutions can be as good and, in some cases, better than their private sector counterparts and the Conservatives hate the BBC bitterly because of it. They’ve hated the BBC for the lion share of its 93 year insistence and will continue to hate it until they turn the BBC into a slightly better version of C-Span.

Because of this, the BBC is in serious danger and there’s not much anyone can do as the BBC’s leadership are fully aware of why the Conservatives are after them and are fighting as hard as they can to keep the BBC as it is. The BBC has the winning argument and the public at large on their side as Lord Hall, Director General of BBC, rightly couched the debate about should decide the fate of the BBC: politicians with their agendas or the public who keep the BBC alive and who the BBC was created for in the first place.

In sum, the BBC can only hope that the latter gets involved in the fight for the future of the BBC before the former get their way.

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[1] J. Martinson, 2015, BBC Fights back against Tory assault on waste and right to make popular shows, http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/jul/13/bbc-fights-back-against-tory-assault-on-waste-and-right-to-make-popular-shows

Margaret Thatcher death: Why Margaret Thatcher was one the most hated yet amongst the most admired prime ministers in British history

There is much that could be said about Margaret thatcher from her personality to her policies when she was in power, but what cannot be denied about the former prime minister is that she has left an indelible mark on British politics that has yet to cede its influence. Thatcher was Britain’s first female leader yet she lead with a brutal toughness rarely seen in her male predecessors as well as her successors.

It is a credible argument to suggest that in the last 100 years only two governments were truly revolutionary, the post war Atlee government that introduced a number of social reforms including the NHS and the Thatcher government that largely hacked its way through of the Atlee’s government’s achievements.

While Thatcher will always divide opinion as much in death as much she did in life, a statement all sides can appreciate about the former prime minster is that she held firm to her convictions, even in the face of serious opposition and social consternation caused by her policies.

There will always be conflict as to what is to made of her political legacy but what all sides can admire, regardless of political position or affiliation, is that she was a woman of ideas, a quality that must be appreciated in an modern age bereft of any as powerful as hers.  

Politics has always been the playground of irony, few more poignant than the fact that British society saw it one of its greatest social, economic and indeed cultural changes during the 80’s thanks to a woman who believed it didn’t exist. She believed in the individuals above all else and sought to individuals to encourage private enterprise and innovation.

However, this innovation played into the hands of financiers and speculators in the city, which would come back to burn the Iron lady and her successors ever since. It is not far stretch to suggest that many of problem that modern Britain were instigated by Thatcher namely unrestrained banks and an ingrained ambivalence towards the working class and the poor.

The real winners under Thatcher’s rule was a middle class who fell hook, line, and sinker for Thatcher’s powerful pitch that only individual achievement and aspiration will drive Britain into the future. However there were many losers under Thatcher who have been disenfranchised in her absence by successive governments who have largely gone farther than Thatcher ever did in shredding the public sector through spending cuts.

In sum, rarely does a prime mister really preside over a paradigm shift that is still in place and is largely unchallenged by both Labour and Conservatives long after they leave power and eventually pass away is exactly what makes Margaret Thatcher a revolutionary force in British politics.

As a consequence of her convictions, which many of her fellow citizens disagreed with, she never back down a political dogfight with unions or any other vested interests, even those of business friendly nature. Finally, the world has been the last real politician with real ideas and current British politicians, regardless of political affiliation should take note of her conviction, and more importantly, her willingness to enter a political dogfight because of it.