We have today sent a letter to Richard Sharp, the Chairman of the BBC, asking for a meeting to discuss the most effective means of safeguarding the future of the BBC’s role at the heart of the UK’s public broadcasting system.
We recognise that you have taken on the role of Chairman at a particularly difficult time and we welcome your robust defence of the BBC’s role. We would now ask you, on behalf of licence payers, to stand strong against any government intimidation or insistence that the BBC must yet again agree to real term cuts.
British Broadcasting Challenge
The BBC is currently engaged in negotiations with government over the level of funding from April 2022. We recognise the difficult nature of these negotiations, but the fact that they are being held, yet again, in secret and behind closed doors means that the BBC is once more in grave danger of being subjected to untoward government pressure. Over the last ten years, the BBC has faced a 30% real terms cut in its funding as a consequence of two successive rounds of negotiations with government over the licence fee in which the government insisted on those damaging cuts. This time, we are asking that the BBC insists on the government acknowledging the BBC’s achievements by guaranteeing a proper level of financial support.
