Public Service Broadcasters, Under Attack: It’s OUR BBC!!!!!

Let me start by saying that the daft mistake of splicing Donald Trump’s January 20 speech, in which he encouraged the overturning of a fair and free election, has now been acknowledged by the BBC, and an unreserved apology has been made to the world’s most famous narcissist and “pussy grabber”. Trump is the man who called January 20 rioters heroes, pardoned them on mass, and released them early into his second term. Trump has not acknowledged his defeat in a free and fair presidential election to Joe Biden and let us not forget his BS assertion that Haitians were eating neighbourhood pets, originally touted by J D Vile and later aped by Farage, except it was about swans. I accept that the BBC had to apologise to Trump for a minor editorial error on Panorama, but it sticks in my throat.

The BBC is a unique public service broadcaster which provides news, entertainment, and education through a variety of channels, including television, radio and online. I am a fan of BBC Sounds, which offers some of the most engaging and informative podcasts available. From Start of the Week, Radical, In Our Time, Beyond Belief, Thinking Aloud, The Rest is History, Real Dictators and side-splitting comedies such as the News Quiz, and I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue. On television, let us not forget the BBC’s adaptation of Hilary Mantel’s “Wolf Hall “, Tolstoy’s War and Peace, Happy Valley, and many other extraordinary dramas. It produced comedies such as Blackadder, The Young Ones and the duo of Rodney and Derek and Have I Got News for You. BBC 4 is an extraordinary channel that produced the Age of Uncertainty, Storyville, Spy Master and finally, Children in Need, which has raised over £1.0 billion. The BBC has largely succeeded in being impartial in respect of its News output. However, at times it has been “stupidly impartial,” particularly during the Brexit debates and most recently, unable to call out Israeli actions in Gaza as genocide. It also went into an unnecessary frenzy after Bob Vylan’s “Death, Death to the IDF.” The IDF is an army, not an ethnic minority; it is a wing of the far-right messianic Netanyahu government. The IDF has committed war crimes as charged by the International Criminal Court on a scale not seen since the Second World War. These include starvation and deliberately targeting civilians, which has resulted in the killing of 65,000 people, including 20,000 children, and the targeting of infrastructure from schools to water treatment and energy plants, leaving Gaza a complete wasteland. We are grateful and humbled by BBC journalists who put themselves at risk to keep us informed, such as Lyse Doucet, Orla Guerin, James Waterhouse, Steve Rosenberg and not to forget Jeremy Bowen.

The attack by the right-wing parties and the right-wing media on the BBC is simply a Trojan Horse to decapitate the BBC as this country’s most important asset, and to be fair, respected globally in the form of the BBC World Service. In an era of “GB Spews” inhabited by the likes of Mogg, Anderson, Farage, and Goodwin. The channel is owned by Sir Paul Marshall, a protector of neoliberalism, who also owns The Spectator and Unherd. It would also be fair to say they all reside in the further right of centre zone. In an article for Prospect, Gavin Esler reports that Michael Crick said that “GB News is a political propaganda exercise, not a journalistic exercise.”

The Telegraph, which broke this minor editorial indiscretion, was about to be bought by Redbird Capital, backed by a “Sheikh” from the “democratic” republic of oil-rich UAE, who also owns Manchester City and the billionaire owner of the Daily Mail, Blavatnik. This acquisition, if successful, would have consolidated the right-wing pro neo liberal and anti-BBC press. In addition, it would have allowed the Sheikh, through the Tory Party, to undermine our transition to net zero.

Robbie Gibb, a name that is a cross between Take That and the Bee Gees, was appointed by Boris to the BBC board after being knighted for services to the Conservative Party. He appointed Michael Prescott, his buddy, as an advisor to the BBC’s new Editorial Guidance and Standards Committee. Prescott, without any real justification in the letter that was leaked, said that the entire coverage of the US 2024 election was heavily biased against Trump.

It seems that he also resides on planet Fox. This comment and the minor indiscretion around Panorama’s Oct 2024 programmes have been blown out of all proportion compared to the output of BBC News globally. Please also stop the flagellation when Martine Croxall rolled her eyes when she had to say “pregnant person” at that point, I also shouted FFS.

 So, it is even more important that” we the people” have an independent public service broadcaster free from political influence and that is publicly funded. To whinging Gen Zers and millennials, and others who complain about paying the £175.00 licence fee, this is a vital counterbalance to your obsession with social media, bots, and targeted feeds that provide a mixture of information, misinformation, and disinformation through algorithms created by freely given information about you, by you. Payment of the licence fee should not be a choice, as it seems to be today, but an obligation if we as a country do not want to turn into the sort of state-controlled media ecosystem run by oligarchs like in Orban’s Hungary or the misinformation media ecosystem that exists in the US,  such as Fox News and News Max, also controlled by oligarchs who kiss the Trump’s “ring”.

The BBC must not capitulate to Trump’s threats and must not give him one red cent in compensation for damaging a reputation that is only fit for the gutter. A president with only one goal, that is to ingratiate himself and his dysfunctional family. If it does end up in court, it will be an opportunity for our public service broadcaster to show its integrity, and Trump’s MAGA maniacs will see even clearer who they voted for. If the BBC are forced to go to court, I will set up a GoFundMe page in which I will encourage each UK citizen to donate a £ to support the legal costs. The reality is that the UK has no economic or military hard power, and on top of that, the UK, between Sunak and Starmer, has cut the international aid budget by £12 billion, so the BBC not just underpins our democracy but is an important element of the UK’s global soft power.

Finally, the BBC is a huge organisation navigating an unpredictable and rapidly changing multipolar world, and unlike the Pope, it is not infallible; we, the licensees, have the right to criticise our public service broadcaster, so put in place a structure where the BBC can get real feedback from the public. Still, we also have an obligation to protect it from oligarch vultures who want to control the information landscape and spoon-feed you, their prejudices. Now is the time for the Beeb to reflect on its mishaps and past scandals and appoint a Director General with a journalistic background who clearly understands the new and changing media and information ecosystem and believes in a bright future for the world’s most important public service broadcaster.

Finally, Thomas Hobbes said, “Knowledge is Power,”. This is acquired through active engagement, such as reading, asking questions, observation, as well as hands-on experience, formal education, and enjoying the acquisition of knowledge. It also involves discussing with others, reflecting, and ultimately having an independent and non-partisan public service broadcaster accountable to the public.

A bit of advice to the BBC: “FIGHT LIKE HELL,” I wonder who said that?

Suneil Sharma

22nd November 2025

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