Protect BBC’s independence in case of Farage government, ex-news head urges
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/aug/20/protect-bbc-independence-in-case-of-farage-government-ex-news-head-urges
Posted by F0urLeafCl0ver
Protect BBC’s independence in case of Farage government, ex-news head urges
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/aug/20/protect-bbc-independence-in-case-of-farage-government-ex-news-head-urges
Posted by F0urLeafCl0ver
28 Comments
BBC news section should absolutely be protected and kept independent. Don’t really care about the rest of the BBC, license fee model needs to be changed anyway.
We need to start planning on right-wing populists marching into Downing St and Westminster. We can take steps to limit the amount of damage they do to our society and government but we need to pull our heads out of the sand and start taking action now.
Wasn’t protected from Boris Johnson it became the mouth of the Tories when they were in power.
The BBC loves Nigel farge and gives him more air time then anyone else for some unknown reason it always has supported him for prime minister.
Hilarious that he would even think it was independent.
I mean, isn’t it already giving more screen time to farage than any other politician?
This rather presumes it hasn’t already been captured.
Politics aside, BBC productions have been on a downhill trajectory for the past decade.
I don’t think it’s unreasonable to criticise the BBC or even suggest an end to the licence fee, with a debate in parliament and referendum to effectively make it a private organisation.
I know a lot of people who prefer streaming sites, never watch the BBC yet are still forced to pay the licence fee. This seems unfair.
Notice the statement “we need to Make sure everybody pays” that’s all the BBC are interested in. Getting g their funds from what is essentially a tax. Why should I pay if I don’t watch any service requiring a TV License – and more people are realising.
News does need to remain independent, but as with everyone else if they want independence then you can’t demand public money to fund you – you have to source it yourself!
The BBC is “independent” only at the most basic level. See [Marr interviewing Chomsky](https://youtu.be/GjENnyQupow?si=D_doiktgUUcpdiwc) and [Orwell’s essay](https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwell/essays-and-other-works/the-freedom-of-the-press/) that Chomsky references.
Maybe stop giving Farage all the attention and oversizing their stature first. They don’t deserve it.
Oh I hope to god he destroys the BBC. Who wants that disgusting paedophile ring to continue any longer?
It’s glorious to see the lefties worrying about their little paedophile ring. Vermin.
Or we could stop reporting every hateful breath the treacherous little toad hisses from his hate filled mouth and stop him ever getting power?
No news service can be neutral when it’s entire existence depends on the Government in power.
Ever since Thatcher threatened to take over the BBC during the Falklands War the BBC has always favoured the Government in power.
This has gotten worse over the last decade as the Tories ensured all the top management positions were filled with their supporters.
None of these measures would stop a Farage government, parliament is sovereign and cannot be bound by previous government.
It’s ridiculous that the Guardian included a section in the article (which is basically just written by James Harding by way of an extended quote) about allegations that the BBC are anti-Semitic due to their coverage of Gaza when the reality is that they’ve been extremely biased towards Israel over this issue to the point of complicity in the crimes being committed there.
Independent? How about learning what’s right and wrong.
So it was ok when Alastair Campbell constantly threatened the BBC for New Labour then
He already runs the BBC News. I see him all the time on BBC 2’s NewsNige.
Probably a good idea, but let’s not act like some law will really get in the way of a fascist regime.
Once they’re in power, they’ll just bully and overwhelm everyone they don’t like and do whatever they want – see the current state of law and order in Trump’s America or ,of course Nazi- Germany, where murdering people based on their ethnicity was also a crime, until it wasn’t.
Fascist dictators will never allow a truly independent media to exist in their country, anyway – it goes against the “my way or death” part of their ideology.
It might be better for them to try and prevent fascism with their media influence, rather than limpy trying to insulate themselves against it.
Hahaha BBC independence…
BBC needs to be stripped of it’s license fee monopoly and thrown into the real world, survive or die.
The BBC will never be independent, as long as they are funded by government enforced licence fees. They’re not an independent company like they pretend to be.
Because no other TV company in the UK has the authority to have fines issued against you for not paying for their services.
The BBC is the governments propaganda arm, it always has been and it always will be.
They have a history of protecting child predators within the corporation and also not reporting anything that the government wants kept under the radar. You can’t tell me that the BBC were unaware of the grooming gangs, did they report it, no they kept it quiet because their bosses in government didn’t want any racial divide created because of it. If it weren’t for people like (love him or hate him) Tommy Robinson, most people still wouldn’t know anything about it.
BBC hasn’t been independent in decades lmao
It was literally the mouthpiece of Johnson’s government and ran heavy propaganda on COVID and immigration
The convention of having a broadcaster whose remit is to inform and educate the public has been under attack by politicians for decades. When the BBC says to us it’s *our* BBC that’s exactly what they mean, it’s there to serve *us* as a nation, not deliver what politicians want us to know or see. Its international reputation for quality, honesty and independence was astounding, especially in countries that are fed nothing but propaganda and slop day in, day out – at least it was until the Tories put themselves on the board, interfered in its output and threatened its funding, until it turned from something which as a democracy we were incredibly proud of, to the thing we’ve all been told to ridicule and despise, and perceive as not worth paying for. Its reputation has been deliberately undermined through political will. People need to stand up and defend it.
Parliament can’t bind a future Parliament, so i don’t see how this is possible. The best protection is making sure Farage isn’t elected.
Regardless of who the government is, the BBC should be free of political influence to ensure we have free and balanced news. I don’t think we’re anywhere near that right now, but it’s where we should want to get to.
Anyone who thinks the BBC is entirely independent needs to read Tom Mills’s book ‘The BBC: Myth of a Public Service.’
From its very inception, the BBC has been used by the government to shape and manufacture consent for official government narratives. In the first year of the BBCs existence, Downing Street pushed the BBC to produce and promote anti union editorials and programming to undermine what was then an overwhelming public support for the unions. This helped to defeat the unions on the current issue and made the unions look selfish and greedy – a narrative that is still promoted and held to this day.
Yes, the BBCs drama and arts programming tend to be left wing. This makes sense since most creatives tend to be left or centre left, politically. But this is how they balance the idea if impartiality. Sure, we’ve given Nigel Farage the biggest possible platform for the last 15 years (despite him not being an MP during the majority of the time), and sure we feathered the nest for Boris and his ‘oven ready deal’ while treating Corbyn worse than any of our in-house BBC sex offenders, but we’ve got a black Doctor Who, and we have sympathetic pro-LGBT storylines on Call the Midwife, so of course we’re really just a bunch of far left, woke agitators that need to be dragged further to the right!
Meanwhile their news, politics and current affairs output still manufactures consent for government narratives around immigration, industrial action, trans people, Gaza, etc.
I don’t think BBC is independent at the moment . It was heavily Toryfied when conservatives were in power and it’s still is .
It would be nice to protect the independence of the BBC from the current government, and the previous government, too.
Protect them from platforming him even more than they do now?