06.04.1995

BBC faces both ways

The rather complicated relationship between the BBC and the government has been highlighted in recent weeks. The latest example of this was in the form of a Panorama interview on April 3 with John Major, banned by judges from being shown in Scotland because it might have given an unfair advantage to the Conservative Party in the Scottish local elections.

The BBC had previously come under fire from the governing party, notably from the unfortunate chief secretary of the treasury, Jonathan Aitken, who accused BBC presenter John Humphreys of bias.

A year ago, a Panorama programme dealing with Tory gerrymandering on Westminster Council was withdrawn before the local elections in case it affected the result.

The case is a pointer to the BBC’s ambivalent nature. On the one hand the corporation stresses its own impartiality. On the other hand it is Britain’s state broadcasting service, with all the government and establishment control and influence that this implies.

This does not mean that a BBC interviewer cannot tear a government minister to pieces in the studio, but it does mean that the corporation has reason to fear government retaliation, and so might be under pressure to give Conservatives like Major extra chances to present their case. It is a sort of perpetual balancing act.

Where, however, there is a broad chauvinistic consensus - such as in support of the British war of oppression in Ireland - all pretence of impartiality is dropped in favour of blatant propaganda against the ‘terrorists’ and for ‘our’ army.

Some parts of the BBC are meshed directly into the fabric of government and carry out its policy. The World Service receives a large ‘grant in aid’ from the Foreign Office. World Service bias is carefully disguised in normal times - a fact which nurtures its influence - but during conflicts like the Falklands and Gulf Wars its real face is open for all to see.

BBC Monitoring, a branch of the World Service, shares premises with the Foreign Broadcast Information Service, a US government agency.

Recently the BBC’s Hungarian language service received a ceremonial sword from the Hungarian authorities. The sword was given in recognition of the services the BBC performed when that country was under the ‘communist regime’.

The BBC’s ‘impartiality’ was in fact tailor-made for the foreign policy objectives of Britain and the USA.

Andrew MacKay