House of Commons - FCO performance and finances 2012-13

FCO performance and finances 2012-13 - Foreign Affairs Committee Contents

6 The BBC World Service

Future funding and output

75. In April 2014, the BBC World Service will cease to be one of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office's associated public bodies, and the primary source of funding for the Service will not be FCO Grant in Aid but the BBC Licence Fee. The BBC Trust is drawing up a new Operating Licence for the World Service and will use it as the basis for assessment of the Service's performance and for considering any proposals made by the BBC Executive for changes to the Service. The Operating Licence will also set out the Service's objectives, priorities and targets, as well as the languages in which World Service programming and content will be provided. A draft Operating Licence was published for consultation in June 2013,[93] and Mr Peter Horrocks (Director of BBC Global News) told us that the World Service had contributed to deliberations before the draft had been issued and that he was "very comfortable" with the document that had been published.[94]

76. Alongside the draft Operating Licence, the BBC Trust published a position paper in June 2013, setting out its vision for the World Service and announcing that the World Service would receive £245 million in 2014-15—an increase upon the £238.5 million in total Government grant in 2013-14.[95] The Trust said in its position paper that the BBC believed that the scale of the reduction in Government grant in recent years "has made it difficult for the World Service to achieve its objectives as fully as it would wish". We strongly welcome the decision to increase the funding available to the BBC World Service in 2014-15.

77. The BBC Trust argued in its position paper that direct Government funding "can also have its drawbacks" and that whereas broadcasting required long-term investment, the interests of government would sometimes require "more immediate responses to budget challenges". The Trust pointed out that licence fee funding is based upon multi-year settlements and that the current funding arrangement would last until 2017, which provided a "level of certainty" and "a relatively stable environment in which to make decisions about existing and future services". It said that the BBC was "committed to providing sufficient investment in the World Service to support its current strategy for the remainder of the current licence fee period".[96]

78. We considered the implications of transferring funding responsibility from the FCO to the BBC licence fee in our report The Implications of Cuts to the BBC World Service, published in April 2011; and we were not convinced that the transfer would make funding for the BBC World Service any more secure. Indeed, we saw a "risk of a gradual diversion of resources from the World Service to fund other BBC activities", led for instance by pressure to spend more on light entertainment for domestic services.[97] So, while we welcome the BBC's commitment to invest in the World Service for the remainder of the licence fee period, we would take greater comfort if the BBC Trust were to have indicated the level of funding provision for the World Service beyond 2014-15. It has not done that, and so there is not the level of security that there might be. We urge the BBC to announce funding levels for the BBC World Service for the remainder of the current BBC Charter period and at least to maintain in real terms the 2014-15 funding levels.

FUTURE PARLIAMENTARY OVERSIGHT OF THE WORLD SERVICE

79. Despite the ending of the direct financial link between the FCO and the BBC World Service, the FCO will retain its close interest in the output and delivery of the BBC World Service. The new Operating Licence will set out the Service's objectives, priorities and targets, as well as the languages in which World Service programming and content will be provided. All these elements will require the agreement of the Foreign Secretary.[98]

80. We intend to continue to monitor the BBC World Service's output and the extent to which it reflects the FCO's strategic priorities. We strongly oppose the proposals currently under consideration by the BBC Trust for a wider commercialisation of the World Service as indicated in the letter sent by the Director, Global News at the BBC, Mr Peter Horrocks, to Lord Alton of Liverpool on 1 November 2013. We expect to take evidence on these matters in future, both from FCO Ministers and from the BBC; and we encourage our successors to do the same. However, we recognise that the World Service will become less of a discrete unit, sharing budgets and support services with other parts of the BBC; and there will clearly be more of a role in future for the Culture, Media and Sport Committee to monitor the administration and expenditure of the BBC World Service as part of its wider oversight of the BBC. We are confident that the work of the two committees will be complementary in this respect.

LANGUAGE SERVICES

81. The draft Operating Licence published by the BBC Trust in June 2013 listed 28 language services (including English) in which the World Service should broadcast.[99] For each one, a target audience was defined and an indication given of the scale of the service and the means of broadcast (digital, television or radio, or a mix). The BBC Trust's position paper, published alongside the draft Operating Licence in June 2013, said that

100

Mr Richard Thomas, Chief Operating Officer at BBC Global News, confirmed in oral evidence that there were no plans to close any of the language services "at the moment" and that the Foreign Secretary retained the "yes or no" on any proposals for change.[101] We note that the BBC Trust's position paper, published in June 2013, said that its funding plans would "enable the World Service to invest in a limited amount of new activity—most notably extensions to its television programmes for emerging markets".[102]

Burmese Service

82. Last year, Mr Horrocks told us that one thing "he would really like to be able to do" would be to complement the existing Burmese-language radio service for Burma with a television service, and he noted the particular relationship between Burma and the UK and "the special strength of the Burmese Service over many years".[103] The draft Operating Licence for 2014 envisages a "medium-scale" service in Burmese on radio and digital media: these two elements are already in place (as is BBC World News in English),[104] but there is no mention of a television service.

83. We raised this with Mr Horrocks, who told us that funds were now available for "a small television operation" and that a television bulletin pilot had been conducted, and that the World Service had been talking to distributors and television companies in Burma about it. There were some hindrances to progress: elements within the country were not committed to complete openness, and some BBC broadcasts had recently been censored. Nonetheless, Mr Horrocks said that he hoped that a deal for Burmese language television could be concluded in 2014.[105] We recommend that the FCO use its influence to encourage the Burmese authorities to look favourably on provision of a BBC Burmese television service.

Korean Service

84. On 28 December 2012, The Independent published an article suggesting that thought was being given to the establishment of a BBC Korean service, to broadcast into North Korea, and that the US Administration was encouraging the FCO to support the plan. The Chair of the Committee wrote to the Foreign Secretary on 10 January 2013, asking whether the FCO was in favour of the proposal, given the potential for such broadcasts to help open the country to external influence. The Foreign Secretary replied that he was "open-minded" on the matter but would need to consider what impact broadcasting would have on the UK's ability to provide cultural and education projects for North Korean people; and he would "need to assess where our resources can be best deployed to have the most impact".[106]

85. We asked Mr Horrocks for his view. He said that "if we were able to do it cost-effectively and if it were effective, we would like to do it", as the lack of information in North Korea was "probably the most severe in the world". However, he believed that there was no realistic means of getting a broadcasting signal into the country and that to attempt to do so would require significant expense, with no certain benefit.[107] The World Service fears that audience figures in North Korea would be small (citizens are officially banned from accessing foreign media, and radios are sold pre-tuned in North Korea). Mr Horrocks also told us that it was not possible to broadcast a strong FM signal "because the South Korean Government do not allow foreign broadcasters to broadcast from South Korean soil"[108]. The Foreign Secretary wrote to us as we were finalising this report, noting the World Service's position and saying that it was "hard to disagree with their conclusion".[109] We are, however, aware of suggestions that Voice of America currently broadcasts into North Korea from medium wave transmitters in Russia and South Korea, and that attempts by North Korea to jam broadcasts have become more sporadic.[110] We have received conflicting information on whether BBC World Service broadcasts would achieve good levels of penetration in North Korea and whether the BBC World Service could broadcast from within South Korea. We note, however, that the Foreign Secretary does not dispute the analysis done by the BBC World Service. The BBC World Service should nonetheless keep policy in this area under review.

GOVERNANCE OF THE BBC WORLD SERVICE

86. We have consistently expressed misgivings about the steady erosion of direct representation of the BBC World Service at the highest levels of decision-making within the BBC. We recommended in 2011 that the Director of the World Service should have a place ex officio on the new Executive Board of the BBC, and that the International Trustee of the BBC Board of Governors should be given the specific responsibility of representing the interests of the World Service.[111]

87. The Government and the BBC accepted the case for an International Trustee, and Lord Williams of Baglan took up the post on 1 December 2011. However, the Government signalled that the make-up of the Executive Board of the BBC was a matter for the BBC, and the BBC stated simply that the interests of the BBC World Service would continue to be represented on the BBC Executive Board by the Director of BBC News (currently James Harding).[112] We returned to the issue last year, concluding that we did not accept that the distinct interests of the World Service would be fully represented at the BBC's Executive Board by the Director of News, given that there would be occasions when the interests of the World Service would be in direct conflict with those of other parts of the Director of News' empire. In response, the BBC Executive said that the whole of the Executive Board was responsible to the BBC Trust for delivery of the World Service's strategy.[113]

88. In oral evidence to this inquiry, it emerged that not only was there no direct representation of the World Service on the BBC's Executive Board: Mr Horrocks no longer sits on what used to be known as the BBC Direction Group and is now the BBC Management Board, responsible for "managing pan-BBC issues delegated to it from the Executive Board" and "ensuring that the organisation meets its pan-BBC objectives".[114] Although Mr Horrocks did not accept that this was a demotion, he recognised the "symbolism of representation". He also acknowledged that the integration of the BBC World Service with the mainstream organisation would mean that it would be sharing resources which it had previously owned and run directly, and the BBC would be balancing the demands of the World Service with those of other, domestic arms of the Corporation.[115]

89. We conclude that the World Service will be ever more dependent on the Director of News for priority access to the resources—both technical and human—which it needs in order to meet its obligations. We are not convinced that the protection of the BBC World Service's interests within the BBC's governance structure is as strong as is being claimed, and the picture appears to us to be one of steady erosion of World Service influence within the BBC. The World Service will be heavily reliant in future upon advocacy by a single Executive Board member, who has many other competing responsibilities. The result may be that the World Service is more regularly denied the resources it needs to maintain or develop services. We recommend once again that the World Service should be represented on the BBC Executive Board, and we believe that the Director of BBC Global News should be a member of the Management Board.

93 http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/assets/files/pdf/consult/wsol/wsol_operating_licence.pdf Back

94 Q 9 Back

95 http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/assets/files/pdf/consult/wsol/wsol_positioning.pdf Back

96 http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/assets/files/pdf/consult/wsol/wsol_positioning.pdf, page 11 Back

97 Sixth Report of Session 2010-11, The Implications of Cuts to the BBC World Service, HC 849, paragraph 80 Back

98 See Broadcasting: An Agreement between Her Majesty's Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport and the British Broadcasting Corporation, Cm 8170, September 2011 Back

99 Listed in Annex III to the draft Operating Licence. The languages (in addition to English) are Arabic, Mandarin, Cantonese, Hindi, Indonesian, Portuguese for Brazil, Russian, Spanish, Swahili, Turkish, Ukrainian, Azeri, Bengali, Burmese, French for Africa, Hausa, Kinyarwanda/Kirundi (for the Great Lakes), Kyrgyz, Nepali, Pashto, Persian, Sinhala, Somali, Tamil, Urdu, Uzbek and Vietnamese. Back

100 http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/assets/files/pdf/consult/wsol/wsol_positioning.pdf Back

101 Q 34 Back

102 http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/assets/files/pdf/consult/wsol/wsol_positioning.pdf Back

103 Q 133, evidence given on 18 December 2012, see HC 690 (Session 2012-13) Back

104 Q 10 Back