Radio
Gaffes galore
Michael Vestey
The late Jack de Manio made some- thing of a name for himself when, settling in front of the radio microphone to announce the title of a programme to mark the independence of Nigeria, he intoned, 'We now present Land of the Nigger . . . ' He should have said, of course, 'Niger' with a soft g. There was a diplomatic row, gov- ernment apologies and so on. He was told to lie low for six weeks until the fuss died down. He later went on to become the first presenter of Today, his bosses thinking it would be a quiet backwater.
This story has entered BBC folklore but I was reminded of it by the urgency of an important decision that will have to be made next week by the Foreign Secretary Malcolm Rifkind. He has to decide the future of the BBC World Service. This week the report of the joint FCO/BBC Working Group on the BBC's restructuring plans is ready for his perusal. This group has been meeting for some weeks at the old Colonial Office to examine the BBC Director General John Birt's plans to merge the World Service English language programmes with domestic radio and tele- vision. Although Rifkind is responsible for the Government's funding of the World Service, he was not told about the restructuring in advance, so this working party is a kind of retrospective consulta- tion.
After being grilled by the Commons For- eign Affairs Committee during the sum- mer, Birt complained to an aide that if he'd been running ICI he would not have to consult in this way. First, no one in their right minds would put him in charge of ICI, and, second, the BBC is, unlike ICI, pub- licly funded, both by the licence fee and, in the case of the World Service, by taxpayers' money through the Foreign Office.
John Birt, incidentally, is the first direc- tor general in the corporation's history not to be the accounting officer for the World Service. He delegated that task to Bob Phillis, his deputy, an indication, I think, of his lack of interest in it, and radio as a whole, except as a means of cutting costs by merging it with national broadcasting. Phillis, as the accounting officer, was given a mere 48 hours notice of the changes. Birt, and his chairman, Sir Christopher Bland, are really television men, hence the obses- sion with digital technology and a 24-hour television news channel.
Every organisation needs modernising to compete effectively but Birt claims that, if the World Service is not restructured, it will be 'left behind' and become a museum. It is not a museum now, having adapted well to change. It broadcasts 24 hours a day, seven days a week and has 44 language services, including English. It is respected throughout the world and relied upon by those living under totalitarian regimes. They must be glued to it in Afghanistan at the moment. It is also efficient, and cheap- er than domestic radio, having been praised by the National Audit Office.
The BBC pays the management consul- tants McKinsey £2 million a year of licence fee payers' money for advice and most of John Birt's position papers submitted to the Commons and the joint working party have McKinsey's codes stamped on them. The company has no interest in radio as such — to them it is just another business. Birt's contempt for any opposition, or, for that matter, the views of Malcolm Rifkind himself, is apparent by the fact that senior appointments have already been made to prepare for the implementation of the changes next April. So much for the con- sultation process.
It's well known in the BBC that domestic radio and television, for all its quality, is unsuitable to be in charge of the spe- cialised nature of the World Service. When, eventually, World Service News is part of the news operation as a whole, domestic priorities will take precedence. It's often the case now. The World Service had to cancel its contract with Broadcasting House to make business programmes and set up its own unit. The domestic radio producers' approach was considered at Bush House to be unsatisfactory.
Foreign news is no great mystery but it's surprising how unsuited to it so many domestic radio reporters and producers are. There have been cases where BBC news correspondents have filed despatches from abroad only for them to be dropped by the World Service newsroom because they were either mistaken, biased or even inflammatory.
I know exactly what will happen to the World Service when it loses its autonomy. There will be de Manioisms galore, its much copied but still unique identity will vanish, and it will end up embarrassing the Foreign Office. It won't be obvious at first but will soon become apparent. The Tal- ibans of the BBC boardroom must be stopped before they reach Bush House.
Malcolm Rifkind has an excellent oppor- tunity to do something for which he will be remembered with respect and admiration, long after his other vital interventions in the morass of foreign affairs have been for- gotten: 140 million people across the world want him to say no to the restructuring.
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