Trouble at the BBC

...Instead of introducing a fundamental strategy designed to maintain the BBC's reputation for excellence, critics note, he has instituted changes having largely to do with saving money...

...But there could be no denying that numerous BBC Television product ions remained superb—a fact affirmed by increased syndication sales in other countries, where programs like the Monty Python series and the dramatization of the John le Carre spy stories attracted cult followings...

...Norman Gelb writes regularly for The New Leader on British affairs...

...Many at the BBC, though, have had doubts about Birt from the moment he took over last March...

...Ideologically committed to free enterprise, Thatcher had qualms about its public funding when commercial stations had to raise their own cash...

...Thus a producer needing simply to check some fact by telephone has a sum charged against his budget by the BBC reference department...

...Moreover, in contrast to private broadcasting operations, which depend on advertisements for revenue, it has been permitted to secure its funding through a license fee on all households in the country that have a television set, with defaulters subject to a stiff fine...

...There was an inevitable loss of audience share, and the image of a proper "Auntie" (as it is still affectionately called) influencing public tastes and attitudes was diluted by its attempts to counter the competition...

...To begin with, he was originally from commercial television, where dedication to public service is not a high priority...

...One producer observed that many of his colleagues are "shunning the BBC's collection of world-beating equipment and technicians in order to save a few bob by working from poky editing suites in Soho...

...Despite its frequently having to go down market, therefore, the corporation continued to be considered a valuable and worthy national institution...

...Nevertheless, Thatcher was incensed...

...And that charter is up for renewal in three years...

...PC was introduced only last April...

...Unlike the United States, where broadcasting developed as a partly regulated yet wholly commercial phenomenon from the start, the BBC was founded in the 1920s with the understanding that "The wavebands...

...Not totally without justification, there were complaints that it was financially irresponsible and grossly overstaffed...

...Questions began to be asked in government and Conservative Party circles about how the BBC was run and whether it was sufficiently accountable to the public...

...Meanwhile, Bin's accountants have moved in with a passion...

...Indeed, many consider that one of its virtues...

...It now presents the greatest challenge the BBC has ever faced, and could conceivably spell its doom...

...But already many of its productions are displaying less polish and flair than previously and the mood at the BBC is unmistakably somber...

...They anticipate steadily upping the number, so that it will probably reach more than 100 around the turn of the century...

...Marmaduke ("Duke") Hussey, a Thatcher soul mate, had been appointed chairman of the BBC's board of governors, and it was widely thought that his mission was to gradually chip away at the corporation's public service status...

...It is true that more journalists in Britain lean toward the Left than the Right...

...The transition period was bound to be painful...

...The revelation that for tax purposes he had arranged to serve as the Director General on a freelance consultant basis, which drew so much adverse publicity and derision that he was compelled to accept staff member status, did not improve his image...

...But BBC producers no longer automatically turn to the organization's increasingly trimmed special departments...

...The "manageable change" scheme he has introduced, declares John Birt, is intended to make the BBC "even more creative and vital than it is now" and to provide "a distinctive service of programs of high quality and originality...

...Not surprisingly, the controversy at "the Beeb" has become a matter of major national interest in Britain...

...Yet the reality is that the BBC, though on the whole balanced in its political coverage, has always tended to be marginally biased against the party that happens to be in power...

...must be regarded as a valuable form of public property...

...But it retained a special status and a special place in the hearts and minds of Britons...

...In voicing what many others at the organization feel but have been afraid to declare publicly, Tully said he did not believe Birt "understands what the BBC was, or what it should be...

...The world-famous and revered institution is wracked by internal disgruntlement...

...My last annual bill was about $130...

...The support sections, for their part, are trying to keep charges down to discourage producers from seeking cheaper prices externally...

...Comparative ratings and the views of critics, in the press and elsewhere, suddenly had to be taken into account...

...She also was deeply offended by criticism of her Tory government on BBC current affairs programs and by what she took to be an anti-Tory, pro- Labor Party bias in news reports...

...The question is whether, when all the Birtian changes have taken hold, the BBC will still deserve special public funding...

...At present cable companies here offer viewers a choice of up to about 30 channels (plus the two BBC channels and the two pre-existing commercial ones...

...This, the new management contends, is what it is trying to head off...

...Neither has his recruitment of people from the commercial sector for various top positions...

...The BBC emerged from the Thatcher era two years ago exposed and vulnerable...

...In the process jobs have been cut—except for more accountants being hired to monitor the new business units...

...The BBC's monopoly on radio and television in Britain was protected by law until the 1950s, when commercial broadcasting was permitted to begin competing with it...

...During the '80s, while Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister, a dark shadow fell over the BBC...

...Only 2 per cent of the homes in Britain are today equipped to receive cable TV, but the cable companies are engaged in a heavily financed, aggressive expansion...

...Once the BBC lost its radio and television monopoly, however, it found dealing with consumer choice to be jarring...

...Except for the absence of advertising, it sometimes became difficult to tell the difference between the fare on BBC Television and the commercial channels...

...It has operated from its first days as a public service organization under a charter from Parliament...

...Furthermore, commercial cable television, after a modest intrusion into Britain during the '80s, was coming on strong...

...They have transformed the long-existing internal BBC support departments—engineering, costumes, information services, etc.—into "business units," forcing them to compete with private outfits and sell their services in house...

...Central to his approach is something called "Producer Choice," whose unfortunate acronym is PC...

...By the end of the decade, they hope to blanket almost the entire country and to have 70 per cent of all homes subscribing...

...This is supposed to free program producers to choose whatever production facilities they wish for artistic or budgetary purposes—whether within the huge BBC organization or outside it...

...He insists that the changes he has introduced will protect the BBC in the jungle of broadcast competition it now must venture into far more deeply than before...

...The BBC, with its limited menu, is certain to come under growing pressure to justify its public funding...

...In addition, it offered public service programs of minority interest, including intellectual gabfests, esoteric art features, and obscure sporting events...

...Birt has responded that "those who look back with nostalgia to bygone days" do not appreciate the harsh realities of current competitiveness...

...On BBC Radio, newscasts, plays, comedy performances, classical music presentations, and a variety of specialized talk shows were (and are) of the highest level...

...With Britain's National Health Service being cut back and the privatization of British Rail in the cards, the Thatcherite revolution may yet claim another victim in this green and pleasant land...

...But the main criticisms leveled against Birt are that he so far appears to be presiding over a decline in the quality of BBC programming, that the corporation's audience share clearly has dropped, and that its staff is demoralized and fearful...

...Mark Tully, one of its most distinguished correspondents, has accused John Birt, the new Director General, of introducing radical changes that are seriously damaging...

...The annual fee for cable ranges from approximately $185 to $375...