BBC Funding
The Briefing Room
BBC
4.8 • 731 Ratings
🗓️ 20 January 2022
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
With the longer term funding of the BBC under pressure, David Aaronovitch and guests explore the alternatives to the licence fee. How do other nations pay for their public service broadcasters?
Contributors: Professor Jean Seaton, University of Westminster Matt Walsh, Head of school of Journalism, Media & Culture, Cardiff University Vilde Sundet, University of Oslo Professor Patrick Barwise, London Business School Claire Enders, Enders Analysis
Producers: Kirsteen Knight, Ben Carter, Rosamund Jones Studio manager: Neil Churchill Production co-ordinators: Sophie Hill, Siobhan Reed Editor: Richard Vadon
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:06.4 | Welcome to the briefing room with me, David O'Ronovich. |
| 0:09.0 | The briefing room is the mind chamber, where in 28 minutes, |
| 0:12.3 | you and I get to understand a big issue with the help of the top experts on the subject. |
| 0:17.6 | This week, the government wants to scrap the BBC licence fee. What are the alternatives? |
| 0:23.6 | At the weekend, Nadine Dorris, Secretary of State for Digital Culture, media and Sport, tweeted that the BBC licence fee would be scrapped by 2027. |
| 0:35.6 | Then this week, she told Parliament that it was time to begin asking those |
| 0:39.7 | really serious questions about the long-term funding model of the BBC. So that's what we're |
| 0:45.9 | doing today. What other funding options are out there? How do they work? And would they work for the BBC? |
| 0:53.2 | Step inside the briefing room and together we'll find out. |
| 0:59.0 | First though, it's worth asking why the licence fee model, you pay it if you have a TV, |
| 1:03.8 | was chosen in the first place. |
| 1:06.1 | To find out, the briefing room's Ben Carter spoke to Jean Seton, |
| 1:09.7 | Professor of Media History at the University of Westminster |
| 1:12.3 | and the official historian of the BBC |
| 1:14.6 | and asked her how the idea of a licence fee first emerged. |
| 1:19.3 | The notion of a licence fee was influenced by three quite separate things, |
| 1:24.7 | one of which was real anxiety about who was broadcasting, and that notion |
| 1:30.4 | comes from the 1904 licensed to broadcast act when people began to understand that this new |
| 1:38.8 | fangled thing called broadcasting was around, and people wanted to make sets. |
| 1:43.3 | So they wanted to be very sure about who was going to have them. |
| 1:47.0 | They were jolly worried about men in Penge broadcasting propaganda to the British public. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.