Observer editor-in-chief James Harding says BBC should be ‘put beyond reach of politicians’

The Observer’s editor-in-chief has called for the BBC to be “put beyond the reach of politicians” – and has compared the fight for survival within television to the zombie fungus in The Last Of Us.

Speaking to Sky News about his James MacTaggart Memorial Lecture at the Edinburgh TV Festival on Wednesday, James Harding said it “is not the golden age of TV, it’s more like The Last Of Us… just trying to stay alive as the fungus of new things eats through all of us”.

The co-founder of Tortoise Media – which bought The Observer from the Scott Trust and Guardian Media Group in December – said he believes establishing the independence of the BBC is critical “if we want to build confidence in shared facts and respect for the truth”.

“At the moment politicians choose the chairman, they choose the licence fee, they have enormous influence over it,” he said.

“Let’s face it, there’s a suspicion that there’s a certain worldview attached to the BBC. Let’s make sure that it’s obvious to people that actually different points of view are really welcome.”

Mr Harding, who ran the BBC’s news and current affairs programming from 2013 up until the beginning of 2018, said the government must consider separating itself from the institution.

He explained: “When the government established the independence of the Bank of England in 1997, it put confidence in the central institution of the economy ahead of politics; the government today can and should do the same for the shared institution in our society by giving real independence to the BBC.”

The BBC has been criticised for a number of incidents in recent months, including breaching its own accuracy editorial guidelines and livestreaming the controversial Bob Vylan Glastonbury set, where there were chants of: “Death to the IDF [Israel Defence Forces]”.

Following the incident, Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said ministers expected “accountability at the highest levels” for the BBC’s decision to screen the performance.

In his lecture, Mr Harding said the BBC is “not institutionally antisemitic” and that: “Whatever your view of the hate speech versus freedom of speech issues, an overbearing government minister doesn’t help anyone.

“The hiring and firing of the editor-in-chief of the country’s leading newsroom and cultural organisation should not be the job of a politician. It’s chilling.”

Ahead of the BBC charter renewal in 2027, he said the corporation’s “survival is at stake”.

He argued that the BBC chair and board of directors should be “chosen, not by the prime minister, but by the board itself and then, like other such organisations, with the approval of Ofcom.

“The charter should be open-ended. And the licence fee – or any future funding arrangement – should not be decided behind closed doors by the culture secretary and the chancellor, but, as in Germany, set transparently and rationally by an independent commission that impartially advises government and is scrutinised by parliament.”

He also said the BBC should lead the way in striking deals with generative AI companies by taking advantage of the “meaningful pricing of its reliable, ceaselessly renewed library of content.

“That would help set the terms for other UK news and media companies that don’t get a hearing from the new generation of tech giants,” he said.

Mr Harding suggested that the BBC should look to work with AI developers to provide a “BBC GPT” that could enable the public to utilise AI “without handing over every last detail of what’s on their minds to US tech corporations that have proved obstinately unaccountable in the UK.”

He said it’s “about more than the BBC, it’s a national investment in our future that will come back to reap multi-platform rewards that an investment in no other UK organisation can.”

Edinburgh TV Festival runs from 19 – 22 August.

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