To think the BBC really should be shut down?

[Loeri]

After the child abuse scandals, and now this where BBC execs have been given payments far beyond anything they were required to be given, isn't it time that the BBC was just shut down? It can't really be said that it makes the best TV in the world anymore, the best TV programmes come from the US and have done for well over a decade now. I just don't see the purpose of the BBC in 2013. It is arrogant, bloated beyond belief and seems only to exist to provide cushy jobs for the Guardian set.

Yeah. More than two years after Brooks was arrested she's finally going before a jury. Meanwhile her arrest itself came (I don't often C&P from Wikipedia, but I like the style of whoever contributed this passage) "about 1 year after the Metropolitan Police Service reopened its dormant investigation into phone hacking, about 3 years after the then Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Service told the Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee that 'no additional evidence has come to light,' 5 years after News International executives began claiming that phone hacking was the work of a single 'rogue reporter', 10 years after The Guardian began reporting that the Met had evidence of widespread illegal acquisition of confidential information, and 13 years after the Met began accumulating "boxloads" of that evidence, including information sources for News of the World journalists, but kept it unexamined in trash bags at Scotland Yard."

It's not exactly the swiftest retributive justice in the world, is it?

"I am sure if any criminal activity is uncovered the CPS will decide if they will persecute - or are you suggesting the BBC control the police?"

NI handed over documents and co-operated with the police, to an extent. The BBC claims to have no documents, because the money just got paid by pixies and it was all rather regrettable. There's not a lot for the police to investigate. The direct victim of this is the BBC itself, and if it won't co-operate (oh, sorry, has conveniently lost all the paperwork) then it's difficult for the police to do anything. Patten's patrician position appears to be that he doesn't want a load of muddy-shoed plod tramping through his shag-pile office carpet, and it should be left to the right chaps to resolve.

If you had a burglary at your house, and then did a massive springclean just before the scene-of-crime people came and then replied "no comment" to every question you were asked, do you think the police would continue to try to find who nicked your laptop? In that sense, the BBC do control the police: if they refuse to produce any evidence (oh, sorry, if after extensive searches they find there's no evidence, that's what I meant) there's not a lot that can be investigated.

If the BBC handed over a paper-trail for Keating's payoff, to take one of the more egregious examples, the police and CPS could consider whether a crime was committed. The BBC claim there is no paper trail. Isn't that convenient?

"It's not exactly the swiftest retributive justice in the world, is it?"

It isn't. But it's better than nothing, isn't it? Do you think that in thirteen years time, BBC executives will be on trial for giving money to their mates? No, me neither.

I doubt that a journalist will be relaxed about phone hacking if asked to do it today. A BBC employee asked to pay money off the books to one of their mates? Pass the pen.

If that's all accurate Friday I'm horrified. I'm going to go read up on it a bit more.

or the truth?

Do you think that in thirteen years time, BBC executives will be on trial for giving money to their mates

I don't know. It's possible. I would like to think that the police were at least looking into the possibility. Money disappearing into the hands of pixies must fall foul of auditing regulations in and of itself, surely, even if they've conveniently forgotten what the pixies did with it.

The us might make good drama but they can't make a documentary for shit.

I'd pay the license fee just for bbc4, horizon, the sky at night, and gardeners world. (And Luther, life on mars, call the midwife, dr who etc!)

We're not all the kind of people who want to watch fiction all the time. Some of us want to learn something. From what I have seen American documentaries are awful and they seem to think that people are so thick that they need a 2 minute recap after every add break.

I'd rather boil my own brain than be subjected to that kind of television.

Several very bad apples doesn't mean we should ditch the entire barrel (which has a vast number of very good apples, to continue the analogy).

There's a lot of expensive stuff on the BBC that I can't stand (Eastenders leaps to mind) but I appreciate there are those that do. Just as there are some poor folk who don't appreciate 6Music or Radio 4.

And it's not just programming - the whole iPlayer and red button thing was started by the BBC and look at the Olympics coverage (although Channel 4 did OK on the Paralympics). A lot of technological developments come from the Beeb before they are commercially viable.

I do think the Beeb should be prevented from bidding vast amounts for sporting events - commercial broadcasters can recoup their investment when the Beeb obviously can't. Sport involving national teams should be free-to-air though (and I'm not much of a sports fan).

OP - omg you are going to force me to watch Game of Thrones until I dig out my own eyes with rusty spoons!

Not everyone likes what you like. That is not illegal. The mandate of the BBC is to make available programmes then benefit us all even if they are uneconomic and not everyone takes up the opportunity to enjoy them.

Classical music - I am not a posho. When I was a kid in emergency council housing I still had access to things like classical music on Radio 3. Because BBC allow those who aren't 'poshos' to enjoy music and theatre that they wouldn't otherwise have access to. That's the point I can't afford the tickets to allow me to see Last Night of the Proms, or the Festival of Remembrance, or the Edinburgh Tattoo. I can have access to the highlights through my licence fee.

Overhaul - great. Oversight - open to political manipulation. Abolition - tragedy.

(Strong stuff for Friday morning)

If there was a like button LisaMed, I'd be pressing it now!

Who decides what programmes will "benefit us all"?

It all sounds like paternalism to me. The BBC is a relic of the past, when nice upper class people thought they needed to decide what was best for the lower orders. The problem is it's now been taken over by greedy bastards who are just out to line their own pockets, and just trot out a list of all the "good things" the BBC has done to anyone that objects.

or the truth?

In which case, the BBC has been paying money out without proper process or audit. Who signs their accounts, again? Perhaps their auditors might like to explain just how much sampling they did of large exceptional payments, and what evidence they were shown?

The BBC can't have it both ways. Either they don't know who paid the money, in which case they need to ask some very tough questions of their accountants, finance department and (by extension) internal and external audit. Or they do know who paid the money, in which case those people should be named. They can't simultaneously claim that their governance was OK, and that they don't know who ate all the pies.

Im pretty sure homeland didn't benefit us all..

"Oversight - open to political manipulation. "

So if the BBC isn't accountable to democratically elected governments, and isn't accountable to license fee payers, to whom is it accountable? And if the BBC regards itself as above being overseen (oversighted, in modern cant) by the legislature, perhaps it should reconsider its reliance on the criminal justice system to enforce its payment scheme? Are there any other parts of the UK establishment which are not accountable to parliament and yet are able to enforce their writ through criminal offences?

I do not have TV, I watch everything online (very little iplayer before that gets moaned at, which I would live without if I had to pay for it) I know increasing amounts of people who do the same.

I wonder how many people would have to do this before the BBC couldnt function as it does now?

If it even got close to that they'd change the rules so that you had to pay for the BBC regardless.

the best tv programmes come from the US! Are you 12?

BBC 4 m'lady for this I would pay my licence fee ten times over

YABVVU

It should be done away with. Those who want to pay for the kind of programmes that "only the BBC can make" should launch a subscription service for a channel that shows those programmes.

How is a subscription channel possibly going to provide the wealth of variety available on the BBC? I don't watch everything, everybody has different tastes and will lean towards varying genres, but where are you going to find that range of choice anywhere else?

Rather than mugging everyone else to pay for their minority interests. How can it be right that single mothers on council estates are jailed for not paying the license fee so that poshos can watch Opera and Classical music?

This statement is so breathtakingly sweeping and ill-informed that it's hard to comment sensibly on it. Look at the BBC1 Saturday night schedule - hardly 'minority interest', is it? Yes, some programming is more specialist, less populist - hence the fact that you'll find it on smaller digital channels, with massively smaller budgets to match.

I'm not a 'posho', but I do like a bit of opera now and again. I also like the Glastonbury coverage. Back in the day, The Old Grey Whistle Test. I love a bit of Strictly. Doctor Who. Sherlock. Any David Attenborough. My kids grew up with CBeebies. I would be lost without Radio 4. Whoever said that Radio 4 on its own was worth the licence fee, I am totally with you .

I also love Game of Thrones, Mad Men, Homeland, Breaking Bad ... most new, innovative, well-written drama. The reason most of these come from the States is that they have much bigger budgets as a result of being funded by advertising or subscription. They also have a system where a hugely expensive pilot is made, and the idea jettisoned if that show is not then taken to series. Whereas the BBC has the freedom to try out new shows and give them time to breathe, without pressure from sponsors/advertisers/shareholders. Would Dennis Potter have stood a chance on a subscription channel? Or is he too 'minority' for you, OP?

Yes, it has its problems and needs to do some internal housekeeping. But we are bloody lucky to have it, in all its fucked up, bureaucratic, red-taped glory. £10 a month is nothing when you consider what you get for it.

YANBU the BBC should be privatised and the tv licence abolished, why do we need the State to own a media outlet.

Im pretty sure homeland didn't benefit us all..

Damien Lewis. He's pretty beneficial

It's tricky. On balance though, I'd probably come down in favour of keeping it. The news braodcasting isn't always as impartial as it should be, and much of the content falls short of the standard you might reasonably expect.

That said though, everytime I'm just about ready to cancel the TV license, they produce something that justifies it (the fee) on its own.

The quality of the radio output (I'm excluding Radio 1 here) is also pretty decent.

In conclusion, chop it down to size, and reduce the fee. Also, I'd say to the subscription services: either have adverts, or charge a subscription. Not both!

"the best tv programmes come from the US! Are you 12? "

No. But the people who think Doctor Who, Merlin and Sherlock are "great TV programmes" might be. The best TV for ADULTS comes from the US. I don't think anyone can seriously disagree with that.

What else do you watch loeri?. Apart from American drama I mean.

"I don't think anyone can seriously disagree with that"

I disagree. Seriously.

I have to say, the quality of the output from the US is (when taken in its entririty) pretty poor. The best of "their" stuff, is very very good. All tghe more impressive when you consider what a low base they started from.