The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is the
national broadcaster
Public broadcasting involves radio, television and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service. Public broadcasters receive funding from diverse sources including license fees, individual contributions, public financing ...
of the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
, based at
Broadcasting House in
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
, England. It is the world's oldest national broadcaster, and the largest broadcaster in the world by number of employees, employing over 21,000 staff in total, of whom approximately 17,900 are in public-sector broadcasting.
The BBC is established under a
royal charter
A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta (great charter) of 1215, but s ...
and operates under its agreement with the
Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
The secretary of state for digital, culture, media and sport, also referred to as the culture secretary, is a Secretary of State (United Kingdom), secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, with overall responsibility for strateg ...
. Its work is funded principally by an annual
television licence fee
A television licence or broadcast receiving licence is a payment required in many countries for the reception of Television broadcasting, television broadcasts, or the possession of a television set where some broadcasts are funded in full or ...
which is charged to all British households, companies, and organisations using any type of equipment to receive or record live television broadcasts or watch using
iPlayer
BBC iPlayer (stylised as iPLAYER or BBC iPLAYER) is a video on demand service from the BBC. The service is available on a wide range of devices, including mobile phones and tablets, personal computers and smart televisions. iPlayer services de ...
.
The fee is set by the
British Government, agreed by
Parliament
In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. Th ...
,
and is used to fund the BBC's radio, TV, and online services covering the nations and regions of the UK. Since 1 April 2014, it has also funded the
BBC World Service (launched in 1932 as the BBC Empire Service), which broadcasts in 28 languages and provides comprehensive TV, radio, and online services in Arabic and Persian.
Around a quarter of the BBC's revenue comes from its commercial subsidiary
BBC Studios
BBC Studios is a British content company. It is a commercial subsidiary of the BBC that was formed in April 2018 through the merger of the BBC's commercial production arm and the BBC's commercial international distribution arm, BBC Worldwide. ...
(formerly
BBC Worldwide), which sells BBC programmes and services internationally and also distributes the BBC's international 24-hour English-language news services
BBC World News
BBC World News is an international English-language pay television network, operated under the ''BBC Global News Limited'' division of the BBC, which is a public corporation of the UK government's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and ...
, and from BBC.com, provided by BBC Global News Ltd. In 2009, the company was awarded the
Queen's Award for Enterprise
The Queen's Awards for Enterprise is an awards programme for British businesses and other organizations who excel at international trade, innovation, sustainable development or promoting opportunity (through social mobility). They are the highest ...
in recognition of its international achievements.
Since its formation in 1922 the BBC has played a prominent role in British life and culture. It is colloquially known as the Beeb, Auntie, or a combination of both (Auntie Beeb).
History
The birth of British broadcasting, 1920 to 1922
Britain's first live public broadcast was made from the factory of
Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company
The Marconi Company was a British telecommunications and engineering company that did business under that name from 1963 to 1987. Its roots were in the Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company founded by Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi in 1897 ...
in
Chelmsford
Chelmsford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, city in the City of Chelmsford district in the county of Essex, England. It is the county town of Essex and one of three cities in the county, along with Southend-on-Sea and Colchester. It ...
in June 1920. It was sponsored by the ''
Daily Mail''s
Lord Northcliffe
Alfred Charles William Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe (15 July 1865 – 14 August 1922), was a British newspaper and publishing magnate. As owner of the ''Daily Mail'' and the ''Daily Mirror'', he was an early developer of popular journal ...
and featured the famous Australian soprano
Dame Nellie Melba
Dame Nellie Melba (born Helen Porter Mitchell; 19 May 186123 February 1931) was an Australian operatic dramatic coloratura soprano (three octaves). She became one of the most famous singers of the late Victorian era and the early 20th centur ...
. The Melba broadcast caught the people's imagination and marked a turning point in the British public's attitude to radio. However, this public enthusiasm was not shared in official circles where such broadcasts were held to interfere with important military and civil communications. By late 1920, pressure from these quarters and uneasiness among the staff of the licensing authority, the
General Post Office (GPO), was sufficient to lead to a ban on further Chelmsford broadcasts.
But by 1922, the GPO had received nearly 100 broadcast licence requests and moved to rescind its ban in the wake of a petition by 63 wireless societies with over 3,000 members. Anxious to avoid the same chaotic expansion experienced in the United States, the GPO proposed that it would issue a single broadcasting licence to a company jointly owned by a consortium of leading wireless receiver manufacturers, to be known as the
British Broadcasting Company Ltd, which was formed on 18 October 1922.
John Reith, a Scottish
Calvinist
Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Ca ...
, was appointed its general manager in December 1922 a few weeks after the company made its first official broadcast.
L. Stanton Jefferies
Leonard Stanton Jefferies LRAM (4 September 1896 – 22 October 1961) was a British musician, composer, and conductor. He was the first director of music at the British Broadcasting Company, and pioneered techniques for broadcasting live musi ...
was its first director of music. The company was to be financed by a royalty on the sale of BBC wireless receiving sets from approved domestic manufacturers. To this day, the BBC aims to follow the Reithian directive to "inform, educate and entertain".
From private company towards public service corporation, 1923 to 1926
The financial arrangements soon proved inadequate. Set sales were disappointing as amateurs made their own receivers and listeners bought rival unlicensed sets. By mid-1923, discussions between the GPO and the BBC had become deadlocked and the Postmaster General commissioned a review of broadcasting by the Sykes Committee.
The committee recommended a short term reorganisation of licence fees with improved enforcement in order to address the BBC's immediate financial distress, and an increased share of the licence revenue split between it and the GPO. This was to be followed by a simple 10 shillings licence fee to fund broadcasts.
The BBC's broadcasting monopoly was made explicit for the duration of its current broadcast licence, as was the prohibition on advertising. To avoid competition with newspapers,
Fleet Street persuaded the government to ban news bulletins before 7 pm and the BBC was required to source all news from external wire services.
Mid-1925 found the future of broadcasting under further consideration, this time by the Crawford committee. By now, the BBC, under Reith's leadership, had forged a consensus favouring a continuation of the unified (monopoly) broadcasting service, but more money was still required to finance rapid expansion. Wireless manufacturers were anxious to exit the loss-making consortium with Reith keen that the BBC be seen as a public service rather than a commercial enterprise. The recommendations of the Crawford Committee were published in March the following year and were still under consideration by the GPO when the
1926 general strike
The 1926 general strike in the United Kingdom was a general strike that lasted nine days, from 4 to 12 May 1926. It was called by the General Council of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) in an unsuccessful attempt to force the British governme ...
broke out in May. The strike temporarily interrupted newspaper production, and with restrictions on news bulletins waived, the BBC suddenly became the primary source of news for the duration of the crisis.
[supra Curran and Seaton, p. 117]
The crisis placed the BBC in a delicate position. On the one hand Reith was acutely aware that the government might exercise its right to commandeer the BBC at any time as a mouthpiece of the government if the BBC were to step out of line, but on the other he was anxious to maintain public trust by appearing to be acting independently. The
government
A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state.
In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is ...
was divided on how to handle the BBC, but ended up trusting Reith, whose opposition to the strike mirrored the PM's own. Although
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from ...
in particular wanted to commandeer the BBC to use it "to the best possible advantage", Reith wrote that
Stanley Baldwin's government wanted to be able to say "that they did not commandeer
he BBC
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
but they know that they can trust us not to be really impartial".
Thus the BBC was granted sufficient leeway to pursue the government's objectives largely in a manner of its own choosing. The resulting coverage of both striker and government viewpoints impressed millions of listeners who were unaware that the PM had broadcast to the nation from Reith's home, using one of Reith's sound bites inserted at the last moment, or that the BBC had banned broadcasts from the
Labour Party and delayed a peace appeal by the
Archbishop of Canterbury. Supporters of the strike nicknamed the BBC the BFC for British Falsehood Company. Reith personally announced the end of the strike which he marked by reciting from Blake's "
Jerusalem
Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
" signifying that England had been saved.
While the BBC tends to characterise its coverage of the general strike by emphasising the positive impression created by its balanced coverage of the views of government and strikers,
Jean Seaton
Jean Seaton (born 6 March 1947) is Professor of Media History at the University of Westminster and the Official Historian of the BBC. She is the Director of the Orwell Prize and on the editorial board of ''Political Quarterly''. She is the wido ...
, Professor of Media History and the Official BBC Historian, has characterised the episode as the invention of "modern propaganda in its British form".
Reith argued that trust gained by 'authentic impartial news' could then be used. Impartial news was not necessarily an end in itself.
The BBC did well out of the crisis, which cemented a national audience for its broadcasting, and it was followed by the Government's acceptance of the recommendation made by the Crawford Committee (1925–26) that the British Broadcasting Company be replaced by a non-commercial, Crown-chartered organisation: the British Broadcasting Corporation.
1927 to 1939
![John Logie Baird in 1917](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/80/John_Logie_Baird_in_1917.jpg)
The British Broadcasting Corporation came into existence on 1 January 1927, and Reith – newly knighted – was appointed its first Director General. To represent its purpose and (stated) values, the new corporation adopted the
coat of arms
A coat of arms is a heraldic visual design on an escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the latter two being outer garments). The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central element of the full heraldic achievement, which in its ...
, including the motto "Nation shall speak peace unto Nation".
British radio audiences had little choice apart from the upscale programming of the BBC. Reith, an intensely moralistic executive, was in full charge. His goal was to broadcast "All that is best in every department of human knowledge, endeavour and achievement.... The preservation of a high moral tone is obviously of paramount importance." Reith succeeded in building a high wall against an American-style free-for-all in radio in which the goal was to attract the largest audiences and thereby secure the greatest advertising revenue. There was no paid advertising on the BBC; all the revenue came from a tax on receiving sets. Highbrow audiences, however, greatly enjoyed it. At a time when American, Australian and Canadian stations were drawing huge audiences cheering for their local teams with the broadcast of baseball, rugby and hockey, the BBC emphasised service for a national rather than a regional audience. Boat races were well covered along with tennis and horse racing, but the BBC was reluctant to spend its severely limited air time on long football or cricket games, regardless of their popularity.
John Reith and the BBC, with support from
the Crown
The Crown is the state in all its aspects within the jurisprudence of the Commonwealth realms and their subdivisions (such as the Crown Dependencies, overseas territories, provinces, or states). Legally ill-defined, the term has different ...
, determined the universal needs of the people of Britain and broadcast content according to these perceived standards. Reith effectively censored anything that he felt would be harmful, directly or indirectly.
While recounting his time with the BBC in 1935,
Raymond Postgate
Raymond William Postgate (6 November 1896 – 29 March 1971) was an English socialist, writer, journalist and editor, social historian, mystery novelist, and gourmet who founded the '' Good Food Guide''. He was a member of the Postgate fa ...
claims that BBC broadcasters were made to submit a draft of their potential broadcast for approval. It was expected that they tailored their content to accommodate the modest, church-going elderly or a member of the
Clergy
Clergy are formal leaders within established religions. Their roles and functions vary in different religious traditions, but usually involve presiding over specific rituals and teaching their religion's doctrines and practices. Some of the ter ...
. Until 1928, entertainers broadcasting on the BBC, both singers and "talkers" were expected to avoid biblical quotations, Clerical impersonations and references, references to drink or
Prohibition in America, vulgar and doubtful matter and political allusions.
The BBC excluded popular foreign music and musicians from its broadcasts, while promoting British alternatives. On 5 March 1928,
Stanley Baldwin, the Prime Minister, maintained the censorship of editorial opinions on public policy, but allowed the BBC to address matters of religious, political or industrial controversy.
The resulting political "talk series", designed to inform England on political issues, were criticised by members of parliament, including
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from ...
,
David Lloyd George
David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, (17 January 1863 – 26 March 1945) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1916 to 1922. He was a Liberal Party politician from Wales, known for leading the United Kingdom during ...
and
Sir Austen Chamberlain. Those who opposed these chats claimed that they silence the opinions of those in Parliament who are not nominated by Party Leaders or Party Whips, thus stifling independent, non-official views.
In October 1932, the policemen of the
Metropolitan Police Federation
The Metropolitan Police Federation is a staff association that represents the interests of all police in the Metropolitan Police Service up to the rank of Chief Inspector in England and Wales. It seeks to ensure that the Metropolitan Police Serv ...
marched in protest at a proposed pay cut. Fearing dissent within the police force and public support for the movement, the BBC censored its coverage of the events, only broadcasting official statements from the government.
Throughout the 1930s, political broadcasts had been closely monitored by the BBC.
In 1935, the BBC censored the broadcasts of
Oswald Mosley
Sir Oswald Ernald Mosley, 6th Baronet (16 November 1896 – 3 December 1980) was a British politician during the 1920s and 1930s who rose to fame when, having become disillusioned with mainstream politics, he turned to fascism. He was a member ...
and
Harry Pollitt
Harry Pollitt (22 November 1890 – 27 June 1960) was a British communist who served as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) from 1929 to September 1939 and again from 1941 until his death in 1960. Pollitt spent ...
.
Mosley was a leader of the
British Union of Fascists, and Pollitt a leader of the
Communist Party of Great Britain. They had been contracted to provide a series of five broadcasts on their parties' politics. The BBC, in conjunction with
The Foreign Office of Britain, first suspended this series and ultimately cancelled it without the notice of the public.
Less radical politicians faced similar censorship. In 1938, Winston Churchill proposed a series of talks regarding British domestic and foreign politics and affairs but was similarly censored.
The censorship of political discourse by the BBC was a precursor to the total shutdown of political debate that manifested over the BBC's wartime airwaves.
The Foreign Office maintained that the public should not be aware of their role in the censorship.
From 1935 to 1939, the BBC also attempted to unite the British Empire's radio waves, sending staff to Egypt,
Palestine,
Newfoundland, Jamaica, India, Canada and South Africa.
Reith personally visited South Africa, lobbying for state-run radio programmes which was accepted by
South African Parliament
The Parliament of the Republic of South Africa is South Africa's legislature; under the present Constitution of South Africa, the bicameral Parliament comprises a National Assembly and a National Council of Provinces. The current twenty-seve ...
in 1936.
A similar programme was adopted in Canada. Through collaboration with these state-run broadcasting centres, Reith left a legacy of cultural influence across the empire of Great Britain with his departure from the corporation in 1938.
Experimental television broadcasts were started in 1929, using an electromechanical 30-line system developed by
John Logie Baird
John Logie Baird FRSE (; 13 August 188814 June 1946) was a Scottish inventor, electrical engineer, and innovator who demonstrated the world's first live working television system on 26 January 1926. He went on to invent the first publicly dem ...
. Limited regular broadcasts using this system began in 1934, and
an expanded service (now named the
BBC Television Service) started from
Alexandra Palace in November 1936, alternating between an improved Baird mechanical 240-line system and the all-electronic
405-line
The 405-line monochrome analogue television broadcasting system was the first fully electronic television system to be used in regular broadcasting. The number of television lines influences the image resolution, or quality of the picture.
It wa ...
Marconi-EMI system which had been developed by an
EMI
EMI Group Limited (originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records Ltd. or simply EMI) was a British Transnational corporation, transnational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in March 1 ...
research team led by Sir
Isaac Shoenberg
Sir Isaac Shoenberg (1 March 1880 – 25 January 1963) was a British electronic engineer born in Belarus who was best known for his role in the history of television. He was the head of the EMI research team that developed the 405-line (Marconi-EM ...
. The superiority of the electronic system saw the mechanical system dropped early the following year, with the Marconi-EMI system the first fully electronic television system in the world to be used in regular broadcasting.
BBC versus other media
![Royal broadcast, Christmas 1934 (Our Generation, 1938)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c4/Royal_broadcast%2C_Christmas_1934_%28Our_Generation%2C_1938%29.jpg)
The success of broadcasting provoked animosities between the BBC and well-established media such as theatres, concert halls and the recording industry. By 1929, the BBC complained that the agents of many comedians refused to sign contracts for broadcasting, because they feared it harmed the artist "by making his material stale" and that it "reduces the value of the artist as a visible music-hall performer". On the other hand, the BBC was "keenly interested" in a cooperation with the recording companies who "in recent years ... have not been slow to make records of singers, orchestras, dance bands, etc. who have already proved their power to achieve popularity by wireless." Radio plays were so popular that the BBC had received 6,000 manuscripts by 1929, most of them written for stage and of little value for broadcasting: "Day in and day out, manuscripts come in, and nearly all go out again through the post, with a note saying 'We regret, etc.'" In the 1930s music broadcasts also enjoyed great popularity, for example the friendly and wide-ranging organ broadcasts at
St George's Hall, London by
Reginald Foort, who held the official role of BBC Staff Theatre Organist from 1936 to 1938.
Second World War
![George Orwell statue - BBC London (38562767202)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f1/George_Orwell_statue_-_BBC_London_%2838562767202%29.jpg)
Television broadcasting was suspended from 1 September 1939 to 7 June 1946, during the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...
, and it was left to
BBC Radio
BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927). The service provides national radio stations covering ...
broadcasters such as Reginald Foort to keep the nation's spirits up. The BBC moved most of its radio operations out of London, initially to
Bristol
Bristol () is a city, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Gloucestershire to the north and Somerset to the south. Bristol is the most populous city in ...
, and then to
Bedford
Bedford is a market town in Bedfordshire, England. At the 2011 Census, the population of the Bedford built-up area (including Biddenham and Kempston) was 106,940, making it the second-largest settlement in Bedfordshire, behind Luton, whilst ...
. Concerts were broadcast from the
Bedford Corn Exchange
Bedford Corn Exchange is an events and concert venue located on St Paul's Square in the Castle, Bedford, Castle area of Bedford, Bedfordshire, England.
History of the Corn Exchange
The building (constructed in 1874) was designed to be a concert ...
; the Trinity Chapel in
St Paul's Church, Bedford was the studio for the daily service from 1941 to 1945, and, in the darkest days of the war in 1941, the
Archbishops of Canterbury and
York
York is a cathedral city with Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. It is the historic county town of Yorkshire. The city has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a ...
came to St Paul's to broadcast to the UK and the world on the National Day of Prayer. BBC employees during the war included
George Orwell who spent two years with the broadcaster.
During his role as prime minister during the war,
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from ...
delivered 33 major wartime speeches by radio, all of which were carried by the BBC within the UK. On 18 June 1940, French general
Charles de Gaulle, in exile in London as the leader of the Free French, made a speech, broadcast by the BBC, urging the French people not to capitulate to the Nazis. In October 1940, Princesses
Elizabeth
Elizabeth or Elisabeth may refer to:
People
* Elizabeth (given name), a female given name (including people with that name)
* Elizabeth (biblical figure), mother of John the Baptist
Ships
* HMS ''Elizabeth'', several ships
* ''Elisabeth'' (sch ...
and
Margaret made their first radio broadcast for the BBC's ''
Children's Hour'', addressing other children who had been evacuated from cities.
In 1938, John Reith and the
British government, specifically the
Ministry of Information which had been set up for WWII, designed a censorship apparatus for the inevitability of war.
Due to the BBC's advancements in
shortwave radio technology, the corporation could broadcast across the world during the Second World War.
Within Europe, the BBC European Service would gather intelligence and information regarding the current events of the war in English.
Regional BBC workers, based on their regional geo-political climate, would then further censor the material their broadcasts would cover. Nothing was to be added outside the preordained news items.
For example, the BBC Polish Service was heavily censored due to fears of jeopardising relations with the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
. Controversial topics, i.e. the contested Polish and Soviet border, the deportation of Polish citizens, the arrests of
Polish Home Army
The Home Army ( pl, Armia Krajowa, abbreviated AK; ) was the dominant resistance movement in German-occupied Poland during World War II. The Home Army was formed in February 1942 from the earlier Związek Walki Zbrojnej (Armed Resistance) est ...
members and the
Katyn massacre
The Katyn massacre, "Katyń crime"; russian: link=yes, Катынская резня ''Katynskaya reznya'', "Katyn massacre", or russian: link=no, Катынский расстрел, ''Katynsky rasstrel'', "Katyn execution" was a series of m ...
, were not included in Polish broadcasts. American radio broadcasts were broadcast across Europe on BBC channels. This material also passed through the BBC's censorship office, which surveilled and edited American coverage of British affairs.
By 1940, across all BBC broadcasts, music by composers from enemy nations was censored. In total, 99 German, 38 Austrian and 38 Italian composers were censored. The BBC argued that like the Italian or German languages, listeners would be irritated by the inclusion of enemy composers. Any potential broadcasters said to have pacifist, communist or
fascist ideologies were not allowed on the BBC's airwaves. In 1937, a
MI5
The Security Service, also known as MI5 ( Military Intelligence, Section 5), is the United Kingdom's domestic counter-intelligence and security agency and is part of its intelligence machinery alongside the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), G ...
security officer was given a permanent office within the organisation. This officer would examine the files of potential political subversives and
mark the files of those deemed a security risk to the organisation,
blacklisting them. This was often done on spurious grounds; even so, the practice would continue and expand during the years of the Cold War.
[Mark Hollingsworth and Richard Norton-Taylor ''Blacklist: The Inside Story of Political Vetting'', London: Hogarth, 1988, p. 103. The relevant extract from the book i]
here
/ref>
Later 20th century
There was a widely reported urban myth that, upon resumption of the BBC television service after the war, announcer Leslie Mitchell started by saying, "As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted ..." In fact, the first person to appear when transmission resumed was Jasmine Bligh
Jasmine Lydia Bligh (20 May 1913 – 21 July 1991) was one of the first three BBC Television Service presenters in the 1930s. Along with Leslie Mitchell and Elizabeth Cowell, she provided continuity announcements introducing programmes in-vis ...
and the words said were "Good afternoon, everybody. How are you? Do you remember me, Jasmine Bligh ... ?" The European Broadcasting Union was formed on 12 February 1950, in Torquay
Torquay ( ) is a seaside town in Devon, England, part of the unitary authority area of Torbay. It lies south of the county town of Exeter and east-north-east of Plymouth, on the north of Tor Bay, adjoining the neighbouring town of Paig ...
with the BBC among the 23 founding broadcasting organisations.
Competition to the BBC was introduced in 1955, with the commercial and independently operated television network of ITV. However, the BBC monopoly on radio services would persist until 8 October 1973 when under the control of the newly renamed Independent Broadcasting Authority
The Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) was the regulatory body in the United Kingdom for commercial television ( ITV and Channel 4 and limited satellite television regulation – cable television was the responsibility of the Cable Author ...
(IBA), the UK's first Independent local radio station, LBC
LBC (originally the London Broadcasting Company) is a British phone-in and talk radio station owned and operated by Global and based in its headquarters in London. It was the UK's first licensed commercial radio station, and began to broadca ...
came on-air in the London area. As a result of the Pilkington Committee report of 1962, in which the BBC was praised for the quality and range of its output, and ITV was very heavily criticised for not providing enough quality programming, the decision was taken to award the BBC a second television channel, BBC2, in 1964, renaming the existing service BBC1
BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, ...
. BBC2 used the higher resolution 625-line standard which had been standardised across Europe. BBC2 was broadcast in colour from 1 July 1967 and was joined by BBC1 and ITV on 15 November 1969. The 405-line VHF transmissions of BBC1 (and ITV) were continued for compatibility with older television receivers until 1985.
Starting in 1964, a series of pirate radio
Pirate radio or a pirate radio station is a radio station that broadcasts without a valid license.
In some cases, radio stations are considered legal where the signal is transmitted, but illegal where the signals are received—especially ...
stations (starting with Radio Caroline
Radio Caroline is a British radio station founded in 1964 by Ronan O'Rahilly and Alan Crawford initially to circumvent the record companies' control of popular music broadcasting in the United Kingdom and the BBC's radio broadcasting monopoly ...
) came on the air and forced the British government finally to regulate radio services to permit nationally based advertising-financed services. In response, the BBC reorganised and renamed their radio channels. On 30 September 1967, the Light Programme was split into Radio 1 Radio 1 or Radio One most commonly refers to:
*BBC Radio 1, a music radio station from the BBC
** BBC Radio 1Xtra, a digital radio station broadcasting black music
*CBC Radio One, a talk radio station operated by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporatio ...
offering continuous "Popular" music and Radio 2 more "Easy Listening". The "Third" programme became Radio 3 offering classical music and cultural programming. The Home Service became Radio 4 offering news, and non-musical content such as quiz shows, readings, dramas and plays. As well as the four national channels, a series of local BBC radio stations were established in 1967, including Radio London. In 1969, the BBC Enterprises department was formed to exploit BBC brands and programmes for commercial spin-off products. In 1979, it became a wholly owned limited company, BBC Enterprises Ltd.
In 1974, the BBC's teletext
A British Ceefax football index page from October 2009, showing the three-digit page numbers for a variety of football news stories
Teletext, or broadcast teletext, is a standard for displaying text and rudimentary graphics on suitably equipp ...
service, Ceefax
Ceefax (, punning on "seeing facts") was the world's first teletext information service and a forerunner to the current BBC Red Button service. Ceefax was started by the BBC in 1974 and ended, after 38 years of broadcasting, at 23:32:19 BST ( ...
, was introduced, created initially to provide subtitling, but developed into a news and information service. In 1978, BBC staff went on strike just before the Christmas, thus blocking out the transmission of both channels and amalgamating all four radio stations into one. Since the deregulation of the UK television and radio market in the 1980s, the BBC has faced increased competition from the commercial sector (and from the advertiser-funded public service broadcaster Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a fourth television service ...
), especially on satellite television, cable television, and digital television
Digital television (DTV) is the transmission of television signals using digital encoding, in contrast to the earlier analog television technology which used analog signals. At the time of its development it was considered an innovative adva ...
services. In the late 1980s, the BBC began a process of divestment by spinning off and selling parts of its organisation. In 1988, it sold off the Hulton Press Library, a photographic archive which had been acquired from the ''Picture Post
''Picture Post'' was a photojournalistic magazine published in the United Kingdom from 1938 to 1957. It is considered a pioneering example of photojournalism and was an immediate success, selling 1,700,000 copies a week after only two months. ...
'' magazine by the BBC in 1957. The archive was sold to Brian Deutsch and is now owned by Getty Images. In 1987, BBC decided to centralize its operations by the management team with the radio and television divisions joining forces together for the first time, the activities of the news and currents departments and coordinated jointly under the new directorate. During the 1990s, this process continued with the separation of certain operational arms of the corporation into autonomous but wholly owned subsidiaries
A subsidiary, subsidiary company or daughter company is a company owned or controlled by another company, which is called the parent company or holding company. Two or more subsidiaries that either belong to the same parent company or having a s ...
, with the aim of generating additional revenue for programme-making. BBC Enterprises was reorganised and relaunched in 1995, as BBC Worldwide Ltd. In 1998, BBC studios, outside broadcasts, post production, design, costumes and wigs were spun off into BBC Resources Ltd.
The BBC Research Department
BBC Research & Development is the technical research department of the BBC.
Function
It has responsibility for researching and developing advanced and emerging media technologies for the benefit of the corporation, and wider UK and European ...
has played a major part in the development of broadcasting and recording techniques. The BBC was also responsible for the development of the NICAM
Near Instantaneous Companded Audio Multiplex (NICAM) is an early form of lossy compression for digital audio. It was originally developed in the early 1970s for point-to-point links within broadcasting networks.Croll, M.G., Osborne, D.W. and Spi ...
stereo standard. In recent decades, a number of additional channels and radio stations have been launched: Radio 5 was launched in 1990, as a sports and educational station, but was replaced in 1994, with Radio 5 Live
BBC Radio 5 Live is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that broadcasts mainly news, sport, discussion, interviews and phone-ins. It is the principal BBC radio station covering sport in the United Kingdom, broadcas ...
to become a live radio station, following the success of the Radio 4 service to cover the 1991 Gulf War
The Gulf War was a 1990–1991 armed campaign waged by a Coalition of the Gulf War, 35-country military coalition in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Spearheaded by the United States, the coalition's efforts against Ba'athist Iraq, ...
. The new station would be a news and sport station. In 1997, BBC News 24
BBC News (also known as the BBC News Channel) is a British free-to-air public broadcast television news channel for BBC News. It was launched as BBC News 24 on 9 November 1997 at 5:30 pm as part of the BBC's foray into digital domestic telev ...
, a rolling news channel, launched on digital television
Digital television (DTV) is the transmission of television signals using digital encoding, in contrast to the earlier analog television technology which used analog signals. At the time of its development it was considered an innovative adva ...
services, and the following year, BBC Choice
BBC Choice was a British digital television channel which was owned by the BBC and was launched on 23 September 1998. It was the first British TV channel to broadcast exclusively in digital format, as well as the BBC's second non-analogue-terres ...
was launched as the third general entertainment channel from the BBC. The BBC also purchased The Parliamentary Channel, which was renamed BBC Parliament
BBC Parliament is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel from the BBC that broadcasts live and recorded coverage of the House of Commons, House of Lords and Select Committees of the British Parliament, the Scottish Parliamen ...
. In 1999, BBC Knowledge
BBC Knowledge was a British television channel which was owned by the BBC and was launched on 1 June 1999, broadcasting documentary, cultural and educational programmes. It was shut down on 2 March 2002, and was replaced by BBC Four.
History
L ...
launched as a multimedia channel, with services available on the newly launched BBC Text digital teletext service, and on BBC Online
BBC Online, formerly known as BBCi, is the BBC's online service. It is a large network of websites including such high-profile sites as BBC News and BBC Sport, Sport, the on-demand video and radio services branded BBC iPlayer and BBC Sounds, t ...
. The channel had an educational aim, which was modified later on in its life to offer documentaries.
2000 to 2011
In 2002, several television and radio channels were reorganised. BBC Knowledge was replaced by BBC Four and became the BBC's arts and documentaries channel. CBBC
CBBC (initialised as Children's BBC and also known as the CBBC Channel) is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the bran ...
, which had been a programming strand as Children's BBC since 1985, was split into CBBC and CBeebies
CBeebies is a British free-to-air public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the brand used for all BBC content for children aged 6 years and under. Its sister channel CBBC is aimed at older childr ...
, for younger children, with both new services getting a digital channel: the CBBC Channel and CBeebies Channel. In addition to the television channels, new digital radio stations were created: 1Xtra
BBC Radio 1Xtra is a British digital radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It broadcasts black music and urban music, including hip hop and R&B and is a sister station to Radio 1. Launching at 18:00 on 16 August 2002, it had been co ...
, 6 Music
BBC Radio 6 Music is a British digital radio station owned and operated by the BBC, specialising primarily in alternative music. BBC 6 Music was the first national music radio station to be launched by the BBC in 32 years. It is available onl ...
and BBC7. BBC 1Xtra
BBC Radio 1Xtra is a British digital radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It broadcasts black music and urban music, including hip hop and R&B and is a sister station to Radio 1. Launching at 18:00 on 16 August 2002, it had been c ...
was a sister station to Radio 1 Radio 1 or Radio One most commonly refers to:
*BBC Radio 1, a music radio station from the BBC
** BBC Radio 1Xtra, a digital radio station broadcasting black music
*CBC Radio One, a talk radio station operated by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporatio ...
and specialised in modern black music, BBC 6 Music specialised in alternative music genres and BBC7 specialised in archive, speech and children's programming.
The following few years resulted in repositioning of some channels to conform to a larger brand: in 2003, BBC Choice
BBC Choice was a British digital television channel which was owned by the BBC and was launched on 23 September 1998. It was the first British TV channel to broadcast exclusively in digital format, as well as the BBC's second non-analogue-terres ...
was replaced by BBC Three
BBC Three is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was first launched on 9 February 2003 with programmes targeting 16 to 34-year-olds, covering all genres including animation, comedy, cur ...
, with programming for younger adults and shocking real-life documentaries, BBC News 24 became the BBC News Channel
BBC News (also known as the BBC News Channel) is a British free-to-air public broadcast television news channel for BBC News. It was launched as BBC News 24 on 9 November 1997 at 5:30 pm as part of the BBC's foray into digital domestic telev ...
in 2008, and BBC Radio 7 became BBC Radio 4 Extra in 2011, with new programmes to supplement those broadcast on Radio 4. In 2008, another channel was launched, BBC Alba, a Scottish Gaelic
Scottish Gaelic ( gd, Gàidhlig ), also known as Scots Gaelic and Gaelic, is a Goidelic language (in the Celtic branch of the Indo-European language family) native to the Gaels of Scotland. As a Goidelic language, Scottish Gaelic, as well ...
service.
During this decade, the corporation began to sell off a number of its operational divisions to private owners; BBC Broadcast was spun off as a separate company in 2002, and in 2005, it was sold off to Australian-based Macquarie Capital Alliance Group and Macquarie Bank
Macquarie Group Limited () is an Australian global financial services group. Headquartered and listed in Australia (), Macquarie employs more than 17,000 staff in 33 markets, is the world's largest infrastructure asset manager and Australia's t ...
Limited and rebranded Red Bee Media
Red Bee Media, formerly Ericsson Broadcast and Media Services (EBMS), is an international broadcasting and media services company and the largest access provider in Europe. Red Bee has its headquarters in London, England, with branch offices in ...
. The BBC's IT, telephony
Telephony ( ) is the field of technology involving the development, application, and deployment of telecommunication services for the purpose of electronic transmission of voice, fax, or data, between distant parties. The history of telephony is i ...
and broadcast technology were brought together as BBC Technology Ltd in 2001, and the division was later sold to the German company Siemens IT Solutions and Services Atos Information Technology Incorporated is a service provider which is owned by Atos. Atos Information Technology Incorporated provides a wide range of information technology services such as consulting, systems integration, and IT management.
At ...
(SIS). SIS was subsequently acquired from Siemens by the French company Atos
Atos is a European multinational information technology (IT) service and consulting company headquartered in Bezons, France and offices worldwide. It specialises in hi-tech transactional services, unified communications, cloud, big data and ...
. Further divestments included BBC Books
BBC Books (also formerly known as BBC Publishing) is an imprint majority-owned and managed by Penguin Random House through its Ebury Publishing division. The minority shareholder is BBC Studios, the commercial subsidiary of the British Broadcasti ...
(sold to Random House
Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...
in 2006); BBC Outside Broadcasts Ltd (sold in 2008 to Satellite Information Services
Sports Information Services (SIS) is a company which provides content and production services to the betting industry; such as horse racing and greyhound racing, to betting shops in the United Kingdom and Ireland and other worldwide destinati ...
); Costumes and Wigs (stock sold in 2008 to Angels The Costumiers); and BBC Magazines
Immediate Media Company Limited (styled as Immediate Media Co) is a British multinational publishing house that currently publishes a significant range of titles, including ''Radio Times, BBC Top Gear, BBC Good Food'' and a host of others. In H ...
(sold to Immediate Media Company
Immediate Media Company Limited (styled as Immediate Media Co) is a British multinational publishing house that currently publishes a significant range of titles, including ''Radio Times, BBC Top Gear, BBC Good Food'' and a host of others. In ...
in 2011). After the sales of OBs and costumes, the remainder of BBC Resources was reorganised as BBC Studios and Post Production
BBC Studioworks Limited (formerly BBC Studios and Post Production Ltd and BBC Resources) is a commercial subsidiary of the BBC, providing television studios, post production and related services to the market.
It works with broadcasters and pro ...
, which continues today as a wholly owned subsidiary of the BBC.
The 2004 Hutton Inquiry
The Hutton Inquiry was a 2003 judicial inquiry in the UK chaired by Lord Hutton, who was appointed by the Labour government to investigate the controversial circumstances surrounding the death of Dr David Kelly, a biological warfare expert and ...
and the subsequent report raised questions about the BBC's journalistic standards and its impartiality. This led to resignations of senior management members at the time including the then Director General, Greg Dyke
Gregory Dyke (born 20 May 1947) is a British media executive, football administrator, journalist, and broadcaster. Since the 1960s, Dyke has had a long career in the UK in print and then broadcast journalism. He is credited with introducing ' ...
. In January 2007, the BBC released minutes of the board meeting which led to Greg Dyke's resignation.
Unlike the other departments of the BBC, the BBC World Service was funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office, more commonly known as the Foreign Office or the FCO, is the British government department responsible for promoting the interests of the United Kingdom abroad.
A strike in 2005 by more than 11,000 BBC workers, over a proposal to cut 4,000 jobs, and to privatise parts of the BBC, disrupted much of the BBC's regular programming.
In 2006, BBC HD
BBC HD was a 24-hour high-definition television channel provided by the BBC. The service was initially run as a trial from 15 May 2006 until becoming a full service on 1 December 2007 before its discontinuation on 26 March 2013. It broadcast ...
launched as an experimental service and became official in December 2007. The channel broadcast HD simulcasts of programmes on BBC One
BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, ...
, BBC Two, BBC Three
BBC Three is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was first launched on 9 February 2003 with programmes targeting 16 to 34-year-olds, covering all genres including animation, comedy, cur ...
and BBC Four as well as repeats of some older programmes in HD. In 2010, an HD simulcast of BBC One launched: BBC One HD. The channel uses HD versions of BBC One's schedule and uses upscaled versions of programmes not currently produced in HD. The BBC HD channel closed in March 2013 and was replaced by BBC Two HD in the same month.
On 18 October 2007, BBC Director General Mark Thompson announced a controversial plan to make major cuts and reduce the size of the BBC as an organisation. The plans included a reduction in posts of 2,500; including 1,800 redundancies, consolidating news operations, reducing programming output by 10% and selling off the flagship Television Centre building in London. These plans were fiercely opposed by unions, who threatened a series of strikes; however, the BBC stated that the cuts were essential to move the organisation forward and concentrate on increasing the quality of programming.
On 20 October 2010, the Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne
George Gideon Oliver Osborne (born Gideon Oliver Osborne; 23 May 1971) is a former British politician and newspaper editor who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 2010 to 2016 and as First Secretary of State from 2015 to 2016 in the ...
announced that the television licence fee would be frozen at its current level until the end of the current charter in 2016. The same announcement revealed that the BBC would take on the full cost of running the BBC World Service and the BBC Monitoring
BBC Monitoring (BBCM) is a division of the British Broadcasting Corporation which monitors, and reports on, mass media worldwide using open-source intelligence. Based at New Broadcasting House, the BBC's headquarters in central London, it has ...
service from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and partially finance the Welsh broadcaster S4C.
2011 to present
Further cuts were announced on 6 October 2011, so the BBC could reach a total reduction in their budget of 20%, following the licence fee freeze in October 2010, which included cutting staff by 2,000 and sending a further 1,000 to the MediaCityUK development in Salford
Salford () is a city and the largest settlement in the City of Salford metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. In 2011, Salford had a population of 103,886. It is also the second and only other city in the metropolitan county afte ...
, with BBC Three moving online only in 2016, the sharing of more programmes between stations and channels, sharing of radio news bulletins, more repeats in schedules, including the whole of BBC Two daytime and for some original programming to be reduced. BBC HD was closed on 26 March 2013, and replaced with an HD simulcast of BBC Two; however, flagship programmes, other channels and full funding for CBBC and CBeebies would be retained. Numerous BBC facilities have been sold off, including New Broadcasting House on Oxford Road in Manchester. Many major departments have been relocated to Broadcasting House in central London and MediaCityUK in Salford, particularly since the closure of BBC Television Centre in March 2013. On 16 February 2016, the BBC Three
BBC Three is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was first launched on 9 February 2003 with programmes targeting 16 to 34-year-olds, covering all genres including animation, comedy, cur ...
television service was discontinued and replaced by a digital outlet under the same name, targeting its young adult audience with web series and other content.
Under the new royal charter instituted in 2017, the corporation must publish an annual report to Ofcom, outlining its plans and public service obligations for the next year. In its 2017–18 report, released July 2017, the BBC announced plans to "re-invent" its output to better compete against commercial streaming services such as Netflix
Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fi ...
. These plans included increasing the diversity of its content on television and radio, a major increase in investments towards digital children's content, and plans to make larger investments in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland to "rise to the challenge of better reflecting and representing a changing UK". Since 2017, the BBC has also funded the Local Democracy Reporting Service, with up to 165 journalists employed by independent news organisations to report on local democracy issues on a pooled basis.
In 2016, the BBC Director General Tony Hall announced a savings target of £800 million per year by 2021, which is about 23% of annual licence fee revenue. Having to take on the £700 million cost for free TV licences for the over-75 pensioners, and rapid inflation in drama and sport coverage costs, was given as the reason. Duplication of management and content spending would be reduced, and there would be a review of BBC News
BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...
. In 2020, the BBC announced a BBC News savings target of £80 million per year by 2022, involving about 520 staff reductions. The BBC's director of news and current affairs Fran Unsworth
Francesca Mary Unsworth (born 29 December 1957) is a British journalist and media executive. Since January 2018 she has been Director, News & Current Affairs for BBC News. She was appointed in succession to James Harding. Before then she ser ...
said there would be further moves toward digital broadcasting, in part to attract back a youth audience, and more pooling of reporters to stop separate teams covering the same news. In 2020, the BBC reported a £119 million deficit because of delays to cost reduction plans, and the forthcoming ending of the remaining £253 million funding towards pensioner licence fees would increase financial pressures.
In January 2021, it was reported that former banker Richard Sharp would succeed David Clementi
Sir David Cecil Clementi (born 25 February 1949) is a British business executive and a former Deputy Governor of the Bank of England. He was formerly the Chairman of the BBC.
Clementi holds a number of board positions including chairman of int ...
, as chairman, when he stepped down in February.
In 2023, BBC's offices in New Delhi were searched by officials from the Income Tax Department. The move comes after BBC released a documentary on Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi
Narendra Damodardas Modi (; born 17 September 1950) is an Indian politician serving as the 14th and current Prime Minister of India since 2014. Modi was the Chief Minister of Gujarat from 2001 to 2014 and is the Member of Parliament fro ...
. The documentary investigated Modi's role in the 2002 Gujarat riots
The 2002 Gujarat riots, also known as the 2002 Gujarat violence, was a three-day period of inter-communal violence in the western Indian state of Gujarat. The burning of a train in Godhra on 27 February 2002, which caused the deaths of 58 Hin ...
, which resulted in more than 1,000 casualties. The Indian Government banned viewing of the documentary in India and restricted clips of the documentary on social media.
In March the BBC was at the centre of a political row with football pundit Gary Lineker
Gary Winston Lineker (; born 30 November 1960) is an English former professional footballer and current sports broadcaster. He is regarded as having been one of the greatest English strikers. His media career began with the BBC, where he has ...
, after Lineker made comments on social media comparing the British Governments proposed policy to that of the Nazis. After the comments, Lineker was suspended from his position on Match of the Day before being re-instated after receiving overwhelming support from his colleagues. The scandal was made worse due to the connections between BBC's chairman, Richarp Sharp, and the Conservative Party.
Governance and corporate structure
The BBC is a statutory corporation, independent from direct government intervention, with its activities being overseen from April 2017 by the BBC Board
The BBC Board is the governing board of the British Broadcasting Corporation #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
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and regulated by Ofcom. The chairman is Richard Sharp.
Charter
The BBC operates under a royal charter
A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta (great charter) of 1215, but s ...
. The current charter came into effect on 1 January 2017 and runs until 31 December 2027. The 2017 charter abolished the BBC Trust and replaced it with external regulation by Ofcom, with governance by the BBC Board.
Under the royal charter, the BBC must obtain a licence from the home secretary
The secretary of state for the Home Department, otherwise known as the home secretary, is a senior minister of the Crown in the Government of the United Kingdom. The home secretary leads the Home Office, and is responsible for all national s ...
. This licence is accompanied by an agreement which sets the terms and conditions under which the BBC is allowed to broadcast.
BBC Board
The BBC Board was formed in April 2017. It replaced the previous governing body, the BBC Trust
The BBC Trust was the governing body of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) between 2007 and 2017. It was operationally independent of BBC management and external bodies, and its stated aim was to make decisions in the best interests of ...
, which in itself had replaced the board of governors
A board of directors (commonly referred simply as the board) is an executive committee that jointly supervises the activities of an organization, which can be either a for-profit or a nonprofit organization such as a business, nonprofit organi ...
in 2007. The board sets the strategy for the corporation, assesses the performance of the BBC's executive board in delivering the BBC's services, and appoints the director-general. Regulation of the BBC is now the responsibility of Ofcom. The board consists of the following members.
Executive committee
The executive committee is responsible for the day-to-day operations of the broadcaster. Consisting of senior managers of the BBC, the committee meets once per month and is responsible for operational management and delivery of services within a framework set by the board, and is chaired by the director-general
A director general or director-general (plural: ''directors general'', ''directors-general'', ''director generals'' or ''director-generals''
) or general director is a senior executive officer, often the chief executive officer, within a governmen ...
, currently Tim Davie
Timothy Douglas Davie (born 25 April 1967 in Croydon, London) is the current and seventeenth Director-General of the BBC. He succeeded Tony Hall in the role on 1 September 2020. Davie was formerly the chief executive officer of BBC Studios. ...
, who is chief executive and (from 1994) editor-in-chief.
Operational divisions
The corporation has the following in-house divisions covering the BBC's output and operations:
* Content, headed by Charlotte Moore is in charge of the corporation's television channel
A television channel is a terrestrial frequency or virtual number over which a television station or television network is distributed. For example, in North America, "channel 2" refers to the terrestrial or cable band of 54 to 60 MHz, with ...
s including the commissioning of programming.
* Nations and Regions, headed by Rhodri Talfan Davies is responsible for the corporation's divisions in Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...
, Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...
, Wales
Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...
, the English Regions
The regions, formerly known as the government office regions, are the highest tier of sub-national division in England, established in 1994. Between 1994 and 2011, nine regions had officially devolved functions within government. While they no ...
.
Commercial divisions
The BBC also operates a number of wholly owned commercial divisions:
* BBC Studios
BBC Studios is a British content company. It is a commercial subsidiary of the BBC that was formed in April 2018 through the merger of the BBC's commercial production arm and the BBC's commercial international distribution arm, BBC Worldwide. ...
is the former in-house television production; Entertainment, Music & Events, Factual and Scripted (drama and comedy). Following a merger with BBC Worldwide in April 2018, it also operates international channels and sells programmes and merchandise in the UK and abroad to gain additional income that is returned to BBC programmes. It is kept separate from the corporation due to its commercial nature.
* BBC World News
BBC World News is an international English-language pay television network, operated under the ''BBC Global News Limited'' division of the BBC, which is a public corporation of the UK government's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and ...
department is in charge of the production and distribution of its commercial global television channel. It works closely with the BBC News group, but is not governed by it, and shares the corporation's facilities and staff. It also works with BBC Studios, the channel's distributor.
* BBC Studioworks
BBC Studioworks Limited (formerly BBC Studios and Post Production Ltd and BBC Resources) is a commercial subsidiary of the BBC, providing television studios, post production and related services to the market.
It works with broadcasters and pr ...
is also separate and officially owns and operates some of the BBC's studio facilities, such as the BBC Elstree Centre
The BBC Elstree Centre, sometimes referred to as the BBC Elstree Studios, is a television production facility, currently owned by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). The complex is located between Eldon Avenue and Clarendon Road in Bore ...
, leasing them out to productions from within and outside of the corporation.[bbc.co.uk About The BBC section](_blank)
. Retrieved 9 July 2011
MI5 vetting policy
From as early as the 1930s until the 1990s, MI5
The Security Service, also known as MI5 ( Military Intelligence, Section 5), is the United Kingdom's domestic counter-intelligence and security agency and is part of its intelligence machinery alongside the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), G ...
, the British domestic intelligence service, engaged in vetting of applicants for BBC positions, a policy designed to keep out persons deemed subversive. In 1933, BBC executive Colonel Alan Dawnay began to meet the head of MI5, Sir Vernon Kell
Major General Sir Vernon George Waldegrave Kell, (21 November 1873 – 27 March 1942) was a British Army general and the founder and first Director of the British Security Service, otherwise known as MI5. Known as K, he was described in ...
, to informally trade information; from 1935, a formal arrangement was made wherein job applicants would be secretly vetted by MI5 for their political views (without their knowledge). The BBC took up a policy of denying any suggestion of such a relationship by the press (the existence of MI5 itself was not officially acknowledged until the Security Service Act 1989
The Security Service Act 1989 (c 5) is an Act of the United Kingdom Parliament. The Act established a statutory basis of the UK Security Service (MI5) for the first time. Prior to the Act, despite its operation since 1909, successive UK governme ...
).
This relationship garnered wider public attention after an article by David Leigh and Paul Lashmar appeared in ''The Observer
''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the ...
'' in August 1985, revealing that MI5 had been vetting appointments, running operations out of Room 105 in Broadcasting House. At the time of the exposé, the operation was being run by Ronnie Stonham. A memo from 1984 revealed that blacklisted organisations included the far-left Communist Party of Great Britain, the Socialist Workers Party, the Workers Revolutionary Party and the Militant Tendency
, native_name_lang = cy
, logo =
, colorcode =
, leader = collective leadership(''Militant'' editorial board)
, leader1_name = Ted Grant
, leader1_title = Political Secretary
, leader2_name = Pet ...
, as well as the far-right National Front and the British National Party
The British National Party (BNP) is a far-right, fascist political party in the United Kingdom. It is headquartered in Wigton, Cumbria, and its leader is Adam Walker. A minor party, it has no elected representatives at any level of UK gover ...
. An association with one of these groups could result in a denial of a job application.
In October 1985, the BBC announced that it would stop the vetting process, except for a few people in top roles, as well as those in charge of Wartime Broadcasting Service
The Wartime Broadcasting Service is a service of the BBC that is intended to broadcast in the United Kingdom either after a nuclear attack or if conventional bombing destroyed regular BBC facilities in a conventional war. It is unclear if the ...
emergency broadcasting (in event of a nuclear war) and staff in the BBC World Service. In 1990, following the Security Service Act 1989, vetting was further restricted to only those responsible for wartime broadcasting and those with access to secret government information. Michael Hodder, who succeeded Stonham, had the MI5 vetting files sent to the BBC Information and Archives in Reading, Berkshire
Reading ( ) is a town and borough in Berkshire, Southeast England, southeast England. Located in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the rivers River Thames, Thames and River Kennet, Kennet, the Great Western Main Line railway and the M4 mot ...
.
Finances
The BBC has the second largest budget of any UK-based broadcaster with an operating expenditure of £4.722 billion in 2013/14 compared with £6.471 billion for British Sky Broadcasting
Sky UK Limited is a British broadcaster and telecommunications company that provides television and broadband Internet services, fixed line and mobile telephone services to consumers and businesses in the United Kingdom. It is a subsidiary of ...
in 2013/14 and £1.843 billion for ITV in the calendar year 2013.
Revenue
The principal means of funding the BBC is through the television licence, costing £154.50 per year per household since April 2019. Such a licence is required to legally receive broadcast television across the UK, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. No licence is required to own a television used for other means, or for sound only radio sets (though a separate licence for these was also required for non-TV households until 1971). The cost of a television licence is set by the government and enforced by the criminal law. A discount is available for households with only black-and-white television sets. A 50% discount is also offered to people who are registered blind or severely visually impaired, and the licence is completely free for any household containing anyone aged 75 or over. However, from August 2020, the licence fee will only be waived if over 75 and receiving pension credit.
The BBC pursues its licence fee collection and enforcement under the trading name "TV Licensing". The revenue is collected privately by Capita, an outside agency, and is paid into the central government Consolidated Fund
In many states with political systems derived from the Westminster system, a consolidated fund or consolidated revenue fund is the main bank account of the government. General taxation is taxation paid into the consolidated fund (as opposed ...
, a process defined in the Communications Act 2003
The Communications Act 2003 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The act, which came into force on 25 July 2003, superseded the Telecommunications Act 1984. The new act was the responsibility of Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell. It ...
. Funds are then allocated by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport
, type = Department
, logo = Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport logo.svg
, logo_width =
, logo_caption =
, seal =
, seal_width =
, seal_caption =
, picture = Gove ...
(DCMS) and the Treasury and approved by Parliament via legislation. Additional revenues are paid by the Department for Work and Pensions to compensate for subsidised licences for eligible over-75-year-olds.
The licence fee is classified as a tax, and its evasion is a criminal offence. Since 1991, collection and enforcement of the licence fee has been the responsibility of the BBC in its role as TV Licensing Authority. The BBC carries out surveillance (mostly using subcontractors) on properties (under the auspices of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000
The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 ( c.23) (RIP or RIPA) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, regulating the powers of public bodies to carry out surveillance and investigation, and covering the interception of comm ...
) and may conduct searches of a property using a search warrant. According to TV Licensing, 216,900 people in the UK were caught watching TV without a licence in 2018/19. Licence fee evasion makes up around one-tenth of all cases prosecuted in magistrates' courts, representing 0.3% of court time.
Income from commercial enterprises and from overseas sales of its catalogue of programmes has substantially increased over recent years, with BBC Worldwide contributing some £243 million to the BBC's core public service business.
According to the BBC's 2018/19 Annual Report, its total income was £4.889 billion a decrease from £5.062 billion in 2017/18 – partly owing to a 3.7% phased reduction in government funding for free over-75s TV licences, which can be broken down as follows:
* £3.690 billion in licence fees collected from householders;
* £1.199 billion from the BBC's commercial businesses and government grants some of which will cease in 2020
The licence fee has, however, attracted criticism. It has been argued that in an age of multi-stream, multi-channel availability, an obligation to pay a licence fee is no longer appropriate. The BBC's use of private sector company Capita Group to send letters to premises not paying the licence fee has been criticised, especially as there have been cases where such letters have been sent to premises which are up to date with their payments, or do not require a TV licence.
The BBC uses advertising campaigns to inform customers of the requirement to pay the licence fee. Past campaigns have been criticised by Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
MP Boris Johnson
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (; born 19 June 1964) is a British politician, writer and journalist who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2019 to 2022. He previously served as F ...
and former MP Ann Widdecombe
Ann Noreen Widdecombe (born 4 October 1947) is a British politician, author and television personality. She was Member of Parliament (MP) for Maidstone and The Weald, and the former Maidstone constituency, from 1987 to 2010 and Member of the ...
for having a threatening nature and language used to scare evaders into paying. Audio clips and television broadcasts are used to inform listeners of the BBC's comprehensive database. There are a number of pressure groups campaigning on the issue of the licence fee.
The majority of the BBC's commercial output comes from its commercial arm BBC Worldwide who sell programmes abroad and exploit key brands for merchandise. Of their 2012/13 sales, 27% were centred on the five key "superbrands" of '' Doctor Who'', ''Top Gear
Top Gear may refer to:
* "Top gear", the highest gear available in a vehicle's manual transmission
Television
* ''Top Gear'' (1977 TV series), a British motoring magazine programme
* ''Top Gear'' (2002 TV series), a relaunched version of the or ...
'', '' Strictly Come Dancing'' (known as '' Dancing with the Stars'' internationally), the BBC's archive of natural history programming (collected under the umbrella of BBC Earth
BBC Earth is a brand used by BBC Studios since 2009 to market and distribute the BBC's natural history content to countries other than the United Kingdom. BBC Studios is the commercial arm of the public service broadcaster.
BBC Earth commercia ...
) and the (now sold) travel guide brand Lonely Planet
Lonely Planet is a travel guide book publisher. Founded in Australia in 1973, the company has printed over 150 million books.
History Early years
Lonely Planet was founded by married couple Maureen and Tony Wheeler. In 1972, they embarke ...
.
Headquarters and regional offices
Broadcasting House in Portland Place, central London, is the official headquarters of the BBC. It is home to six of the ten BBC national radio networks, BBC Radio 1, BBC Radio 1xtra, BBC Asian Network, BBC Radio 3, BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...
, and BBC Radio 4 Extra. It is also the home of BBC News
BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...
, which relocated to the building from BBC Television Centre in 2013. On the front of the building are statues of Prospero
Prospero ( ) is a fictional character and the protagonist of William Shakespeare's play '' The Tempest''.
Prospero is the rightful Duke of Milan, whose usurping brother, Antonio, had put him (with his three-year-old daughter, Miranda) to se ...
and Ariel
Ariel may refer to:
Film and television
*Ariel Award, a Mexican Academy of Film award
* ''Ariel'' (film), a 1988 Finnish film by Aki Kaurismäki
* ''ARIEL Visual'' and ''ARIEL Deluxe'', 1989 and 1991 anime video series based on the novel series ...
, characters from William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
's play '' The Tempest'', sculpted by Eric Gill
Arthur Eric Rowton Gill, (22 February 1882 – 17 November 1940) was an English sculptor, letter cutter, typeface designer, and printmaker. Although the ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' describes Gill as ″the greatest artist-cra ...
. Renovation of Broadcasting House began in 2002, and was completed in 2012.
Until it closed at the end of March 2013, BBC Television was based at BBC Television Centre
Television Centre (TVC) is a building complex in White City, West London, that was the headquarters of BBC Television between 1960 and 2013. After a refurbishment, the complex reopened in 2017 with three studios in use for TV production, opera ...
, a purpose built television facility opened in 1960 located in White City, west of central London. This facility was host to a number of famous guests and programmes through the years, and its name and image is familiar with many British citizens. Nearby, the BBC White City
White City Place is the name given to the collection of buildings formerly known as BBC Media Village (more commonly simply as White City or W12 within the BBC). White City Place is a collection of six buildings occupying a 17-acre site off W ...
complex contains numerous programme offices, housed in Centre House, the Media Centre and Broadcast Centre. It is in this area around Shepherd's Bush that the majority of BBC employees worked.
As part of a major reorganisation of BBC property, the entire BBC News operation relocated from the News Centre at BBC Television Centre to the refurbished Broadcasting House to create what is being described as "one of the world's largest live broadcast centres". The BBC News Channel
BBC News (also known as the BBC News Channel) is a British free-to-air public broadcast television news channel for BBC News. It was launched as BBC News 24 on 9 November 1997 at 5:30 pm as part of the BBC's foray into digital domestic telev ...
and BBC World News
BBC World News is an international English-language pay television network, operated under the ''BBC Global News Limited'' division of the BBC, which is a public corporation of the UK government's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and ...
relocated to the premises in early 2013. Broadcasting House is now also home to most of the BBC's national radio stations, and the BBC World Service. The major part of this plan involved the demolition of the two post-war extensions to the building and construction of an extension designed by Sir Richard MacCormac of MJP Architects. This move concentrated the BBC's London operations, allowing them to sell Television Centre.
In addition to the scheme above, the BBC is in the process of making and producing more programmes outside London, involving production centres such as Belfast
Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdom ...
, Cardiff
Cardiff (; cy, Caerdydd ) is the capital and largest city of Wales. It forms a principal area, officially known as the City and County of Cardiff ( cy, Dinas a Sir Caerdydd, links=no), and the city is the eleventh-largest in the United Kingd ...
, Glasgow
Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...
, Newcastle and, most notably, in Greater Manchester as part of the "BBC North Project" scheme where several major departments, including BBC North West, BBC Manchester, BBC Sport, CBBC (TV channel), BBC Children's, CBeebies
CBeebies is a British free-to-air public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the brand used for all BBC content for children aged 6 years and under. Its sister channel CBBC is aimed at older childr ...
, Radio 5 Live
BBC Radio 5 Live is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that broadcasts mainly news, sport, discussion, interviews and phone-ins. It is the principal BBC radio station covering sport in the United Kingdom, broadcas ...
, BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra, ''BBC Breakfast'', BBC Learning and the BBC Philharmonic have all moved from their previous locations in either London or New Broadcasting House, Manchester to the new 200-acre (80ha) MediaCityUK production facilities in City of Salford, Salford, that form part of the large BBC North, BBC North Group division and will therefore become the biggest staffing operation outside London.
As well as the two main sites in London (Broadcasting House and White City), there are seven other important BBC production centres in the UK, mainly specialising in different productions. BBC Cymru Wales New Broadcasting House, Cardiff is home to BBC Cymru Wales, which specialises in drama production. Open since 2012, and containing 7 new studios, Roath Lock is notable as the home of productions such as '' Doctor Who'' and ''Casualty (TV series), Casualty''. Broadcasting House (Belfast), Broadcasting House Belfast, home to BBC Northern Ireland, specialises in original drama and comedy, and has taken part in many co-productions with independent companies and notably with RTÉ in the Republic of Ireland. BBC Scotland, based in BBC Pacific Quay, Pacific Quay, Glasgow is a large producer of programmes for the network, including several quiz shows. In England, the larger regions also produce some programming.
Previously, the largest hub of BBC programming from the BBC English Regions, regions is BBC North West. At present they produce all religious and ethical programmes on the BBC, as well as other programmes such as ''A Question of Sport''. However, this is to be merged and expanded under the BBC North project, which involved the region moving from New Broadcasting House, Manchester, to MediaCityUK. BBC West Midlands, BBC Midlands, based at The Mailbox in Birmingham, also produces drama and contains the headquarters for the BBC English Regions, English regions and the BBC's daytime output. Other production centres include Broadcasting House (Bristol), Broadcasting House Bristol, home of BBC West and famously the BBC Natural History Unit and to a lesser extent, Quarry Hill, Leeds, Quarry Hill in Leeds, home of BBC Yorkshire. There are also many smaller local and regional studios throughout the UK, operating the BBC regional television services and the BBC Local Radio stations.
The BBC also operates several news gathering centres in various locations around the world, which provide news coverage of that region to the national and international news operations.
Technology (Atos service)
In 2004, the BBC contracted out its former BBC Technology division to the German engineering and electronics company Siemens IT Solutions and Services Atos Information Technology Incorporated is a service provider which is owned by Atos. Atos Information Technology Incorporated provides a wide range of information technology services such as consulting, systems integration, and IT management.
At ...
(SIS), outsourcing its IT, telephony
Telephony ( ) is the field of technology involving the development, application, and deployment of telecommunication services for the purpose of electronic transmission of voice, fax, or data, between distant parties. The history of telephony is i ...
and broadcast technology systems. When Atos Origin acquired the SIS division from Siemens in December 2010 for €850 million (£720m), the BBC support contract also passed to Atos
Atos is a European multinational information technology (IT) service and consulting company headquartered in Bezons, France and offices worldwide. It specialises in hi-tech transactional services, unified communications, cloud, big data and ...
, and in July 2011, the BBC announced to staff that its technology support would become an Atos service. Siemens staff working on the BBC contract were transferred to Atos; the BBC's Information technology, Information Technology systems are now managed by Atos. In 2011, the BBC's chief financial officer Zarin Patel stated to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons Public Accounts Committee (United Kingdom), Public Accounts Committee that, following criticism of the BBC's management of major IT projects with Siemens (such as the Digital Media Initiative), the BBC partnership with Atos would be instrumental in achieving cost savings of around £64 million as part of the BBC's "Delivering Quality First" programme. In 2012, the BBC's then-Chief Technology Officer John Linwood, expressed confidence in service improvements to the BBC's technology provision brought about by Atos. He also stated that supplier accountability had been strengthened following some high-profile technology failures which had taken place during the partnership with Siemens.
Services
Television
The BBC operates several television channels nationally and internationally. BBC One
BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, ...
and BBC Two are the flagship television channels. Others include the youth channel BBC Three
BBC Three is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was first launched on 9 February 2003 with programmes targeting 16 to 34-year-olds, covering all genres including animation, comedy, cur ...
, which originally ceased broadcasting as a linear television channel in February 2016 and returned to television in February 2022, cultural and documentary channel BBC Four, news channels BBC News (TV channel), BBC News and the BBC World News
BBC World News is an international English-language pay television network, operated under the ''BBC Global News Limited'' division of the BBC, which is a public corporation of the UK government's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and ...
, parliamentary channel BBC Parliament
BBC Parliament is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel from the BBC that broadcasts live and recorded coverage of the House of Commons, House of Lords and Select Committees of the British Parliament, the Scottish Parliamen ...
, and two children's channels, CBBC
CBBC (initialised as Children's BBC and also known as the CBBC Channel) is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the bran ...
and CBeebies
CBeebies is a British free-to-air public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the brand used for all BBC content for children aged 6 years and under. Its sister channel CBBC is aimed at older childr ...
. Digital television is now entrenched in the UK, with analogue transmission completely phased out .
BBC One is a regionalised TV service which provides opt-outs throughout the day for local news and other local programming. These variations are more pronounced in the BBC "Nations", i.e. Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...
, Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...
and BBC Wales, Wales, where the presentation is mostly carried out locally on BBC One and Two, and where programme schedules can vary greatly from that of the network. BBC Two variations exist in the Nations; however, BBC English Regions, English regions today rarely have the option to opt out as regional programming now only exists on BBC One. In 2019, the Scottish variation of BBC Two ceased operation and was replaced with the networked version in favour of the BBC Scotland (TV channel), BBC Scotland channel. BBC Two was also the first channel to be transmitted on 625 lines in 1964, then carry a small-scale regular colour service from 1967. BBC One would follow in November 1969.
A new Scottish Gaelic
Scottish Gaelic ( gd, Gàidhlig ), also known as Scots Gaelic and Gaelic, is a Goidelic language (in the Celtic branch of the Indo-European language family) native to the Gaels of Scotland. As a Goidelic language, Scottish Gaelic, as well ...
television channel, BBC Alba, was launched in September 2008. It is also the first multi-genre channel to come entirely from Scotland with almost all of its programmes made in Scotland. The service was initially only available via Satellite television, satellite but since June 2011 has been available to viewers in Scotland on Freeview (UK), Freeview and cable television.
The BBC currently operates High-definition television, HD simulcasts of all its nationwide channels with the exception of BBC Parliament
BBC Parliament is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel from the BBC that broadcasts live and recorded coverage of the House of Commons, House of Lords and Select Committees of the British Parliament, the Scottish Parliamen ...
. Until 26 March 2013, a separate channel called BBC HD
BBC HD was a 24-hour high-definition television channel provided by the BBC. The service was initially run as a trial from 15 May 2006 until becoming a full service on 1 December 2007 before its discontinuation on 26 March 2013. It broadcast ...
was available, in place of BBC Two HD. It launched on 15 May 2006, following a 12-month trial of the broadcasts. It became a proper channel in 2007, and screened HD programmes as simulcasts of the main network, or as repeats. The corporation has been producing programmes in the format for many years, and stated that it hoped to produce 100% of new programmes in HDTV by 2010. On 3 November 2010, a high-definition simulcast of BBC One was launched, entitled BBC One HD, and BBC Two HD launched on 26 March 2013, replacing BBC HD. Scotland's new television channel, BBC Scotland, launched in February 2019.
In the Republic of Ireland, Belgium, the Netherlands and Switzerland, the BBC channels are available in a number of ways. In these countries digital and cable operators carry a range of BBC channels. These include BBC One, BBC Two, BBC Four and BBC World News, although viewers in the Republic of Ireland may receive BBC services via overspill from transmitters in Northern Ireland or Wales, or via "deflectors"—transmitters in the Republic which rebroadcast broadcasts from the UK, received off-air, or from digital satellite.
Since 1975, the BBC has also provided its TV programmes to the British Forces Broadcasting Service, British Forces Broadcasting Service (BFBS), allowing members of Military of the United Kingdom, UK military serving abroad to watch them on four dedicated TV channels. From 27 March 2013, BFBS will carry versions of BBC One and BBC Two, which will include children's programming from CBBC
CBBC (initialised as Children's BBC and also known as the CBBC Channel) is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the bran ...
, as well as carrying programming from BBC Three
BBC Three is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was first launched on 9 February 2003 with programmes targeting 16 to 34-year-olds, covering all genres including animation, comedy, cur ...
on a new channel called Forces TV, BFBS Extra.
Since 2008, all the BBC channels are available to watch online through the BBC iPlayer service. This online streaming ability came about following experiments with live streaming, involving streaming certain channels in the UK. In February 2014, Director-General Tony Hall announced that the corporation needed to save £100 million. In March 2014, the BBC confirmed plans for BBC Three to become an internet-only channel.
BBC Genome Project
In December 2012, the BBC completed a digitisation exercise, scanning the listings of all BBC programmes from an entire run of about 4,500 copies of the ''Radio Times'' magazine from the first, 1923, issue to 2009 (later listings already being held electronically), the "BBC Genome project", with a view to creating an online database of its programme output. An earlier ten months of listings are to be obtained from other sources. They identified around five million programmes, involving 8.5 million actors, presenters, writers and technical staff. The Genome project was opened to public access on 15 October 2014, with corrections to OCR errors and changes to advertised schedules being Crowdsourcing, crowdsourced.
Radio
The BBC has ten radio stations serving the whole of the UK, a further seven stations in the "national regions" (Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland), and 39 other local stations serving defined areas of England. Of the ten national stations, five are major stations and are available on FM broadcasting, FM and/or AM broadcasting, AM as well as on Digital radio in the United Kingdom, DAB and online. These are BBC Radio 1, offering new music and popular styles and being notable for its chart show; BBC Radio 2, playing Adult contemporary music, Adult contemporary, country and soul music amongst many other genres; BBC Radio 3, presenting classical and jazz music together with some spoken-word programming of a cultural nature in the evenings; BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...
, focusing on current affairs, factual and other speech-based programming, including drama and comedy; and BBC Radio 5 Live, broadcasting 24-hour news, sport and talk programmes.
In addition to these five stations, the BBC runs a further five stations that broadcast on DAB and online only. These stations supplement and expand on the big five stations, and were launched in 2002. BBC Radio 1Xtra sisters Radio 1, and broadcasts new black music and urban tracks. BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra sisters 5 Live and offers extra sport analysis, including broadcasting sports that previously were not covered. BBC Radio 6 Music offers alternative music genres and is notable as a platform for new artists.
BBC Radio 7, later renamed BBC Radio 4 Extra, provided archive drama, comedy and children's programming. Following the change to Radio 4 Extra, the service has dropped a defined children's strand in favour of family-friendly drama and comedy. In addition, new programmes to complement Radio 4 programmes were introduced such as ''Ambridge Extra'', and ''Desert Island Discs revisited''. The final station is the BBC Asian Network, providing music, talk and news to this section of the community. This station evolved out of Local radio stations serving certain areas, and as such this station is available on Medium Wave frequency in some areas of the Midlands.
As well as the national stations, the BBC also provides 40 BBC Local Radio stations in England and the Channel Islands, each named for and covering a particular city and its surrounding area (e.g. BBC Radio Bristol), county or region (e.g. BBC Three Counties Radio), or geographical area (e.g. BBC Radio Solent covering the central south coast). A further six stations broadcast in what the BBC terms "the national regions": Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. These are BBC Radio Wales (in English), BBC Radio Cymru (in Welsh language, Welsh), BBC Radio Scotland (in English), BBC Radio nan Gaidheal (in Scottish Gaelic language, Scottish Gaelic), BBC Radio Ulster, and BBC Radio Foyle, the latter being an opt-out station from Radio Ulster for the north-west of Northern Ireland.
The BBC's UK national channels are also broadcast in the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man (although these Crown Dependencies are outside the UK), and in the former there are two local stations – BBC Guernsey and BBC Radio Jersey. There is no BBC local radio station, however, in the Isle of Man, partly because the island has long been served by the popular independent commercial station, Manx Radio, which predates the existence of BBC Local Radio. BBC services in the dependencies are financed from television licence fees which are set at the same level as those payable in the UK, although collected locally. This is the subject of some controversy in the Isle of Man since, as well as having no BBC Local Radio service, the island also lacks a local television news service analogous to that provided by BBC Channel Islands News, BBC Channel Islands.
For a worldwide audience, the BBC World Service provides news, current affairs and information in 28 languages, including English, around the world and is available in over 150 capital cities. It is broadcast worldwide on shortwave radio, DAB and online and has an estimated weekly audience of 192 million, and its websites have an audience of 38 million people per week. Since 2005, it is also available on DAB in the UK, a step not taken before, due to the way it is funded. The service is funded by a Parliamentary Grant-in-Aid, administered by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Foreign Office; however, following the Government's spending review in 2011, this funding will cease, and it will be funded for the first time through the Licence fee. In recent years, some services of the World Service have been reduced: the Thai language, Thai service ended in 2006, as did the Eastern European languages. Resources were diverted instead into the new BBC Arabic Television.
Historically, the BBC was the only legal radio broadcaster based in the UK mainland until 1967, when URY, University Radio York (URY), then under the name ''Radio York'', was launched as the first, and now oldest, legal independent radio station in the country. However, the BBC did not enjoy a complete monopoly before this, as several Continental stations, such as Radio Luxembourg (English), Radio Luxembourg, had broadcast programmes in English to Britain since the 1930s and the Isle of Man-based Manx Radio began in 1964. Today, despite the advent of commercial radio, BBC radio stations remain among the most listened-to in the country. Radio 2 has the largest audience share (up to 16.8% in 2011–12) and Radios 1 and 4 ranked second and third in terms of weekly Reach (advertising), reach.
BBC programming is also available to other services and in other countries. Since 1943, the BBC has provided radio programming to the British Forces Broadcasting Service, which broadcasts in countries where British troops are stationed. BBC Radio 1 is also carried in Canada on Sirius XM Radio (online streaming only).
The BBC is a patron of The Radio Academy.
News
BBC News is the largest broadcast news gathering operation in the world, providing services to BBC domestic radio as well as television networks such as the BBC News (TV channel), BBC News, BBC Parliament
BBC Parliament is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel from the BBC that broadcasts live and recorded coverage of the House of Commons, House of Lords and Select Committees of the British Parliament, the Scottish Parliamen ...
and BBC World News
BBC World News is an international English-language pay television network, operated under the ''BBC Global News Limited'' division of the BBC, which is a public corporation of the UK government's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and ...
. In addition to this, news stories are available on the BBC Red Button service and BBC News Online. In addition to this, the BBC has been developing new ways to access BBC News and as a result, has launched the service on BBC Mobile, making it accessible to mobile phones and PDAs, as well as developing alerts by email, on digital television, and on computers through a BBC Alerts, desktop alert.
Ratings figures suggest that during major incidents such as the 7 July 2005 London bombings or royal events, the UK audience overwhelmingly turns to the BBC's coverage as opposed to its commercial rivals.
On 7 July 2005, the day that there were a series of coordinated bomb blasts on London's public transport system, the BBC Online
BBC Online, formerly known as BBCi, is the BBC's online service. It is a large network of websites including such high-profile sites as BBC News and BBC Sport, Sport, the on-demand video and radio services branded BBC iPlayer and BBC Sounds, t ...
website recorded an all time bandwidth (computing), bandwidth peak of 11 gigabit, Gb/s at 12.00 on 7 July. BBC News received some 1 billion total hits on the day of the event (including all images, text, and HTML), serving some 5.5 terabytes of data. At peak times during the day, there were 40,000-page requests per second for the BBC News website. The previous day's announcement of the 2012 Olympics being awarded to London caused a peak of around 5 Gbit/s. The previous all-time high at BBC Online
BBC Online, formerly known as BBCi, is the BBC's online service. It is a large network of websites including such high-profile sites as BBC News and BBC Sport, Sport, the on-demand video and radio services branded BBC iPlayer and BBC Sounds, t ...
was caused by the announcement of the Michael Jackson verdict, which used 7.2 Gbit/s.
Internet
The BBC's online presence includes a comprehensive BBC News Online, news website and archive. The BBC's first official online service was the BBC Networking Club, which was launched on 11 May 1994. The service was subsequently relaunched as BBC Online in 1997, before being renamed BBCi, then bbc.co.uk, before it was rebranded back as BBC Online. The website is funded by the Licence fee, but uses Geo targeting, GeoIP technology, allowing advertisements to be carried on the site when viewed outside of the UK. The BBC claims the site to be "Europe's most popular content-based site" and states that 13.2 million people in the UK visit the site's more than two million pages each day.
The centre of the website is the Homepage, which features a modular layout. Users can choose which modules, and which information, is displayed on their homepage, allowing the user to customise it. This system was first launched in December 2007, becoming permanent in February 2008, and has undergone a few aesthetical changes since then. The home page then has links to other micro-sites, such as BBC News Online, BBC Sport, Sport, BBC Weather, Weather, TV, and Radio. As part of the site, every programme on BBC Television or Radio is given its own page, with bigger programmes getting their own micro-site, and as a result it is often common for viewers and listeners to be told Uniform Resource Locator, website addresses (URLs) for the programme website.
Another large part of the site also allows users to watch and listen to most Television and Radio output live and for seven days after broadcast using the BBC iPlayer platform, which launched on 27 July 2007, and initially used peer-to-peer and Digital rights management, DRM technology to deliver both radio and TV content of the last seven days for offline use for up to 30 days, since then video is now streamed directly. Also, through participation in the Creative Archive Licence group, bbc.co.uk allowed legal downloads of selected archive material via the internet.
The BBC has often included learning as part of its online service, running services such as BBC Jam, BBC Learning Zone, Learning Zone Class Clips and also runs services such as BBC WebWise and First Click which are designed to teach people how to use the internet. BBC Jam was a free online service, delivered through broadband and narrowband connections, providing high-quality interactive resources designed to stimulate learning at home and at school. Initial content was made available in January 2006; however, BBC Jam was suspended on 20 March 2007 due to allegations made to the European Commission that it was damaging the interests of the commercial sector of the industry.
In recent years, some major on-line companies and politicians have complained that BBC Online receives too much funding from the television licence, meaning that other websites are unable to compete with the vast amount of advertising-free on-line content available on BBC Online. Some have proposed that the amount of licence fee money spent on BBC Online should be reduced—either being replaced with funding from advertisements or subscriptions, or a reduction in the amount of content available on the site. In response to this the BBC carried out an investigation, and has now set in motion a plan to change the way it provides its online services. BBC Online will now attempt to fill in gaps in the market, and will guide users to other websites for currently existing market provision. (For example, instead of providing local events information and timetables, users will be guided to outside websites already providing that information.)
Part of this plan included the BBC closing some of its websites, and rediverting money to redevelop other parts.
On 26 February 2010, ''The Times'' claimed that Mark Thompson (television executive), Mark Thompson, Director General of the BBC, proposed that the BBC's web output should be cut by 50%, with online staff numbers and budgets reduced by 25% in a bid to scale back BBC operations and allow commercial rivals more room. On 2 March 2010, the BBC reported that it would cut its website spending by 25% and close BBC 6 Music and Asian Network, as part of Mark Thompson's plans to make "a smaller, fitter BBC for the digital age".
Interactive television
BBC Red Button is the brand name for the BBC's Interactive television, interactive digital television
Digital television (DTV) is the transmission of television signals using digital encoding, in contrast to the earlier analog television technology which used analog signals. At the time of its development it was considered an innovative adva ...
services, which are available through Freeview (UK), Freeview (digital terrestrial), as well as Freesat, Sky (UK & Ireland), Sky (satellite), and Virgin Media (cable). Unlike Ceefax
Ceefax (, punning on "seeing facts") was the world's first teletext information service and a forerunner to the current BBC Red Button service. Ceefax was started by the BBC in 1974 and ended, after 38 years of broadcasting, at 23:32:19 BST ( ...
, the service's analogue counterpart, BBC Red Button is able to display full-colour graphics, photographs, and video, as well as programmes and can be accessed from any BBC channel. The service carries News, Weather and Sport 24 hours a day, but also provides extra features related to programmes specific at that time. Examples include viewers to play along at home to gameshows, to give, voice and vote on opinions to issues, as used alongside programmes such as ''Question Time (TV series), Question Time''. At some points in the year, when multiple sporting events occur, some coverage of less mainstream sports or games are frequently placed on the Red Button for viewers to watch. Frequently, other features are added unrelated to programmes being broadcast at that time, such as the broadcast of the '' Doctor Who'' animated episode ''Dreamland (Doctor Who), Dreamland'' in November 2009.
Music
The BBC employs 5 staff orchestras, a professional choir, and supports two amateur choruses, based in BBC venues across the UK; the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Singers and BBC Symphony Chorus based in London, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra in Glasgow, the BBC Philharmonic in Salford, the BBC Concert Orchestra based in Watford, and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and BBC National Chorus of Wales in Cardiff. It also buys a selected number of broadcasts from the Ulster Orchestra in Belfast and the BBC Big Band.
The The Proms, BBC Proms have been produced by the BBC every year since 1927, stepping in to fund the popular classical music festival when music publishers Chappell and Co withdrew their support. In 1930, the newly formed BBC Symphony Orchestra gave all 49 Proms, and have performed at every Last Night of the Proms since then. Nowadays, the BBC's orchestras and choirs are the backbone of the Proms, giving around 40%–50% of all performances each season.
Many famous musicians of every genre have played at the BBC, such as The Beatles (''Live at the BBC (Beatles album), Live at the BBC'' is one of their many albums). The BBC is also responsible for the broadcast of Glastonbury Festival, Reading Festival and United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest, United Kingdom coverage of the Eurovision Song Contest, a show with which the broadcaster has been associated for over 60 years. The BBC also operates the division of BBC Audiobooks sometimes found in association with Chivers Audiobooks.
Other
The BBC operates other ventures in addition to their broadcasting arm. In addition to broadcasting output on television and radio, some programmes are also displayed on the BBC Big Screens located in several central-city locations. The BBC and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office also jointly run BBC Monitoring
BBC Monitoring (BBCM) is a division of the British Broadcasting Corporation which monitors, and reports on, mass media worldwide using open-source intelligence. Based at New Broadcasting House, the BBC's headquarters in central London, it has ...
, which monitors radio, television, the press and the internet worldwide. The BBC also developed several computers throughout the 1980s, most notably the BBC Micro, which ran alongside the corporation's educational aims and programming.
In 1951, in conjunction with Oxford University Press the BBC published ''The BBC Hymn Book'' which was intended to be used by radio listeners to follow hymns being broadcast. The book was published both with and without music, the music edition being entitled ''The BBC Hymn Book with Music''. The book contained 542 popular hymns.
Ceefax
The BBC provided the world's first teletext service called Ceefax
Ceefax (, punning on "seeing facts") was the world's first teletext information service and a forerunner to the current BBC Red Button service. Ceefax was started by the BBC in 1974 and ended, after 38 years of broadcasting, at 23:32:19 BST ( ...
(near-homophonous with "See Facts") on 23 September 1974 until 23 October 2012 on the BBC 1 analogue channel then later on BBC 2. It showed informational pages, such as News, Sport, and the Weather. From New Year's Eve in 1974, ITV plc, ITV's ORACLE (teletext), Oracle tried to compete with Ceefax. Oracle closed on New Year's Eve, 1992. During its lifetime, Ceefax attracted millions of viewers, right up to 2012, prior to the UK digital transition, digital switchover in the United Kingdom. Since then, the BBC's BBC Red Button, Red Button Service has provided a digital information system that replaced Ceefax.
BritBox
In 2016, the BBC, in partnership with fellow UK Broadcasters ITV and Channel 4 (who later withdrew from the project), set up 'project kangaroo' to develop an international online streaming service to rival services such as Netflix and Hulu. During the development stages 'Britflix' was touted as a potential name. However, the service eventually launched as BritBox in March 2017. The online platform shows a catalogue of classic BBC and ITV shows, as well as making a number of programmes available shortly after their UK broadcast. , BritBox is available in the UK, the US, Canada, Australia, and, more recently, South Africa, with the potential availability for new markets in the future.
Commercial activities
BBC Studios (formerly BBC Worldwide) is the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the BBC, responsible for the commercial exploitation of BBC programmes and other properties, including a number of television stations throughout the world. It was formed following the restructuring of its predecessor, BBC Enterprises, in 1995.
The company owns and administers a number of commercial stations around the world operating in a number of territories and on a number of different platforms. The channel BBC Entertainment shows current and archive entertainment programming to viewers in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Middle East, with the BBC Studios channels BBC America and BBC Canada (Joint venture with Corus Entertainment) showing similar programming in the North America region and BBC UKTV in the Australasia region. The company also airs two channels aimed at children, an international CBeebies
CBeebies is a British free-to-air public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the brand used for all BBC content for children aged 6 years and under. Its sister channel CBBC is aimed at older childr ...
channel and BBC Kids, a joint venture with Knowledge Network, Knowledge Network Corporation, which airs programmes under the CBeebies and BBC K brands. The company also runs the channels BBC Knowledge (international), BBC Knowledge, broadcasting factual and learning programmes, and BBC Lifestyle, broadcasting programmes based on themes of Food, Style and Wellbeing. In addition to this, BBC Studios runs an international version of the channel BBC HD Scandinavia, BBC HD, and provides HD simulcasts of the channels BBC Knowledge and BBC America.
BBC Studios also distributes the 24-hour international news channel BBC World News
BBC World News is an international English-language pay television network, operated under the ''BBC Global News Limited'' division of the BBC, which is a public corporation of the UK government's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and ...
. The station is separate from BBC Studios to maintain the station's neutral point of view, but is distributed by BBC Studios. The channel itself is the oldest surviving entity of its kind, and has 50 foreign news bureaus and correspondents in nearly all countries in the world. As officially surveyed, it is available to more than 294 million households, significantly more than CNN's estimated 200 million.
In addition to these international channels, BBC Studios also owns the UKTV network of seven channels. These channels contain BBC archive programming to be rebroadcast on their respective channels: Alibi (TV channel), Alibi, crime dramas; Dave (TV channel), Dave (slogan: "The Home of Witty Banter"); Drama (British TV channel), Drama, drama, launched in 2013; Eden (British TV channel), Eden, nature; Gold (UK TV channel), Gold, comedy; W (UK TV channel), W, Entertainment; and Yesterday (TV channel), Yesterday, history programming.
In addition to these channels, many BBC programmes are sold via BBC Studios to foreign television stations with comedy, documentaries, crime dramas (such as ''Luther (TV series), Luther'' and ''Peaky Blinders (TV series), Peaky Blinders'') and Costume drama, historical drama productions being the most popular. The BBC's most successful reality television show format, '' Strictly Come Dancing''—under the title ''Dancing with the Stars''—has been exported to 60 other countries. In addition, BBC television news appears nightly on many Public Broadcasting Service stations in the United States, as do reruns of BBC programmes such as ''EastEnders'', and in New Zealand on TVNZ 1.
In addition to programming, BBC Studios produces material to accompany programmes. The company maintained the publishing arm of the BBC, BBC Magazines
Immediate Media Company Limited (styled as Immediate Media Co) is a British multinational publishing house that currently publishes a significant range of titles, including ''Radio Times, BBC Top Gear, BBC Good Food'' and a host of others. In H ...
, which published the ''Radio Times'' as well as a number of magazines that support BBC programming such as ''Top Gear (magazine), BBC Top Gear'', ''BBC Good Food'', ''The Sky at Night, BBC Sky at Night'', ''BBC History'', ''BBC Wildlife'' and ''BBC Music Magazine, BBC Music''. BBC Magazines was sold to Exponent Private Equity in 2011, which merged it with Origin Publishing (previously owned by BBC Worldwide between 2004 and 2006) to form Immediate Media Company
Immediate Media Company Limited (styled as Immediate Media Co) is a British multinational publishing house that currently publishes a significant range of titles, including ''Radio Times, BBC Top Gear, BBC Good Food'' and a host of others. In ...
.
BBC Studios also publishes books, to accompany programmes such as '' Doctor Who'' under the BBC Books
BBC Books (also formerly known as BBC Publishing) is an imprint majority-owned and managed by Penguin Random House through its Ebury Publishing division. The minority shareholder is BBC Studios, the commercial subsidiary of the British Broadcasti ...
brand, a publishing imprint majority owned by Random House
Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...
. Soundtrack albums, talking books and sections of radio broadcasts are also sold under the brand BBC Records, with DVDs also being sold and licensed in large quantities to consumers both in the UK and abroad under the 2 Entertain brand. Archive programming and classical music recordings are sold under the brand BBC Legends.
Cultural significance
Until the development, popularisation, and domination of television, radio was the broadcast medium upon which people in the United Kingdom relied. It "reached into every home in the land, and simultaneously united the nation, an important factor during the Second World War". The BBC introduced the world's first "high-definition" 405-line television system, 405-line television service in 1936. It suspended its television service during the Second World War and until 1946, but remained the only television broadcaster in the UK until 1955, when Independent Television ( ITV) began operating.[Perry (1999) p16] This heralded the transformation of television into a popular and dominant medium. Nevertheless, "throughout the 1950s radio still remained the dominant source of broadcast comedy". Further, the BBC was the only legal radio broadcaster until 1968 (when URY obtained its first licence).
Despite the advent of commercial television and radio, with competition from ITV, Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a fourth television service ...
and British Sky Broadcasting, Sky, the BBC has remained one of the main elements in British popular culture through its obligation to produce TV and radio programmes for mass audiences. However, the arrival of BBC2 allowed the BBC also to make programmes for minority interests in drama, documentaries, current affairs, entertainment, and sport. Examples cited include the television series ''Civilisation (TV series), Civilisation'', '' Doctor Who'', ''I, Claudius (TV series), I, Claudius'', ''Monty Python's Flying Circus'', ''Pot Black'', and ''Tonight (1957 TV series), Tonight'', but other examples can be given in each of these fields as shown by the BBC's entries in the British Film Institute's 2000 list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes, with the BBC's 1970s sitcom ''Fawlty Towers'' (featuring John Cleese as Basil Fawlty) topping the list. ''Top of the Pops'', the world's longest-running weekly music show, first aired in January 1964, The Rolling Stones being the first performers on it. On air since 22 August 1964, ''Match of the Day'' is broadcast on Saturday nights during the Premier League season. Some BBC shows have had a direct impact on society. For example, ''The Great British Bake Off'' is credited with reinvigorating interest in baking throughout the UK, with stores reporting sharp rises in sales of baking ingredients and accessories. The export of BBC programmes through services like the BBC World Service and BBC World News
BBC World News is an international English-language pay television network, operated under the ''BBC Global News Limited'' division of the BBC, which is a public corporation of the UK government's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and ...
, as well as through the channels operated by BBC Studios
BBC Studios is a British content company. It is a commercial subsidiary of the BBC that was formed in April 2018 through the merger of the BBC's commercial production arm and the BBC's commercial international distribution arm, BBC Worldwide. ...
, means that audiences can consume BBC productions worldwide. Long-running BBC shows include: ''Desert Island Discs'', broadcast on radio since 1942; ''Panorama (British TV programme), Panorama'', broadcast on BBC television since 1953 it is the world's longest-running news television programme.
The British Academy Film Awards (BAFTAs) was first broadcast on the BBC in 1956, with Vivien Leigh as the host. The television equivalent, the British Academy Television Awards, has been screened exclusively on the BBC since a 2007 British Academy Television Awards, 2007 awards ceremony that included wins for Jim Broadbent (Best actor) and Ricky Gervais (Best comedy performance).
The term "BBC English" was used as an alternative name for Received Pronunciation, and the ''English Pronouncing Dictionary'' uses the term "BBC Pronunciation" to label its recommendations. However, the BBC itself now makes more use of Regional accents of English speakers, regional accents in order to reflect the diversity of the UK, while continuing to expect clarity and fluency of its presenters. From its "starchy" beginnings, the BBC has also become more inclusive, and now attempts to accommodate the interests of all strata of society and all minorities, because they all pay the licence fee.
Colloquial terms
Older domestic UK audiences often refer to the BBC as "the Beeb", a nickname originally coined by Peter Sellers on ''The Goon Show'' in the 1950s, when he referred to the "Beeb Beeb Ceeb". It was then borrowed, shortened and popularised by radio DJ Kenny Everett. David Bowie's recording sessions at the BBC were released as ''Bowie at the Beeb'', while Queen (band), Queen's recording sessions with the BBC were released as ''At the Beeb (Queen album), At the Beeb''. Another nickname, now less commonly used, is "Auntie", said to originate from the old-fashioned "Auntie knows best" attitude, or the idea of aunties and uncles who are present in the background of one's life (but possibly a reference to the "aunties" and "uncles" who presented children's programmes in the early days) in the days when John Reith, the BBC's first director general, was in charge. The term "Auntie" for the BBC is often credited to radio disc-jockey Jack Jackson (radio personality), Jack Jackson. To celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the BBC the song "Auntie (song), Auntie" was released in 1972. The two nicknames have also been used together as "Auntie Beeb".
Controversies
Throughout its existence, the BBC has faced numerous accusations regarding many topics: the Iraq War of 2003, Iraq war, politics, ethics and religion, as well as funding and staffing. It also has been involved in numerous controversies because of its coverage of specific news stories and programming. In October 2014, the BBC Trust issued the "BBC complaints framework", outlining complaints and appeals procedures. However, the regulatory oversight of the BBC may be transferred to Ofcom. The British "House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons Select Committee on Culture Media and Sport" recommended in its report "The Future of the BBC", that OFCOM should become the final arbiter of complaints made about the BBC.
The BBC has long faced accusations of liberalism, liberal and left-wing politics, left-wing bias. Accusations of a bias against the Premiership of Margaret Thatcher and the Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party were often made against the BBC by members of that government, with Margaret Thatcher herself considering the broadcaster's news coverage to be biased and irresponsible. In 2011, Peter Sissons, a main news presenter at the BBC from 1989 to 2009, said that "at the core of the BBC, in its very DNA, is a way of thinking that is firmly of the Left". Another BBC presenter, Andrew Marr, commented that "the BBC is not impartial or neutral. It has a liberal bias, not so much a party-political bias. It is better expressed as a cultural liberal bias." Former BBC director Roger Mosey classified it as "liberal defensive." In 2022, the BBC chairman, Richard Sharp, acknowledged that "the BBC does have a liberal bias", and added that "the institution is fighting against it".
Conversely, writing for ''The Guardian'', the left-wing columnist Owen Jones (writer), Owen Jones stated "the truth is the BBC is stacked full of rightwingers," and cited as an example of bias its employment of "ultra-Thatcherism, Thatcherite" Andrew Neil as a politics presenter. A 2018 opinion poll by BMG Research found that 40% of the British public think that the BBC is politically partisan, with a nearly even split between those that believe it leans to the left or right.
Paul Mason (journalist), Paul Mason, a former Economics Editor of the BBC's ''Newsnight'' programme, criticised the BBC as "unionist" in relation to its coverage of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum, Scottish independence referendum campaign and said its senior employees tended to be of a "Neoliberalism, neo-liberal" point of view. The BBC has also been characterised as a pro-Monarchy of the United Kingdom, monarchist institution. The BBC was accused of propaganda by conservative journalist and author Toby Young due to what he believed to be an anti-Brexit approach, which included a day of live programming on migration.
Conspiracy theorists in Iran, led by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, have regarded the BBC as an instrument of British political machinations. The Minister of Culture Hossein Saffar Harandi declared BBC Persian TV illegal in 2009, citing "the BBC's history of creating chaos in Iran, and its efforts to set the various strata of Iranian society against each other". In 2011, Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi said the BBC's real identity was "Baha'i, Baha’i and Zionist" and he accused it of helping direct the 2009 Iranian presidential election protests. BBC Persian journalists have faced online attacks allegedly linked to Iran's government, which has led the BBC to file 4 complaints to the UN addressing the issue. A 2021 poll from the Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland had less respondents in Iran rating news from the BBC as accurate compared to news from domestic TV and social media.
In 2008, the BBC was criticised by some for referring to the men who carried out the November 2008 Mumbai attacks as "gunmen" rather than "terrorists". In protest against the use of the word "gunmen" by the BBC, journalist M. J. Akbar, Mobashar Jawed "M.J." Akbar refused to take part in an interview following the November 2008 Mumbai attacks, Mumbai terror attacks, and criticised the BBC's reportage of the incident. British parliamentarian Stephen Pound supported these claims, referring to the BBC's whitewashing of the terror attacks as "the worst sort of mealy mouthed posturing. It is desperation to avoid causing offence which ultimately causes more offence to everyone."
A BBC World Service newsreader who presented a daily show produced for Kyrgyzstan was claimed to have participated in an opposition movement with the goal of overthrowing the government led by president Kurmanbek Bakiyev. The BBC presenter resigned from his post in 2010 once the allegations of his participation in the Kyrgyz Revolution of 2010, revolution became public.
In February 2021, following Ofcom's decision to cancel the licence of China Global Television Network (CGTN) and the BBC's coverage of the persecution of ethnic minority Uighurs in China, the Chinese authorities banned BBC World News from broadcasting in the country. According to a statement from China's National Radio and Television Administration (NRTA), BBC World News reports on China "infringed the principles of truthfulness and impartiality in journalism" and also "harmed China's national interests". RTHK, Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK) suspended BBC World News the day after the ban took effect on the mainland.
Logo and symbols
Logos
File:BBC logo (50s-60s).svg, BBC's first three-box logo used from 1958 until 1963.
File:BBC logo (70s).svg, BBC's inverted variant of the second three-box logo used from 1963 until 1971.[Hayden Walker]
History of BBC corporate logos
. TVARK, TV ARK. Retrieved 20 November 2010.
File:BBC logo (80s).svg, BBC's third three-box logo used from 1971 until 1988.
File:BBC logo (pre97).svg, BBC's fourth three-box logo used from 1988 until 1997.
File:BBC.svg, BBC's fifth three-box logo used from 1997 to 2023.
File:BBC Logo 2021.svg, BBC's sixth and current three-box logo used since 2021.
Coat of Arms
See also
* Gaelic broadcasting in Scotland
* The Green Book (BBC)
* List of BBC television channels and radio stations
* List of companies based in London
* List of television programmes broadcast by the BBC
* Prewar television stations
* Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom
* Quango
* Television in the United Kingdom
*
References
Sources
* Baade, Christina L. ''Victory through Harmony: The BBC and Popular Music in World War II'' (Oxford University Press, 2012).
* Briggs, Asa. – ''The BBC – the First Fifty Years'' – Condensed version of the five-volume history by the same author. – Oxford University Press, 1985.
* Coulton, Barbara. – ''Louis MacNeice in the BBC'' – Writer and producer from 1941 to 1961 in the Features Department of BBC radio. – Faber & Faber, 1980.
* Gilder, Eric. – ''Mass Media Moments in the United Kingdom, the USSR and the USA'' (2003). – Historical background relating to the British Broadcasting Company, Ltd, its founding companies; their transatlantic connections; General Post Office licensing system; commercial competitors from Europe before the Second World War and offshore during the 1960s
online
* Hajkowski, Thomas. ''The BBC and National Identity in Britain, 1922–53'' (Manchester University Press, 2010), 252 pages; explores ideas of Britishness conveyed in BBC radio programmes, including notions of the empire and monarchy as symbols of unity; also considers regional broadcasting in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.
* Hendy, David. ''Life on air: a history of Radio Four'' (Oxford University Press, 2007) covers 1967 to 1997.
* James, A. Lloyd. ''The Broadcast Word''. (Kegan Paul, 1935),
* Mills, Brett. "'Shoved Online': BBC Three, British Television and the Marginalisation of Young Adult Audiences." in ''Media, Margins and Popular Culture'' (Palgrave Macmillan UK, 2015) pp. 219–231.
* Parker, Derek. – ''Radio: the Great Years'' – History of BBC radio programmes from the beginning until the date of publication. Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1977.
* Potter, Simon J. ''Broadcasting Empire: The BBC and the British World, 1922–1970'' (2012) online
* Smart, Billy. "The BBC Television Audience Research Reports, 1957–1979: Recorded Opinions and Invisible Expectations." ''Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television'' 34#3 (2014): 452–462.
* Spangenberg, Jochen. – ''The BBC in Transition. Reasons, Results and Consequences'' – Encompassing account of the BBC and influencing external factors until 1996. – Deutscher Universitaetsverlag. 1997.
* West, W. J. – ''Truth Betrayed'' a critical assessment of the BBC, London, 1987,
* Wilson, H. H. – ''Pressure Group'' – History of the political fight to introduce commercial television into the United Kingdom. – Rutgers University Press, 1961.
* Wyver, John. – ''The Moving Image: An International History of Film, Television & Radio'' – Basil Blackwell Ltd in Association with the British Film Institute, 1989.
Primary sources
*
*
* – Copies of all of the BBC's annual reports since the millennium.
* Milne, Alasdair. – ''The Memoirs of a British Broadcaster'' – History of the Zircon spy satellite affair, written by a former Director-General of the BBC. A series of BBC radio programmes called "''The Secret Society''" led to a raid by police in both England and Scotland to seize documents as part of a government censorship campaign. – Coronet, 1989.
External links
*
*
Third Programme Radio Scripts Collection
a
Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, & Rare Book Library, Emory University
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