05 -Soul searching at the BBC - Sean Dunn

Soon after his appointment as culture secretary, Oliver Dowden delivered a major speech in which he decried the BBC’s ‘narrow urban outlook’. The public broadcaster, Dowden proclaimed, must do more to capture the country's ‘genuine diversity of thought and experience’. Presumably the new director-general, Tim Davie, worries that given free rein on social media, his employees might not reflect this diversity. One of his first moves was to order staff to refrain from expressing ‘ a personal opinion on matters of public policy, politics, or controversial subjects’ and to ‘avoid virtue signalling’. Both Dowden and Davie’s sentiments indicate a growing sense of unease about our relationship with the BBC, its relationship with the state, and that slippery concept: British identity.

An obvious reason why the idea of representation is so central for the BBC is that it is primarily funded through the license fee - currently £157.50 per household for a year (a mere £53 for black and white TV!). So if you wish to (legally) watch live television on any channel, online streaming service, or use BBC iPlayer, you must cough up. But I think that there is something deeper than this economic argument for customer satisfaction. The BBC is prized by many as it is thought to encapsulate what British culture - in all its many forms - is: a part of us that we share with the rest of the world. 

When attempting to assess whether the BBC is backing the right causes, it seems only fair to check what it actually says on the tin. The constitutional basis of the BBC comes in the form of The Royal Charter, which includes a number of ‘Public Purposes’. Extracts from this are:

• ‘the BBC should help everyone learn about different subjects in ways they will find accessible, engaging, inspiring and challenging.’

• ‘the BBC should accurately and authentically represent and portray the lives of the people of the United Kingdom today, and raise awareness of the different cultures and alternative viewpoints that make up its society.’

We - the public - rely mainly on Ofcom to ensure that the Charter is adhered to. Section two of Ofcom’s Broadcasting Code reads ‘In applying generally accepted standards, broadcasters must ensure that material which may cause offence is justified by the context’. As a classical musician, I was particularly struck by an example of these standards being applied a few months ago in the clamour surrounding the performance of ‘Rule Britannia’ at the Last Night of the Proms. In the way these things do, the story sparked, then fizzled out leaving only vestiges of suspicion and rancour. 

Since the first Proms concert in 1895 (the BBC was founded in 1922) the series has witnessed significant changes in tastes and occupied several different venues. The founding principle - ‘to present the widest possible range of music, performed to the highest standards, to large audiences’ - has, I think, largely endured. But the context is more than just the stage; it includes what happens in the real world. Part of the Black Lives Matter movement’s wide influence comes from the way in which it resists clear definitions of its scope. It is perhaps unsurprising, then, that in the announcement of £100 million pounds to be spent over three years on ‘diverse and inclusive content’ forms, Tony Hall, then Director-General, explicitly mentioned the “senseless killing of George Floyd - and what it tells us about the stain of systemic racism.” It’s made us question ourselves” - Hall continued - “about what more we can do to help tackle racism - and drive inclusion within our organisation and in society as a whole.” The question, therefore, is whether ‘Rule, Britannia’ and ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ with their echoes of Empire can be ‘justified by the context’? Or perhaps more accurately (and strangely) can their absence be ‘justified by the context’? 

The Proms organisers probably have a trickier brief than most. On one side, they must attempt to mollify staunch traditionalists who annually decry the ‘dumbing-down’ of these concerts and believe themselves to be providing a bulwark of sense and tradition against an army of ‘progressives’. At the same time, they must deal with constant accusations that the BBC is not doing enough to create more inclusive musical events, and features too few performers from ethnic minorities and positions of socio-economic disadvantage. This balancing act is a tough one - how to achieve the latter without tokenism which, ultimately, benefits no one.

Some welcomed a revamp - Chi-chi Nwanoko, founder of the Chineke! Foundation and frequent Proms performers, was unequivocal: “For any conscious black person who is aware of their history, the empire and colonialism, for example, they will struggle to enjoy the patriotic jingoism of these songs.” Yet this, to me at least, exhibits the traits of a symbolic tussle that leaves more substantial problems untackled. For example, the shortage of diverse voices at the ‘top’ among BBC executives; and at the ‘bottom’ in school, where, as Trevor Phillips wrote in the Times, the academic level reached by Caribbean heritage children at the end of compulsory schooling is markedly lower than their peers. Phillips, the former chairman of the Equalities and Human Rights Commission, suggests that the Proms argument was a superficial one, and more a reflection of the BBC, with its “rooms full of white men panicking that someone is going to think they are racist.” Ironically, this misreading of the beliefs and aims of the very people BBC bigwigs wished to assuage managed to strengthen the resolve of those who view the Last Night as an immutable and sacred ritual. And just like that, an opportunity to present a few of these works in a fresh light - with a different musical setting, for example - passes by.

And so yet again, at the heart of this story lay competing ideas about what the BBC - in this instance through music - does or should represent. Interesting, critical explorations of our nation’s musical heritage are lost in a tempest of outrage and misrepresentation. When everything is subsumed into the ‘culture wars’, we will continue to emerge staggering and resentful; civilised questions about national assumptions and traditions are doomed. Too controversial for Davie perhaps, but can we look forward to a year in which questions such as the following are asked: ‘How can the BBC best contextualise music from previous eras today?’; ‘How can we express our nation’s values within the arts in an unusual, inventive, challenging way?’; and perhaps more relevant than ever as lorries gather in Kent: ‘How will Global Britain sound to the world?’