---

BBC: Chairmanship (Communications Committee Report)

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to take part in this debate and to lend my support to the chair and fellow members of the Communications Committee. It is daunting to follow my noble friend and say anything that is even remotely original. I probably should not say this, but I enormously enjoy being a member of the committee. From the outset, it is important to say that this inquiry, its conclusions and our comments on the issues which broadly can be described as ““what is the chairman of the BBC for?””— which I agree with my noble friend Lady McIntosh we did not quite work out—and ““how he was appointed and whether that process served the public interest”” are not a reflection on the capability or appropriateness of Sir Michael Lyons, the person appointed. I came to this inquiry as a novice on the committee. Many members had been investigating this and other BBC matters for some time. During the inquiry, some matters were of broader concern than simply whether the mechanism by which the chairman of the BBC was appointed was right or not. As my noble friend Lord Maxton said, the BBC is an institution of enormous national significance. Its independence, the quality and trustworthiness of its news and the balance of its comment are part of the weft and weave of British democracy. Any change or development to the way that the BBC does its work has to be tested against its position of national importance. That is why the change to its governance was a hotly debated matter and the appointment of its chair is worthy of at least comment by Parliament. All of us on the Communications Committee will be keeping a watching brief on how it works out. In preparing this contribution, I read through the evidence and was struck by one or two things which merit comment, some of which has already been said. But in the honourable and noble tradition of this House, I intend to say them anyway. Like many other members of the committee, by the end of the inquiry I was still unclear as to who is now the champion of the BBC. Who is the person who will stand up and say, ““Over my dead body””? For instance, the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, spoke about the top slicing of the BBC’s funding. While the current chair was keen to assure us that he is the chairman of the BBC, the fact that the new charter refers to him as having an honorary title, is borne out by the fact that he did not say, ““Over my dead body”” when the top slicing was suggested, which I suspect other chairmen would have done. It was also unclear to me who would win in a confrontation with the director-general should it ever happen, which is why I am keen on recommendation 12 and the need for clarity and the role of the chairman. It should be clear whose job it is to represent the BBC itself as distinct from the licence fee payer. I agree with earlier remarks that the trust seems to act as a regulator and that the director-general acted as the voice of the BBC in its recent troubles concerning ““Blue Peter”” and others problems. That begs the question of how, under the new arrangements, the BBC would handle a Gilligan-type scandal. Would the whole management team resign should such a thing happen now or would no one resign because it is not clear where the responsibility rests? That leads to the other question for the inquiry: why it is important to have a robust and transparent process for appointing the chairman of the BBC. Although the issues of transparency and accountability have been more than adequately covered by the chairman of our committee and others, I suggest that if the process for appointment would be enhanced by the proposals set out in the report. While we were working on it, in my innocence I was surprised at how difficult it was to achieve clarity on the appointments procedure, even from Members of my own Government, and although I was probably less exercised by the fact that the Secretary of State has a role in the appointments procedure because I think he should have such a role, what is important is that it is clear and on the record so that everyone knows what is going to happen. I return to the question of the effect that parliamentary scrutiny would have on this appointment. Greater scrutiny, as outlined by the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, would recognise the importance of appointing a person who is fully aware of the responsibility that the chairman of the BBC bears for the democratic health and fabric of our society, and indeed the importance of the BBC in the world. It may be that a more robust and accountable appointments process would have produced the same result in terms of the present incumbent, but how much stronger a position would he have been in and how much greater status would he have enjoyed had the process been more robust, accountable and transparent? Indeed, how much better would he have been able to fulfil the important job of being both the champion of the licence fee payer and of the BBC? That is why I urge the Minister to take heed of our report.