Former BBC News boss argues BBC's "survival is at stake" amid "chilling" political landscape

Harding pointed out that, in an age of misinformation and increasingly sophisticated AI forgeries, the presence of a robust and authoritative counterweight to the chaos has seldom been more important.

But repeated real-terms cuts to the BBC budget, concerns from within about funding sources and interventions from prominent Westminster politicians have left the broadcaster in a compromising position.

As an example, Harding used the recent controversy surrounding punk rock act Bob Vylan's performance at this year's Glastonbury Festival, which was streamed on BBC iPlayer with a chant that some viewers considered to be hate speech.

The incident caused Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy to demand that "people must be held accountable" and grill the BBC board on why nobody had "been fired" as a result (via The Guardian).

Harding said: "The Culture Secretary’s office insists she did not explicitly ask Samir Shah, the BBC chair, to deliver up the [director-general]'s resignation... but people inside the BBC were left in no doubt that was the message.

"The place became paranoid about how the BBC itself would cover the story; people around him thought the political pressure would be too much. Whatever your view of the hate speech vs freedom of speech issues, an overbearing government minister doesn't help anyone."

He continued: "The hiring and firing of the editor-in-chief of the country's leading newsroom and cultural organisation should not be the job of a politician. It’s chilling."

Harding went on to say that the Culture Secretary isn't the only one holding a significant influence, with the Prime Minister getting to appoint the BBC chair and the Chancellor ultimately allocating the corporation's budget.

"The most important newsroom in the country operates in the knowledge that the editorial budget is, ultimately, set in Downing Street," said Harding, highlighting how that holds a risk of influencing its output, particularly at the current moment, with its "survival at stake" amid an imminent charter review.

"Political interference – and the perception of a political presence looming over the BBC – is a problem," he elaborated, "one that we’ve got too accustomed to. And it looks likely to get worse.

"We need to get on with putting the country’s most important editorial and creative organisation beyond the reach of politicians now. To depoliticise the BBC means changing how appointments are made and budgets are set."

Harding suggested: "The BBC chair and board of directors should be chosen, not by the Prime Minister, but by the board itself and then, like other such organisations, with the approval of Ofcom."

He stressed: "BBC independence means giving it the resources it needs. Not freezing its funding yet again, but doubling down. We’re at the beginning of a new information age, if we want it to be truly creative, innovative and competitive globally, we can’t short-change the BBC again."

To conclude, he warned that "if we wait to see what the future has in store for us, I fear that the recent past can give us the answer already".

"Bystanding is surrender. We can choose the society we live in; or we can choose not to choose. To be the enemies of nonsense, we must act now."

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