The Guardian view on the BBC: government attacks must not be a taste of things to come

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/dec/04/guardian-view-government-attacks-bbc-stand-firm

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There is an air of deja vu about George Osborne’s, and indeed No 10’s, aggressive stance towards the BBC’s coverage of the prospect of further spending cuts. “Hyperbolic” and “nonsense” is how the chancellor described BBC correspondent Norman Smith’s early morning appearance on the Today programme in which he described the Office for Budget Responsibility’s report on the autumn statement as “utterly terrifying” for its warning of the effect of hacking spending back to the levels of the 1930s. “You’re back to the land of Road to Wigan Pier.”

There is a thin line to be trodden between a vivid description of a subject that might otherwise cause the listener to nod off, and crossing over into exaggeration. But even if Mr Smith had been on the wrong side of it, it is absurd that a short, live two-way by one correspondent at 6am should be greeted by apocalyptic statements from Downing Street about the stance of the BBC as a whole – as the Spectator pointed out.

The deja vu comes from the knowledge that ministerial accusations of BBC bias are as old as the BBC itself, and reached their nadir in 2003 over another ill-fated early morning two-way on the Today programme, in which the journalist Andrew Gilligan accused the government of “sexing up” the intelligence dossier on Iraq’s weapons capability – an infinitely more serious charge, of course, than unbalance in an analysis of an OBR report. Even so, the crisis that ensued after the tragic suicide of the story’s source, which claimed the jobs of both the director general and the chairman of the BBC, could have been avoided. But rows between the BBC and the government over news coverage have a way of escalating.

The context is different this time, but it will be no surprise if this is just the opening salvo from the Conservatives, who will scrutinise the BBC’s reporting more and more vigorously as the election approaches. This kind of aggression will do no one very much good. For a start, there is very little evidence that the BBC is anti-government. In fact, there is plenty to suggest that it is just the reverse. Senior BBC figures such as Robert Peston have suggested that the BBC is currently erring to the right rather than the left. Nor will it result in better reporting, but a more defensive and anxious newsroom that will serve its audiences less effectively.

The fear is that this out-of-proportion reaction by the government has little to do with Mr Smith’s analysis at all, but has much more connection with the right’s hostility towards the corporation. There are plenty of signs of antipathy. The Sun is back on the attack and this autumn the culture secretary Sajid Javid announced a review into the law that makes it a criminal offence to evade paying the licence fee. The BBC and the government must settle the corporation’s charter by 1 January 2017. In an era of digital revolution, the future shape of the BBC is of huge importance to every British citizen and its audience overseas. Narrow political squabbles must not be allowed to interfere with a mature discussion of what the BBC brings to Britain and its civic life.