The BBC in crisis?

 The BBC in crisis?

Maybe they should have known this was going to happen. The warning signs were there for all to see. And yet, they assumed it would all would go away and never come back. You may think this vaguest of introductions to the following article but the fact  is that the BBC are being far too woolly minded and naive in the first place. Perhaps this was just a temporary blip and shows a complete lack of judgment. Sometimes what goes around comes around.

The BBC, one of the most globally revered of all TV organisations, is under attack from all sides. They are a team in crisis, languishing perilously near the bottom of the Premier League and  sinking without trace if they're not careful. Of course they've been here before because no company can go throughout their whole existence without a couple of boardroom upheavals, ferocious disagreements and a good deal of argy bargy. 

Now for decades and well over a century, the BBC have been bastions of reliability, good and seemingly lifelong friends and friendly neighbours. They have always accompanied us through dire predicaments when the news was bleak, triumphant moments when it was good, royal occasions, royal weddings, critical turning points in political history, Prime Ministers standing outside 10 Downing Street while the cameras were rolling and those hilarious quiz and chat shows where you couldn't help but laugh. 

It only seems like yesterday but over 50 years ago the BBC had a monopoly on TV bragging rights. They had Bruce Forsyth's Generation Game, one of the daftest if funniest quiz shows for many a year. In those days the whole family would sit down in front of the new colour TV service and feast their eyes on one of the cleverest vehicles for Saturday evening TV. Give the audience at home a genial host with bristling grey sideburns and the most outrageous line in humour and frivolity and there you were. The games on the show itself had most of us convulsed with happiness, laughter and pleasure. It was a recipe for success.

At Christmas time, and the weeks leading up to the great festive period, there was that magical double act known as Morecambe and Wise. The viewing figures, for these legendary and stunningly polished comedians, shot through the roof and soared into the many millions. The BBC had a safety net when it looked like falling from a great height and crashing to the ground. Eric and Ernie were the BBC's salvation at a time when the news agenda was similarly downbeat and depressing. 

The BBC still had a stranglehold on period drama adaptations such as the Forsyte Saga which had captured the imagination of a black and white TV audience. But that was the 1960s and for years the Beeb were treading water. The combination of Dickens, Jane Austen and Anthony Trollope had kept the BBC buoyant. But their evening news coverage, once its flagship, was still in a commanding position. The BBC were trustworthy, responsible, allegedly biased but still worth a half an hour of our spare time. And yet it now all seems very formulaic, predictable, dangerously racist, sexist, antisemitic, xenophobic and just totally prejudiced. 

In the light of the recent Middle East wars and the Ukraine and Russia conflict, the BBC sent in its mightiest heavyweights, journalists without a hint of bigotry or taking sides in any argument. We wondered at the excessive and obsessive focus on the poor, battered and beleaguered Hamas and its dying people in their thousands. And we were just aghast and speechless because this was a sham, a fallacy, a pack of lies, completely exaggerated and just not true. Who started this war? Hamas protested their innocence but then of course the 7th October was still raw in our minds and, as proud Jews, we defended ourselves consistently and if the retaliation was painful, it was something we had to do. 

Now of course the BBC find themselves understandably stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea. Here is a so called a powerful, global TV news bulletin and 24 hour operation. They now look like a groggy boxer staggering around the ring and clinging desperately clinging to the ropes. They have been beaten to a pulp, a bruised, then battered bantamweight with swollen eyes, blood dripping from nose and mouth and struggling to stay on their feet. If they hadn't seen the writing on the wall they have now. 

Then above all the raging turbulence and chronic chaos, the Beeb look for anything resembling redemption, a life boat, anything to save their blushes. On Saturday evening, the BBC present us with their winter comfort food. Now an established Saturday evening favourite, Strictly Come Dancing is sparkling, colourful, glittering, full of showbiz flamboyance, perhaps a tad garish and gaudy for some but maybe not. It is an explosion of outrageous clothes and costumes, gleaming smiles and experienced judges who know exactly what they're talking about. 

But, taken on its own, Strictly Come Dancing can never hope to adequately fill the gap. This is no sticking plaster because there's the rest of the week to be held to account. Of course there are the dramas and cop shows, the mysterious programmes, the fabulous wildlife documentaries, sitcoms from time to time and then a spate of what looks like rehashed mediocrity. But this could never be regarded as a hurtful and withering accusation because the Beeb love to entertain, inform and enlighten. Ask Lord Reith's great grandchildren and relatives.

Then you have to wait for Friday evening before the whistles are allowed to blow and the bells ring. The masterfully and politically irreverent satirical show Have I Got News For You is still a must and highly recommended. It is incredibly amusing, laugh out loud funny and perhaps the one TV programme that deserves far more air time than it does. The family tree show, where celebrities look for their ancestors, is Who Do You Think Are and is just spellbinding, fascinating and a compulsive watch. But that's where it all begins to unravel for the Beeb.

Within the last week, Tim Davie, their latest Director General, has fallen on his sword and left the BBC because his position had become untenable. The BBC have been rocked by one criticism after another, attacked for their poor, slipshod reporting on prominent celebrities who have are being held on rape charges and an American president who just wants to sue the Beeb for billions of dollars and pounds for deplorable behaviour and flawed, fake journalism. Oh dear, Aunty simply can't get it right. 

And to think that it used to be so refreshingly different, a world away from shame and controversy, a day's viewing dominated by quaint Test cards with girls wearing pig tails and playing a game of noughts and crosses which remain, to this day, unresolved. There were those national treasures such as Z Cars, Softly Softly, Dixon of Dock Green, Play for Today, Grandstand and Match of the Day. Morecambe and Wise was just magically essential and imperative, a gloriously intoxicating comedy hour or two from delightful double acts Eric and Ern. There was the Two Ronnies, wonderfully lyrical and stunning word paintings from Ronnie Barker and a comfortable arm chair for Ronnie Corbett.

The children had Watch With Mother, Andy Pandy, Muffin the Mule, Camberwick Green, Trumpton, Bill and Ben, Play School and Play Away, Crackerjack at 5pm on Friday afternoon. Then, back in the mists of the time, there was Billy Cotton's Band Show, Hancock's Half Hour, starring Tony Hancock, a sad and misunderstood comedian who the BBC can probably relate to at the moment. Then there was BBC Two who gave us the alternative entertainment package with groundbreaking snooker in colour, Pot Black and company, classical music concerts, left field educational programmes such as the Open University, jazz, revealing and insightful real life social documentaries on inner city council estates, hard, hitting investigations and Horizon, where the truly amazing casts its eyes on widely diverse cultures.

And so this morning the BBC will be licking its wounds and bandaging over the deep wounds. As an impartial outsider, you fear the worst for the BBC. In an age of constant information and news, and an Internet that now spans the globe providing the news just as accessibly and immediately, the Beeb are now in serious trouble. To all intents and purposes, the BBC has completely lost its way. We no longer need a flickering screen on our TVs since our Smart Phones, Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple and a vast selection of Sky, Fox, CNN News and even tinier screens can tell us precisely where and when the momentous events of the day are taking place.

 The BBC seem to be withering on the vine, slowly disintegrating into a very gradual obscurity. Some of us will lament the way it used to be for BBC TV but the writing is on the wall and the graffiti is telling us a story that the hardcore Beeb audience may not want to hear. The signs are, that the BBC we used to know while we were growing up, has now reached its lowest point. There are those who may be celebrating this moment and those who will be gladly rubbing their hands in relief. Surely Aunty Beeb you can do so much better or should we just allow you to rust away and left to decay. Now let's see, it's time to say farewell to our once family favourite BBC One. Who knows, it's over to you, folks.