And now for something completely different
Britain’s main public-service broadcaster has to make drastic cuts. They look set to be driven by politics not quality
THE BBC is having to play its part in Britain's austerity programme, and faces six lean years, in which its main source of income, the “licence fee”—an annual levy on television-owning households—will be frozen. The government will also stop providing separate funding for the BBC World Service's foreign radio broadcasts, and make the BBC pay for S4C, a Welsh-language television service. The modest cost-trimming the BBC has announced so far will be nothing like enough, so its bosses are now drawing up more severe cutbacks.
This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition under the headline “And now for something completely different”
From the June 4th 2011 edition
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