The BBC Director-General has put the organisation at the centre of a restoration of public trust in society.
In a major speech in Greater Manchester, Tim Davie said the UK must make a series of bold, urgent choices to reverse the erosion of societal trust – and that the BBC stands ready to play a central role in this renewal.
He also made a call for a national plan for IP switchover.
Speaking at the Lowry Theatre in Salford, Davie told an audience of local decision makers, industry experts and policy makers that that the BBC could become “An institution that builds social capital and stimulates growth in the online, AI age.” The speech was also streamed live to BBC staff across the country.
“I don’t want to catastrophise; we have so much to be proud of as the UK: our tolerance, our innovative spirit, our creativity, our humour, our sense of fairness but I think that unless we act we will drift. Becoming weaker, less trusting, less competitive,” he told the audience.
“The future of our cohesive, democratic society feels, for the first time in my life, at risk. This speaks to issues way beyond party politics or one event, but to longer term factors such as the online revolution and globalisation.
The BBC has become a target for the right wing press and keyboard warriors alike – keen to criticise its journalism or lapses in judgement – and could be seen as both victim and potential saviour.
Davie wants to make the UK “a global leader in trusted information”, which he says would support democracy from the roots up.
He also put forward a series of ideas that the BBC was exploring, though admitted that these would need “funding as well as sufficient flexibility for the BBC to innovate”.
Among the ideas is for the presence of BBC News on platforms like YouTube and Tik Tok to “ensure we have a stronger position amidst the noise”; increasing the availability of fact-checking strand Verify around the world; and deploying AI responsibly alongside trusted BBC journalism to create a new, gold standard fact checking tool.
The Local Democracy Reporting Service to include health authorities, police and crime commissioners, and deeper analysis of the regional mayoralties, which would all be available to partner media; the potential to ‘open source’ all local video, news and audio content to enable local media partners to access it.
There was also s call for a national plan for IP switchover in the 2030s – ensuring a smooth, inclusive transition from broadcast to internet-based delivery, including proposals for a “new streaming media device, designed with accessibility in mind, aimed at helping those currently underserved by digital services”.
This runs counter to the Broadcast 2040+ campaign to keep digital terrestrial distribution running for another decade, but in line with findings released last week by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, which recognised a need for government intervention if a IP-switchover was to take place.
