“The BBC: A People’s History”, a new book, reveals how broadcasting reflected, and enabled, an erosion of class divisions
This could be a scene from 2022, as Boris Johnson’s government denounces the “Brexit-Bashing Corporation” and threatens to abolish the licence fee that pays its way. In fact the bust-up occurred 40 years ago, when the’s coverage of the Falklands war enraged Margaret Thatcher . Worse disputes took place in 1956, amid the Suez crisis, and during the General Strike of 1926.
The loosening of social attitudes in wartime was nothing compared with what was to come. One cultural battlefield was race. The stationing of 130,000 African-Americanto make its programming more racially sensitive; but in 1950, following viewers’ complaints, its controller of television ruled that “love songs between white and coloured artists must be very scrupulously considered”.
Broadcasting also reflected, and enabled, an erosion of class divisions. In 1937 ordinary subjects could listen to the coronation of George VI, thanks to 58cameras were let in to film the coronation of Elizabeth II. Palace officials enforced a boundary of 30 feet , but hadn’t reckoned on zoom lenses, which the’s nascent website, which experimented with audio and video clips for the occasion.
Mr Hendy, a professor at the University of Sussex, combines a historian’s sense of sweep with the eye for colour of thegave him archive access but had no editorial control. It is heavy on the’s first half-century, which makes up three-quarters of the book; the internet appears 500 pages in. Perhaps for this reason it is unpersuasive on how the corporation should deal with Hollywood’s streaming services, which already outperform the public broadcaster among young audiences. Mr Hendy thinks the. How much more should young viewers be compelled to pay for an entertainment offering they have mostly rejected?has shown a knack for survival. Winston Churchill and Thatcher both tried to nobble it, and failed.
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