Imagine That: The BBC is More Secretive Than Anybody

[Teddy Bear]

Janet Daley at the Telegraph showing that what should be public information is covered up for as long as possible by the BBC under one pretext or another. Yet they falsely claim that they are open and transparent, but the reality shows its only on things that are really inconsequential.

Imagine that: the BBC is more secretive than anybody
By Janet Daley

Well, well. The BBC is more prone to hiding behind commercial secrecy in order to hide damaging evidence about its own practices than almost any other organisation. And this is a surprise to whom? This "shock announcement" by the Sir Amyas Morse, head of the National Audit Office (NAO), after he had presumably been reduced to screaming exasperation in his attempts to get at the truth about BBC executive pay-offs, will produce little more than a wan smile in anyone who has had actual dealings with the Lubyanka of W1A.

Getting even the most mundane information – let alone damaging evidence – out of a BBC administrator can be made impenetrably impossible, involving as it does at least half a dozen appeals to further layers of authority and innumerable repeated requests to deliberately obtuse "spokesmen".

The attitude of the organisation is that anything not appearing on an official press release must be treated as if it were covered by the Official Secrets Act to be disclosed on a strictly "need to know" basis. This institutional paranoia is justified on the basis that the BBC has "enemies" whose own commercial self-interest make them wish to do the Corporation harm at every possible opportunity.

What this actually means is that news organisations which do not have the benefit of an enormous, compulsory public subsidy are angry (justifiably) and frustrated (understandably) by the unfair competition presented by the BBC operation which can not only afford to dump lavishly-funded free content all over every emerging platform (website, apps, social networks, etc), but which advertises itself relentlessly on all those outlets.

The response of the inevitable BBC spokesman to this revelation of rampant secretiveness was a classic of the genre: "We are committed to openness and transparency..and we have a good working relationship with the NAO.. [but] protecting the editorial independence of the BBC is paramount." Protecting its independence from what? Public scrutiny of its finances?

Even though it is publicly-funded? Somebody, someday has to tell them how this works: if you take the people's money by force of legal statute, then you have to be prepared to be accountable to them and their elected representatives.

[Teddy Bear]

The Mail also has a piece on this story. Note again the BBC response to the comments by the head if the National Audit Office:

A BBC spokesman said: 'We welcome Sir Amyas' positive comments about the management and governance of the BBC, our work on reducing costs and targets we've achieved.

'We are committed to openness and transparency as the content of previous National Audit Office reports has shown and we have a good working relationship with the NAO which already has full access to the BBC's operations, with the exception of editorial areas, as protecting the BBC’s editorial independence is paramount.'

Now if you can find positive comments by Sir Amyas, or find where the content of previous NAO reports showed a good working relationship in the ones below then I must have lost the ability to understand what I read. It simply shows how the BBC is completely unconcerned with whatever truth they encounter and will recite the view that they want their audience to believe.

BBC secrecy on salaries condemned: Corporation attacked by spending watchdog after it stopped investigations into pay deals and IT fiascos

• National Audit Office (NAO) blamed BBC ‘gatekeepers’ for stopping it from viewing key documents about financial scandals
• Watchdog’s director, Sir Amyas Morse, called for BBC bosses to hand over evidence about how it uses its annual £3.5billion licence fee revenue
• Last year, the NAO published two damning reports exposing BBC waste
• First found it blew £100m on failed IT project - the Digital Media Initiative

By Alasdair Glennie

The BBC is too secretive and has stopped official investigators from probing its huge pay deals and IT fiascos, the head of the Government spending watchdog said yesterday.

The National Audit Office (NAO) blamed BBC ‘gatekeepers’ for stopping it from viewing key documents about financial scandals, delaying one crucial report by eight months.

The watchdog’s director, Sir Amyas Morse, called for statutory powers to force BBC bosses to hand over evidence about how it uses its annual £3.5billion licence fee revenue.

He said it can be so hard to extract information from the corporation that he has trouble keeping his staff’s morale up. Giving evidence to the Commons culture, media and sport committee, he said: ‘It is possible, particularly in difficult areas, to find the BBC doesn’t provide evidence where in their judgment it is covered by commercial or confidentiality grounds, or indeed privacy grounds.

‘There are an excessive number of gatekeepers in the organisation who feel they can apply their judgment rather than relying on our professionalism with regards to what we might see.’

The chair of the culture, media and sport committee, Tory MP John Whittingdale, agreed with his criticism: ‘There is a perception that the BBC is an enormously bloated, bureaucratic organisation, with more people carrying out a function than would be the case in any of the equivalent commercial broadcasters.’

Last year, the NAO published two damning reports exposing BBC waste.

The first found it blew £100million on a failed IT project known as the Digital Media Initiative.

The second, which revealed that the corporation handed out £369million in severance pay-offs to its staff over eight years prompted parliamentary enquiries.

But Sir Amyas revealed the Digital Media Initiative report was delayed by eight months because the BBC blocked access to key documents.

And he said there are further delays because the BBC controls when his findings are published. He added: It can be difficult to keep motivation of my people going … when they have to wait a long time for information and it holds the report up.’

The NAO can probe the financial efficiency of all Government departments and agencies, as well as police and the NHS, and has legal powers to force them to reveal documents. However, the BBC only provides access ‘by agreement’, meaning it is able to block investigators.

A BBC spokesman said: 'We welcome Sir Amyas' positive comments about the management and governance of the BBC, our work on reducing costs and targets we've achieved.

'We are committed to openness and transparency as the content of previous National Audit Office reports has shown and we have a good working relationship with the NAO which already has full access to the BBC's operations, with the exception of editorial areas, as protecting the BBC’s editorial independence is paramount.'