BBC Totally Explained

The British Broadcasting Corporation, which is usually known as the BBC, is the largest broadcasting corporation in the world in terms of audience numbers and of revenue.
   It has 26,000 employees in the United Kingdom alone and a budget of more than GBP£4 billion.
   Founded on October 18th, 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company Ltd, it was subsequently granted a Royal Charter and made a state-owned corporation in 1927. The corporation produces programmes and information services, broadcasting globally on television, radio, and the Internet. The stated mission of the BBC is "to inform, educate and entertain"; its motto is "Nation Shall Speak Peace Unto Nation".
   The BBC is a quasi-autonomous Public Corporation operating as a public service broadcaster. The Corporation is run by the BBC Trust; however, the BBC is, per its charter, to be "free from both political and commercial influence and answers only to its viewers and listeners".
   Its domestic programming and broadcasts are primarily funded by levying television licence fees (under the Wireless Telegraphy Act 1949), although money is also raised through commercial activities such as sale of merchandise and programming — the BBC World Service, however, is funded through a grant-in-aid by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. In order to justify the licence fee, the BBC is expected to produce a number of high-rating shows in addition to programmes that commercial broadcasters wouldn't normally broadcast. Another nickname, now less commonly used, is "Auntie", said to originate from the old-fashioned "Auntie knows best" attitude in the days when John Reith, the BBC's founder, was in charge. The two nicknames have also been used together as "Auntie Beeb", and Auntie has been used in outtakes programmes such as Auntie's Big Bloomers.

History

The original British Broadcasting Company was founded in 1922 by a group of telecommunications companies — Marconi, Radio Communication Company, Metropolitan-Vickers, General Electric, Western Electric, and British Thomson-Houston — to broadcast experimental radio services. The first transmission was on 14 November of that year, from station 2LO, located at Marconi House, London.
   The Company, with John Reith as general manager, became the British Broadcasting Corporation in 1927 when it was granted a Royal Charter of incorporation and ceased to be privately owned. It started experimental television broadcasting in 1932 using an entirely mechanical 30 line system developed by John Logie Baird. It became a regular service (known as the BBC Television Service) in 1936 alternating between a Baird mechanical 240 line system and the all electronic 405 line EMI system. The superiority of the electronic system saw the mechanical system dropped later that year. Television broadcasting was suspended from 1 September, 1939 to 7 June, 1946 during the Second World War. A widely reported urban myth is that, upon resumption of service, announcer Leslie Mitchell started by saying, "As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted..." In fact, the first person to appear when transmission resumed was Jasmine Bligh and the words said were "Good afternoon, everybody. How are you? Do you remember me, Jasmine Bligh...?"
   The European Broadcasting Union was formed on 12 February, 1950, in Torquay with the BBC among the 23 founding broadcasting organisations.
   Competition to the BBC was introduced in 1955 with the commercially and independently operated television network ITV. The BBC monopoly on radio services persisted until the 1970s. As a result of the Pilkington Committee report of 1962, in which the BBC was lauded and ITV was very heavily criticised for not providing enough quality programming, the BBC was awarded a second TV channel, BBC2, in 1964, renaming the existing channel BBC1. BBC2 used the higher resolution 625 line standard which had been standardised across Europe. BBC2 was broadcast in colour from 1 July, 1967, and was joined by BBC 1 and ITV on 15 November, 1969. The 405 line VHF transmissions of BBC 1 (and ITV) were continued for compatibility with older television receivers until 1985.
   Starting in 1964 a series of pirate radio stations (starting with Radio Caroline) came on the air, and forced the UK government to finally deregulate radio services. In response the BBC reorganized and renamed their radio channels. The Light Programme was split into Radio-1 offering continuous rock music and Radio-2 more "Easy Listening". The "Third" programme became Radio-3 offering classical music and cultural programming. The Home Service became Radio-4 offering news, and non-musical content such as quiz shows, readings, dramas and plays. As well as the four national channels, a series of local BBC radio stations was established .
   In 1974, the BBC's teletext service, Ceefax, was introduced but wasn't finally transmitted in vision as such until April 1980. In 1978, the BBC went on strike just before the Christmas of that year, thus blocking out the transmission of both channels and amalgamating all four radio stations into one.
Since the deregulation of the UK television and radio market in the 1980s, the BBC has faced increased competition from the commercial sector (and from the advertiser-funded public service broadcaster Channel 4), especially on satellite television, cable television, and digital television services.
The BBC Research Department has played a major part in the development of broadcasting and recording techniques. In the early days it carried out essential research into acoustics and programme level and noise measurement.
The 2004 Hutton Inquiry and the subsequent Report raised questions about the BBC's journalistic standards and its impartiality. This led to resignations of senior management members at the time including the then Director General, Greg Dyke. In January 2007, the BBC released minutes of the Board meeting which led to Greg Dyke's resignation. Many commentators have considered the discussions documented in the minutes to have made Dyke's ability to remain in position untenable and tantamount to a dismissal.
Unlike the other departments of the BBC, BBC World Service is funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office, more commonly known as the Foreign Office or the FCO, is the British government department responsible for promoting the interests of the United Kingdom abroad.
   On the 18th October 2007, BBC Director General Mark Thompson announced a controversial plan to make major cuts and reduce the size of the BBC as an organisation. The plans include a reduction in posts of 2,500; including 1,800 redundancies, consolidating news operations, reducing programming output by 10% and selling off the flagship Television Centre building in London. These plans have been fiercely opposed by unions, who have threatened a series of strikes, however the BBC have stated that the cuts are essential to move the organisation forward and concentrate on increasing the quality of programming.

Corporation

Royal Charter

The BBC is a quasi-autonomous Public Corporation operating as a public service broadcaster incorporated under a Royal Charter that's reviewed every 10 years; this makes it technically a quango and non-departmental public body, but it's rarely called such, as its existence goes back further than the minting of these terms. Until 2007, the Corporation was run by a board of governors appointed by The Queen or King on the advice of the government for a term of four years, but on 1 January, 2007 the Board of Governors was replaced with the BBC Trust. The BBC is required by its charter to be free from both political and commercial influence and to answer only to its viewers and listeners. The Trust sets the overall strategic direction for the corporation and assess the performance of the BBC Executive Board. The Trust has twelve trustees, currently:

Sir Michael Lyons (Chair)

Chitra Bharucha (Vice-Chair)

Diane Coyle

Mehmuda Pritchard The original trustees, three former governors and eight new members, were announced by Tessa Jowell, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, in October 2006. Michael Grade, then Chairman of the Governors, was to become Chairman of the Trust at the time of the announcement, but due to his move to ITV, Chitra Bharucha became the Acting Chair. Sir Michael Lyons took over as Chairman from 1 May 2007.

Executive Board

The Executive Board oversees the effective delivery of the corporation's objectives and obligations within a framework set by the BBC Trust, and is headed by the Director-General, Mark Thompson. In December 2006, Thompson announced the final appointments to the new Executive Board, consisting of ten directors from the different operations of the group, and five non-executive directors, appointed to provide independent and professional advice to the Executive Board. The members are:

Mark Thompson (Board Chairman and Director-General)

Mark Byford (Deputy Chairman and Deputy Director-General; Director, Journalism Group)

Caroline Thomson (Chief Operating Officer)

Jana Bennett (Director, BBC Vision)

Jenny Abramsky (Director, BBC Audio and Music)

Ashley Highfield (Director, Future Media and Technology)

John Smith (Chief Executive, BBC Worldwide)

Zarin Patel (Group Finance Director)

Steve Kelly (Director, BBC People)

Tim Davie (Director, Marketing, Communications and Audiences) Non-executive directors:

Marcus Agius (Senior non-executive director), Chairman, Barclays

Dr Mike Lynch OBE, co-founder and Chief Executive, Autonomy Corporation

David Robbie, Group Finance Director, Rexam

Dr Samir Shah OBE, Chief Executive, Juniper Communications

Robert Webb QC, General Counsel, British Airways

Governors

The Board of Governors regulated the group from incorporation in 1927 until 31 December 2006, when the Board was replaced by the BBC Trust. The governors as of the dissolution of the Board were:

Anthony Salz (Acting Chairman) compared to £3.2 billion for British Sky Broadcasting, £1.7 billion for ITV and £79 million (in 2006) for GCap Media (the largest commercial radio broadcaster).

Revenue

The principal means of funding the BBC is through the television licence, costing £11.37 a month if paid by direct debit (as of February 2007). Such a licence is required to operate a broadcast television receiver within the UK. The cost of a television licence is set by the government and enforced by the criminal law. The revenue is collected privately and is paid into the central government Consolidated Fund, a process defined in the Communications Act 2003. Funds are then allocated by the DCMS and Treasury and approved by Parliament via the Appropriation Act(s). Additional revenues are paid by the Department for Work and Pensions to compensate for subsidised licences for over-75s. As the state controls BBC's funding, it's sometimes referred to as a "state" broadcaster.
Income from commercial enterprises and from overseas sales of its catalogue of programmes has substantially increased over recent years, with BBC Worldwide contributing some £145 million in cash to the BBC's core public service business.
According to the BBC's 2005-2006 Annual Report, its income can be broken down as follows:

£3,100.6 m licence fees collected from consumers.

£620.0 m from BBC Commercial Businesses.

£260.2 m from the World Service, of which £239.1 m is from grants (primarily funded by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office), £15.8 m from subscriptions, and £5.3 m from other sources.

£24.2 m from other income, such as providing content to overseas broadcasters and concert ticket sales.

Expenditure

The BBC gives two forms of expenditure statement for the financial year 2005-2006.
The amount of each licence fee spent monthly breaks down as follows:

Department	Monthly cost (GBP)
BBC ONE	£3.52
BBC TWO	£1.52
Transmission and collection costs	£1.08
Nations and English Regions television	£1.04
BBC Radio 1, 2, 3, 4 and Five Live	£1.02
Digital television channels	£1.00
Nations' and local radio	68p
bbc.co.uk	36p
BBC jam	14p
Digital radio stations	10p
Interactive TV (BBCi)	8p
Total	*£10.54*

The total broadcasting spend for 2005-2006 is given as:

Department	Total cost (£million)
Television	1443
Radio	218
bbc.co.uk	72
BBC jam	36
Interactive TV (BBCi)	18
Local radio and regional television	370
Programme related spend	338
Overheads and Digital UK	315
Restructuring	107
Transmission and collection costs	320
Total	*3237*

Headquarters and regional offices

Broadcasting House in Portland Place, London is the official headquarters of the BBC. It is home to the national radio networks BBC Radio 2, 3, 4, 6 Music, and BBC 7. On the front of the building are statues of Prospero and Ariel (from Shakespeare's The Tempest) sculpted by Eric Gill.
   Renovation of Broadcasting House began in 2002 and is scheduled for completion in 2010. As part of a major reorganisation of BBC property, Broadcasting House is to become home to BBC News (both television and radio), national radio, and the BBC World Service. The major part of this plan involves the demolition of the two post-war extensions to the building and construction of a new building beside the existing structure. During the rebuilding process many of the BBC Radio networks have been relocated to other buildings in the vicinity of Portland Place.
   In 2010, the entire BBC News operation is expected to relocate from the News Centre at BBC Television Centre to the refurbished Broadcasting House in what is being described as "one of the world's largest live broadcast centres".
   By far the largest concentration of BBC staff in the UK exists in White City. Well known buildings in this area include the BBC Television Centre, White City, Media Centre, Broadcast Centre and Centre House.
   As well as the various BBC buildings in London, there are major BBC production centres located in Cardiff, Belfast, Glasgow, Birmingham, Manchester, Bristol, Southampton and Newcastle upon Tyne. Some of these local centres (for example Belfast) are also known as "Broadcasting House" (see Broadcasting House (disambiguation)). There are also many smaller local and regional studios scattered throughout the UK.
   In 2011, the BBC is planning to move several departments including BBC Sport and BBC Children's North to newly built premises in Salford Quays, Greater Manchester. This will mark a major decentralisation of the corporation's operations from London.

News

BBC News is the largest broadcast news gathering operation in the world, providing services to BBC domestic radio as well as television networks such as BBC News 24, BBC Parliament and BBC World, as well as BBCi, Ceefax and BBC News Online. New BBC News services that are also proving popular are mobile services to mobile phones and PDAs. Desktop news alerts, e-mail alerts, and digital TV alerts are also available.

External results

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