Regular readers of this website will be long aware of how critical and disillusioned I am with the BBC's efforts as a public service broadcaster. I am critical of the BBC because I love it, but it is a hard beast to love at the moment. The way it handled the report into the North Wales Care Home scandal, and the testimony given by Steven Messham - a former abuse victim, and clearly someone who is a vulnerable man - was disgraceful.
The BBC is in the wrong whichever way you look at it, and I can see at least two ways of looking at it.
Firstly, assuming the truth that Messham wrongly identified Lord McAlpine as one of his abusers (and we have to learn to question everything now), then the original report into the North Wales Care Abuse on Newsnight was an appalling misjudgement.
Secondly, and conversely, if the sceptre of legal action has bullied Messham into submission, leading to the BBC to cowardly shelve their story and prepare a hasty apology, then the behaviour of those at the BBC is appalling in that sense as well.
Either way, the BBC is in the wrong. Either way, Messham has been treated badly.
The crisis has led to questions about the BBC's purpose, and the future of public service broadcasting in this country. Well, it beats having to indulge in the uncomfortable question of how we are going to get to the bottom of the problem of child abuse when the mere suggestion of legal action sends researchers and investigators on the run.
One problem in particular is trying to unravel the following question: How can we on the left be taken seriously when we cannot even get our story straight as to what the BBC actually is?
On one hand, we are fighting its corner on the grounds it is a treasured institution and provides a public service, or at least it is meant to be when it is not either (a) wrongly making indirect paedophile allegations, (b) backtracking from legitimate allegations when the kitchen gets hot, or (c) both. We justify our position on the basis that the Tories would love to dismantle the BBC. On the other hand, we complain that it has become a Tory mouthpiece, that is complicit in the protection of establishment figures, perhaps like the one mentioned above.
We bemoan that fact that Andrew Marr is like Jeremy Paxman when confronted with a Labour MP, but becomes Phillip Schofield when confronted with a Tory (at least before Phillip Schofield decided that his This Morning sofa would no longer be a cosy seat for politicians).
The truth is we are trying to save an institution that is presently not on our side. Has it ever been really? Have we been admiring of an institution that has been contemptuous of us all along? This is the broadcaster that provides employment for Chris Patten, Andrew Neil, Jeremy Clarkson and a plethora of other people whose views are far removed from the left's ideal.
Amazingly, the funding mechanism that props up the BBC, and which many leftists are trying to preserve, is its very problem. Implicit in any relationship between BBC and government is where the broadcaster would be left if the licence fee was abolished - something the present Tory government has exploited fully. This makes it a state broadcaster, not a public service broadcaster. And it was a state broadcaster, as opposed to a public service broadcaster, that I witnessed as the BBC provided its interminable apology during Friday's Newsnight, as Messham's testimony was safely returned to the bottle it came out of.
Abolishing the licence fee is a form of commercialisation (not the same as privatisation, as the BBC could still have its own corporate structure) and one which I feel would benefit the broadcaster and the public it is supposed to be serving. The broadcaster could be truly independent and not the publicity wing of the Conservative Party, employed to prevent Lords, MPs and other establishment figures. The public would no longer have to pay a household tax for the privilege of watching television, regardless of whether their home is flat or a castle.
Who knows? With a little self-financing, the broadcaster may be able to restore the many events it lost to Sky, ITV and Channel 4 - cricket, golf, football, horse racing and Formula 1 to name a few. If that does not earn a little goodwill, then nothing would.
Another problem with our argument on the left is we support the BBC, not because we are happy with it, but because it supposedly represents what Rupert Murdoch is not. I have never bought into this "enemy of my enemy is my friend" belief. We cannot accuse Rupert Murdoch and his publications of hypocrisy over their criticisms of the BBC handling of the Savile and McAlpine issues if we are hypocrites ourselves.
After Murdoch's institution was found to be hacking people's phones, we were calling for the splitting Murdoch's press on the grounds that the family of publications had become too big and unmanageable. The BBC seems to be cursed with the same illness - bloated, huge and unmanageable. It allowed Savile to stalk its corridors for years, taking his prey back to dressing rooms to rape them. This is of course unless the BBC has since cowardly decided (after speaking to a lawyer or two) that Savile did none of these things after all and can now rest in peace.
Yet whenever I mention the possibility of splitting the BBC, I get quite a reaction. The idea of splitting the BBC is immediately conflated with dismantling the BBC. This is not what I am suggesting, though in the defence of my critics I have not been able to make this clear.
What I suggest, is that if the notion that running The Times, The Sunday Times, The Sun and (then) News of the World is too big a task for the Murdoch family, then BBC's radio, TV, local, commercial and news departments also should be split. Each can have their own management. Each still be nationalised, but funded commercially. Each operating in the public interest. Each still operating under the banner of the BBC.
As I keep saying though, there are aspects of the BBC I do love, but the news operation is now seriously dragging everything else down. Maybe the BBC should stick to what it is good at, and dispense with the current affairs.
I get through my work days thanks to Radio 2 - Britain's top radio station for good reason. Chris Evans has a cheery voice which starts the day well. Simon Mayo (my favourite of all the broadcasters) has a reassuring delivery with a wicked sense of humour, and that's not to mention Ken Bruce, Jeremy Vine and others. Radio 5 does sport extremely well, and allows the broadcasters (such as Alan Green) the creative freedom to be as critical as they wish.
Meanwhile, over on the television, some of the documentaries and research the BBC brings us is amazing. If BBC Four was ever abolished, I would probably fall out with the BBC for good!
So, I am not against the BBC. However I would be lying to say I am happy with it. Many are complaining the BBC is in disarray after a disgraceful process leading to poor Messham's discredited testimony (which has also served to knock back the cause of child protection for at least three decades). However, we are witnessing is the first steps by the BBC to repair itself, as only corporations can.
George Entwistle, who must be the shortest-lived Director General ever, has rightly resigned. In a way, I have a lot of sympathy with him. He was handed an unenviable inbox. His handling of it was appalling though. His appearance in front of MPs in light of the Savile fiasco was weak. The BBC's handling of the Messham evidence was no better.
Many employees within the BBC promptly gave a character reference about what a nice person Entwistle is - and I believe them. Sadly, I have heard it all before. They are the same parting gifts given to a football manager who loses seven of his last eight games in charge and is shown the door. "Nice fella, but we couldn't get results."
I am certainly no apologist for the previous Director General, Mark Thompson, either. I have no doubt though he would have come out fighting. We may never know if he would have sanctioned the Newsnight apology for running the story, but there must be a chance he would have stood firm. Notably, there is the unresolved question: Why is the BBC apologising for Newsnight, despite the name of the alleged abuser being circulated around the Internet, rather than the BBC? I am not certain if anyone at the BBC can answer that one either.
There are many gunning for the BBC at the moment. The newspapers, led by the Murdoch press, would love to see a weakened BBC. They are leading with hypocritical headlines about the chaos. Make no mistake, they have no right to take a moral position. Innocent people suffered when the Murdoch press published photographs of sex offenders, due to the fallibility of human judgement when faced with someone who vaguely resembles one of the Murdoch mugshots. Yet, if the BBC does not reform, people like Murdoch will win. If the BBC does not appoint a strong leader in the wake of Entwistle's resignation, again their enemies will win.
Despite Entwistle's fate, much more needs to be done at the BBC to restore lost trust in the broadcaster. A sacking is not going cure this mess. There is still a lot a lot of goodwill out there towards the BBC, as tweets from my friends on the left reassure me. This goodwill is not infinite though. I sign off with a question with words to the effect of those asked by an excellent user of the oft-maligned twitter website: "How did Savile get away with has paedophilic behaviour for so many years? Look at what has happened over the past seven days, and you will find your answer."
