Channel Four

It is a sign of the times that it took a Diana-related story to shine a proper spotlight on Channel Four, but there we are.

Channel Four, lest we forget, is publicly owned. It in turn owns a gaming channel. Do you remember any discussion in the pubs and clubs, or even just in the pages of Media Guardian, about whether or not this country needed a publicy owned gaming channel? I don't, and it doesn't.

Just one example among numerous, of course. However good Channel Four News and various other Channel Four, E4 and More4 programmes might be (and they often are), nevertheless Channel Four should be told either to stop replicating the private sector (in point of fact, the very worst of the private sector - but that's not really the point), or else take its chance there as a private company.

And it's not the only one.