Boris and the Beeb

Boris Johnson writes:

I speak with all the vehemence of one who spent last Friday evening in a state of ecstatic rapture at the Proms. Take away the licence fee and you take away the Beeb's ability to spend £6 million on the world's greatest festival of classical music.

Get rid of the licence fee and you lose the vast red velvet drapes in the Albert Hall saying BBC Proms; and without the BBC Proms there would have been no frenzied Italian conductor, his spasms barely contained by the polished brass of the stand. There would have been no white-jacketed trombonists, no bare-armed female violinists.

There would have been no choir, their silvery hair like magnesium balls of fire in the TV lights, belting out Beethoven's Ninth, the Ode to Joy, with so much crumping explosive power that it made my neck tingle. The more I rhapsodise, of course, and the more I expand on my love of the BBC Proms, the louder I can imagine the protests.

But why do we have to pay for this, I hear you say. Why can't it be funded by Coca-Cola, or Sky, or private subscription of some kind? To which I can only say that yes, I suppose it might be so funded. But then again it might not be.

No, let the license fee be made voluntary, with those who chose to pay it enrolled as members of the BBC Trust.

The Trustees would be elected by and from among the members in each of Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the nine English regions (with their boundaries adjusted to reflect those of the historic counties). Members would vote for one candidate by means of an X, and the top two would be declared elected at the end. A Chairman would be appointed by the relevant Secretary of State with the approval of the relevant Select Committee.

All would hold office for a fixed term of four years, and would have to be sufficiently independent that they could, in principle, serve on local authority remuneration committees.

The National Trust and the Royal National Lifeboat Institution not only survive, but thrive. So would the BBC.

That is the policy of the British People's Alliance. Do get in touch - info@britishpeoplesalliance.org.uk