Who do the broadcasters think they are? After thirty years or more in charge of most of our public service channels (at one time or another), I thought I knew. But their behaviour over the election debates leads me to believe they suddenly have grossly inflated and misguided ideas of their own importance.
The duty of impartiality is enshrined in broadcasting legislation and the BBC’s Royal Charter. But now, in the run up to the general election, broadcasters are, for the first time, unequivocally playing politics. How else is one to interpret their actions over the election debates?
First they coalesce and present some parties with their plan for the debates, not an agreed plan, but their own idea of what they expect from our elected leaders. They then publish the plan, a move clearly intended to exert public pressure on the parties.
It is a measure of how flawed their “grand design” was that somehow they forgot the Green Party. When this was pointed out, they amended their plan to include not just the Green Party, but Plaid Cymru and the SNP as well. Then they forgot the DUP. It was a shambolic start.
But then it got worse. They let it be known that if, for example, the prime minister or any other leader declined to fall in with their plans, they would be prepared to go ahead without him/her and transmit a debate with an empty chair, real or imagined. David Cameron has clearly stated that he is prepared to debate and he has also been clear about what he is not prepared to do. He is absolutely entitled to make that choice, and people are free to comment on the choice he makes.
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But it is not acceptable for unelected journalists and editors to threaten him, or any party leader, with an “empty chair”. If I were still in charge of a major broadcaster, my position would be very clear: if we cannot persuade one of the relevant leaders to participate for whatever reason in what is proposed, we cannot go ahead with the broadcast. End of debate. That is what the impartiality laws are designed for.
Ah, I hear the broadcasters retort, that would give a single party leader a veto on any broadcast. Yes it would, and so what? The broadcasters, however much they may like to pretend so to themselves, are not the guardians of democracy in these islands. That remains the domain of the elected House of Commons. Broadcasters “sending for political leaders” and bestowing airtime on them, and then threatening them with an empty chair if they do not come running, is not democracy. It is bullying, a case of the broadcast media getting way ahead of itself.
Be in no doubt, that an empty chair represents a threat and worse – it is a political act, in direct contravention of their duty of impartiality. I can understand an empty chair if someone accused of serious malfeasance (swindling or worse) refuses to turn up to respond to the evidence against them. Turning up for an election yah-boo is not in that category by any means. I am shocked and appalled that broadcasters believe it is. They could not be more wrong.
Election debates may be nice to have, and they may help broadcasters to remind themselves how important they are to the democratic fabric of the UK. They may well turn the election campaign into an endless round of “who won, who lost” to feed the media machine in all its forms. But our democracy does not depend on TV patronage for survival.
The United States developed the idea of presidential debates, the first being that memorable encounter between Richard Nixon and John Kennedy. There were no more debates until Ford v Carter, three elections later. Amazing how American democracy survived without the TV networks! The case for debates in America is much stronger than the UK. The election is simply to decide on the next president, not to choose the legislature. It is a bigger choice than the UK since once you are president that is it for the full term (barring impeachment or ill health). In the UK we elect the entire legislature at the same time as the prime minister – who has no such American-style guarantee of tenure. Very different.
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To get back on track, the BBC should take the lead and declare publicly they would not transmit an empty chair, real or implied. In other words, if they cannot reach a consensus with the relevant leaders, there would be no debate. That is the outcome I prefer, an election campaign where the leaders and their policies and promises are rigorously tested by the media individually — rather than six weeks of who won/who lost/who gaffed. Yawn.
Second, The BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Sky News must stop actively and publicly campaigning to try to achieve their narrow idea of what is good for the British public. In short, these broadcasters should get back in their box, where normally they do a phenomenal job holding us all to account.
Lord Grade of Yarmouth was chief executive of Channel 4 1988-97, chairman of the BBC 2004-06 and executive chairman of ITV 2007-09