Simon Mason wrote:


"David" wrote in message
...


The BBC's UK radio and TV services are financed by the television
Licence Fee (all owners of television sets in the UK are required to
buy an annual licence). The BBC also earns extra income through the
sale of programmes overseas and of books, videos, tapes and other
products linked to BBC programmes.
BBC World Service does not receive any funding from the UK Licence
Fee.''

www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice

Hey, I was right.

Yes, the WS, unlike the rest of the BBC (you didn't make it clear you were
referring solely to the WS as opposed to the BBC in general) is funded from
the FCO out of our taxes, so we still pay for it. It's our money, not the
Govt's money.

Running Dog asked if the BBC is a Govt agency, which it definitely is not.
Your own post says:

"The FCO, in close consultation with World Service, is
involved in the process of deciding which languages are broadcast ,
but editorial control of the programmes rests *entirely* with BBC."

Ah. You see, the VOA was (was, since it in effect doesn't exist anymore)
run by an agency of the US govt, USAID I think. In most countries, the
national broadcaster is a govt agency. Since the BBC is not controlled
by the UK govt, the BBC can make all sorts of screwy decisions and
nobody can tell them no. (In contrast, the screwy decisions made at the
VOA were done by presidential appointees. The President and Congress
could have decided to hire new people to run the place.) So the BBC
slashes the WS, they slash domestic programming, they make a lot of
people upset, and nobody can rein them in. At least the big corporate
broadcasters in the US (NBC, CBS, ABC, Fox, Time Warner (who runs the WB
network), Paramount Pictures (UPN)) have majority stockholders and
boards of directors who can fire the CEO if he ****s up.