New Culture Minister Berates BBC

The UK Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has said that the BBC needs to depart from “tokenism” and “groupthink” in order to best represent the views of the country as a whole. 

Speaking at the Conservative Party Conference on Monday, Nadine Dorries, who replaced the former culture minister Oliver Dowden in September’s cabinet reshuffle, said that the publicly funded broadcaster was full of “people from a similar background with a certain political bias.” 

“They all think the same and talk the same, and that’s what’s got to be changed. They talk about lots to do with diversity but they don’t talk about kids from working-class backgrounds, that’s got to change … The days of tokenism are over. Real change has to happen, and that’s what I’m here to make sure does happen.”

Appearing in a recording of The Telegraph’s Chopper Politics podcast on the fringe of the Conservative conference in Manchester earlier on Monday, the new cabinet minister revealed that she was due to conclude negotiations with the BBC over the cost of the £159 a year license fee. Asked whether the licence fee would still be compulsory in the coming decades, Dorries replied: “I can’t look into the future. Will the BBC still be here in 10 years? I don’t know.” 

“The BBC has to change. Where they fail is on impartiality -I think the BBC themselves have probably sat down and thought ‘oh yeah, we do have a bit of a problem’. It’s on access as well - how can it become more representative of the people who pay the licence fee? There's a lot for the BBC to address and we're having those discussions at the moment, but the BBC has to change. How can it be more representative of the people who pay the licence fee and how can it be more accessible to people from all backgrounds, not just people whose mum and dad work there? Even the BBC has admitted themselves they've got an impartiality problem.”

Noting her 1950s working-class Liverpudlian roots and accomplishments as a best-selling author, Dorries claimed that a pathway into the corporation for those from similar backgrounds had been omitted in recent years. 

“If you've got a regional accent at the BBC, it doesn't go down particularly well. They talk about lots to do with diversity but they don't talk about kids from working-class backgrounds and that's got to change. People from my background wrote books, wrote theatre plays, and did really well. There needs to be a pathway because that pathway has completely disappeared, and to me, that is what levelling up is about. I keep using the word ‘groupthink’ and it is just the way I suppose where people have come up through the BBC, they all come from a similar background, they all think and talk the same and that's what's got to be changed.”