At the Labour Party conference last week, Lisa Nandy, Secretary of State for the Department of Culture, Media & Sport, said that she was looking at a mixed funding format for the BBC to help protect it from future government interference. Options included a “mixture of licence fee, commercial funding and some subscription services,” she told a Sunday Times / Times Radio panel at the event. 

Why now?

The BBC’s Royal Charter expires at the end of 2027, and the review process is already under way. With that comes a fresh opportunity – and political pressure – to decide how Britain’s national broadcaster should be funded in the streaming era. Is the £169 annual licence fee still fit for purpose in a world of Netflix, YouTube and TikTok? Or is it an essential guarantee of editorial independence and universality? And what are the pros and cons of alternative funding models? 

In this episode

Lydia and I tried to answer some of these questions in this episode of Riffs. After starting with some facts and figures, we assumed the role of reformer (Lydia) and traditionalist (me) in an impartial debate. What we discovered? That a 40-min conversation barely scrapes the surface of this complex topic.

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