Heated debate

My attention has been drawn to this letter to The Times at the end of last week, which I think comes from the former Editor of Nationwide-and-Mr Sue Lawley. He makes a good point - aside from News, how many programmes now rely on co-funding ? How many don't ?

Sir, 

The chairman of the BBC, Sir David Clementi, is right to argue that turning BBC Television into a subscription service would destroy its universality (news Nov, 21). But this situation has been created by the BBC itself. Its television service is now in reality a commercial operation in which the licence fee, originally meant to prevent commercialisation, is used as working capital to part fund most of its popular programmes, which are then produced on the open market. The fact that Sir David wants to reduce quotas for content of minority interest is an example of how intensely commercial the organisation has become. Encouraging BBC Television to develop as a business rather than a public service has created a broken-backed system.

Hugh Williams
London SW1