HE WHO PAYS THE PIPER

>> Thursday, February 02, 2012

Has the BBC been running with this story today?

The BBC received millions of pounds from the European Union and local authorities over the past four years. The BBC admitted in a letter to a Tory MP that it has received nearly £3million in grant money from the European Union over the past four years. Other grants totalling £16million came from local authorities across the UK. The money was spent on "research and development projects". The broadcaster also disclosed that its commercial arm BBC Worldwide borrowed over £141million from the European Investment Bank since 2003. Of that figure £30million is still due to be repaid by the end of May this year.

24 comments:

john 10:35 PM, February 02, 2012  

"Upon reflection, and after many meetings, I think we got it just about banked."

john in cheshire 10:36 PM, February 02, 2012  

David, a few years ago, sometime before the previous cabal of socialists were kicked out of office, there had been an election which was reported upon by the bbc in their usual partisan way. I exchanged a few emails with one of the producers (can't remember who) of a news team on their blatant bias towards socialist labour. His response was one of incredulity that I should have such thoughts. It got to a point where I just couldn't be bothered to reply to his responses. You see, they are not biased, they don't allow their political views to interfere with their reportage and the management never enquire about their team members' political views or activities. I was also informed that the bbc doesn't have any commercial interests. I naively thought that this lot, who are currently in power,  would put the bbc in its place for a change, but now I see that regardless of which bunch of socialists are in power, none of the three main parties will ever emasculate this nasty organisation. It there needs to be dealt with by other means; the problem is that I don't know what they may be.

Phil 11:07 PM, February 02, 2012  

The UK is a member of the EU.

The UK's politics and economy are deeply entwined with those of the EU by all sorts of laws, rules and regulations.

So why the Telegraph thinks it is news that the BBC is involved in this arrangement is surprising.

After all, the BBC is totally financed by the UK government from the tax on TV use, and that tax, like all taxes, is backed up by the full force of the criminal law.

And the UK government appoints every single member of the BBC's governing body and approves all senior BBC appointments. 

It'd be news if the EU had no influence on the BBC's broadcasts.

ian 3:32 AM, February 03, 2012  

Just think "fish", Phil. It's always supposed to be "fishermen" depleting our fish stocks. Not Spanish, French, and Polish fishermen, who are the real culprits. And then they show a picture of British fishermen. Implying that it's our fault.

Plus, didn't you read that link page on the BBC's EU money sources? (That means our money, of course.)

davejan 8:22 AM, February 03, 2012  

If the beeb got money from the EU then isn't that against the BBC charter ?. If so the charter is null and void therefore they cannot use court action for non payment . Someone should test this in court then the bbc might just lose.

My Site (click to edit) 8:42 AM, February 03, 2012  

'<span>It got to a point where I just couldn't be bothered to reply to his responses. '</span>

Job done then, as far as he was concerned. He still got paid.

My Site (click to edit) 8:47 AM, February 03, 2012  

There are several aspects of the contracted service delivery that by now have been stretched beyond credulity, from compromised editors (Bowen on ME, Black on Enviro, Flanders & Mason on ecomomics, etc) to corporate had-washing tweets, that all need testing.

And not bew allowed to fall at the 'they are unique'/FoI exclusion legal walls erected, ironically, using more public money.

matthew rowe 9:02 AM, February 03, 2012  

Hmm what was the £141million for? who got it and why ? thats what i want to know !

Dogstar060763 9:09 AM, February 03, 2012  

The fact the BBC takes the shilling from the EU is a pretty sorry statement about the true loyalties of a clearly editorially compromised organisation. This isn't rocket science. Follow the money. You don't bite the hand that feeds you - so no surprise, then, that the BBBC fails so consistently to engage any critical faculties when debating the EU and it's multitude of wrongs.

It's all a bit depressing. I listen to the Today programme and watch Newsnight with an increasingly sense of helpless despair; self-serving apparatchicks who stick to the agreed narratives, won't brook any dissent from the manifesto line and disengage petulantly from any who take serious issue or stray from the agenda.

How did we ever arrive at a situation where the BBBC - a publicly-funded national broadcaster - receives money from the EU - with all the dire political implications that involves? It's a staggering blow to any and all notions of 'impartiality'.

*facepalm.jpg*

LJ 9:35 AM, February 03, 2012  

Actually, Phil, we give £15Billion a year to the EU. They take £3m of that money, give it to the BBC ON THE CONDITION the BBC doesn't saying anything negative about the EU. So they do. This is a fact, it is the way the EU works!
Imagine if the government of the day could deliver public money to the BBC on those conditions? It would be a bit like Iran TV, wouldn't it??

ltwf1964 11:20 AM, February 03, 2012  

some/most of the comments on the telegraph article could have come from the guys on this blog

maybe they lurk here without posting or something!!

you do get the odd nutter along the lines of dezzie or scotty boy but they get shot down pretty quickly

much like here in fact

Louis Robinson 11:33 AM, February 03, 2012  

How does the BBC intend to pay back this money? Profits? Or services rendered.

My Site (click to edit) 11:40 AM, February 03, 2012  

Always interested to see how the stance being taken is formulated..

<span> theJeremyVine <span>Jeremy Vine</span> </span> <span> <span><span></span></span> </span> Today's stories @BBCRadio2, see you at noon! pic.twitter.com/fhYoRwn4
Why should a bloke we approve of be... vs. when are folk we don't approve going to go and why are they being more kicked than we can manage already?
Bit blatant in the double standard dept., even for you, Aunty?

George R 1:35 PM, February 03, 2012  

Of course, BBC-NUJ is a global empire building propaganda broadcaster for Islam, and lobbies for continuance of taxpayer finance of BBC-NUJ.

 Things will get worse as BBC takes over World Service in 2013 and gives more of a political advocacy role to its Islamic Arabic TV service and to all the anti-British political tendencies in reporting from such places as Pakistan, Egypt, and Gaza, etc.

"Hansen's pay cut shows the BBC is in need of radical surgery."

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2095442/Alan-Hansens-pay-cut-shows-BBC-need-radical-surgery.html#ixzz1lKCnXUpZ

Derek Buxton 2:55 PM, February 03, 2012  

Sound just like your old fashioned bribery and corruption from here by an organisation that is governed, we wish, by a Royal Charter.  Is it not time for Ma'am to have a word in someones ear?

David Preiser (USA) 4:08 PM, February 03, 2012  

It costs a lot of money to license Rugby Nation and The Chronicles of Riddick, and send Jamie Oliver to the Navajo Reservation. They probably had to borrow money to pay for the batallion of digital media Beeboids traipsing around the US to make all those human interest, magazine-style pieces.

Dez 9:12 PM, February 03, 2012  

LJ,

"They [the EU] take £3m of that money, give it to the BBC ON THE CONDITION the BBC doesn't saying anything negative about the EU."

I agree that would be a scandal if true.

"This is a fact..."

Do uou have any proof of this "fact"?

Dez 9:13 PM, February 03, 2012  

LJ,  

"They [the EU] take £3m of that money, give it to the BBC ON THE CONDITION the BBC doesn't saying anything negative about the EU."  

I agree that would be a scandal if true.  

"This is a fact..."  

Do you have any proof of this "fact"?

Dez 9:32 PM, February 03, 2012  

"[The BBC] received nearly £3million in grant money from the European Union over the past four years."

So that's £750,000 per year. Or 0.015% of the BBC's annual budget. Refhttp://goo.gl/I6Z9l

ltwf1964 9:46 PM, February 03, 2012  

that would be £750000 a year more than the charter setting up the bbc allows


idiot

Dez 10:52 PM, February 03, 2012  

"that would be £750000 a year more than the charter setting up the bbc allows"

Cite?

ltwf1964 7:42 AM, February 04, 2012  

<span>The BBC was founded by a Royal Charter, to receive monies/loans/payments from a foreign entity is treason.</span>

simple enough for even you

My Site (click to edit) 9:08 AM, February 05, 2012  

Going to make future 'wot I fink is' posts from the cherry vulture nest a smidge tricky to justify.

And a large chunk of BBC 'news'.

Nifty precedent. Tx.

My Site (click to edit) 9:11 AM, February 05, 2012  

Not sure highlighting the totality of the BBC budget is a good play, given what is produced from it, and the manner it is derived.

So, again, tx.

Antony Jay

"But we were not just anti-Macmillan; we were anti-industry, anti-capitalism, anti-advertising, anti-selling, anti-profit, anti-patriotism, anti-monarchy, anti-Empire, anti-police, anti-armed forces, anti-bomb, anti-authority. Almost anything that made the world a freer, safer and more prosperous place, you name it, we were anti it."
Antony Jay, Telegraph, July 2007

Andrew Marr

"..the final answer, frankly, is the vigorous use of state power to coerce and repress. It may be my Presbyterian background, but I firmly believe that repression can be a great, civilising instrument for good. Stamp hard on certain 'natural' beliefs for long enough and you can almost kill them off."
Andrew Marr, The Guardian Feb. 1999

Jeremy Paxman

"But the bigger question is whether the BBC itself has a future. Working for it has always been a bit like living in Stalin’s Russia, with one five-year-plan, one resoundingly empty slogan after another. One BBC, Making it Happen, Creative Futures, they all blur into one great vacuous blur. I can’t even recall what the current one is. Rather like Stalin’s Russia, they express a belief that the system will go on forever."
Jeremy Paxman, The James McTaggart Memorial, 24th August 2007

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