House of Commons - Foreign Affairs Committee: The Future of the BBC World Service - HC 1045

Book excerpt: In this report, published on the last day that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has funding responsibility for the World Service, the Foreign Affairs Committee says that it has "clear differences" with the BBC on new arrangements for governance of the World Service. It specifically has reservations about the move to licence fee funding for the World Service and what that would mean for the World Service's budget, and its ability to be heard amongst all the other competing voices within the BBC. The Committee regrets that the World Service now has no direct voice on either the BBC Executive Board or the Management Board, and it says that it "remains to be seen" whether representation of the World Service's interests at Board level by the Director of News and Current Affairs will indeed safeguard the distinct nature of the World Service. The Committee welcomes the assurance given in evidence by James Harding, the BBC's Director of News and Current Affairs, that the £245 million budget for the World Service in 2014-15 will be used as a baseline for the following two years. But what is really needed is longer-term protection at institutional level, and we continue to be concerned about the absence of a direct voice for the World Service on either the BBC's Executive Board or the Management Board