Does the BBC provide value for money? It thinks it does and got Deloittes to provide an “impartial” report that proves this. However a Biased BBC reader who is a professional accountant take issue with what is claimed….
THE ECONOMIC IMPACTOF THE BBC
First I must emphasise that I have only read the executive summary, and brieflyat that, so my comments below may be flawed. I can not afford to spendmuch time reading this.
Good to see the Chief Operating Officer mention in her forward “theprivilege of licence fee funding” which allows the BBC to project itsinfluence widely. Deloitte explain in their report that they have taken information andexplanations from the BBC at face value, with no corroborative work or even areview of its reasonableness.
METHODOLOGY
Gross Value Added (GVA) is total value generated for the UK economy.
Direct Value Added (DVA) is the BBC’s wage bill plus any surplus.
Net Value Added (NVA) is the additional value added to the UK economy becauseof the licence fee funding method rather than the alternative of advertising.
Points about Value Added
A company’s value added is the total amount of value added by all a company’sactivities. It is:
sales – payments to suppliers
It’s use is dubious for an organisation which does not rely on willingcustomers with competitive alternatives to provide its income.
Traditionally it has been used by companies to show that it’s employees receivethe bulk of its wealth creation.
If the BBC wishes to test their Value Added in the marketplace, they shouldchange to a subscription only service.
Spillover effects are the positive effects of BBC spending on otherorganisations.
But we need to remember that anyone who is allowed to take other peoples moneyby force will have a positive value added and spillover effect by simplyspending this money. However the trade off is that those persons deprivedof their own money are denied the opportunity to spend and generate value addedand positive feedback.
The report states that a higher multiple is used to calculate the GVA of BBCspending than to calculate the GVA of alternative consumer spending. Inplain English it is simply assumed that the BBC generates more value addedwhen spending other people’s money than those people would generate by spendingit themselves. Possibly there is an attempt to justify this somewhere inthe full report. But in my experience, those who work hardest for theirmoney spend it more wisely than those simply presented with it, because theyvalue it more.
CONCLUSIONS?
The BBC seems to have chosen the assumptions underlying Deloitte’s report andDeloitte have not assessed their validity. The assumptions appear to havebeen chosen in order to achieve the desired results. Is it just me, ordoes this remind you of mainstream climate change models? Again, I am not sure of the validity of a value added analysis for anorganisation whose customers are compelled by force to pay up. Words such as “estimated” and “approximation” seem to cropup regularly. Not sure whether the word “arbitrary” may be moreappropriate?
The BBC charge £150 a year probably equal to £200 of an employees pre tax salary.
I bet most of us could spend that money on better things than the BBC.
Additionally if the BBC were a subscription based service, it could charge more for its services and offer MORE services just like Sky does.
I’ve never understood the mindset of the BBC, going subscription would give them to really show that they are value for money as they claim.
After reading the “Important Notice from Deloitte” which basically is a wide ranging disclaimer in which they admit all the important info was provided by the BBC and Deloittes can’t be held responsible for any errors or bullshit, my response to the report is quite simple….I WOULD NOT WIPE MY ARSE WITH IT.
I wonder how much Deloittes charged (and we paid) for them to put all that crap in a fancy binder, put their logo on the front and call it a ‘report’ but then make sure they cannot be held to account over any of the information in it?
Nice work if you can get it!
TThe BBC stinks, and is a waste of money. Climate change is climate change, and is bugger all to worry about, and should remove itself from the BBC’s clutches, post haste. Anything ‘invested’ in either of them is money, effort and time wasted.
The BBC enforces people to pay it . That is good value for money says Detoilett
So if the BBC doubled the amount that people had to pay , would that be double the value ?
If it halved, would that be half the value ? If it didn`t force people to pay anything , would it be of no value ?
Must really piss the tossers off that Top Gear and Clarkson brings in so much money 🙂
Good post, my thanks to the reader who wrote in. I tried wading through the report when it was originally posted here, but couldn’t get past all the assumptions and, as john points out above, the disclaimer. It does seem like a report with a pre-determined outcome.
I’ll repeat what I said when this Deloitte thing first popped up: £150 per year for dozens of TV and radio stations, plus an enormous, all-encompassing website? That is an exceptional bargain.
The BBC is terrific value for money and it is a globally-recognised, highly-respected brand; and I have few doubts that it would survive if it went to a subscription-only service or introduced advertising. It may have to close BBC Alba or cut back on its Arabic networks but, then again, it may not.
Incidentally, I have a young family and I would subscribe if only to enjoy a quiet life and to watch the Six Nations, Sherlock, Hustle and The Apprentice.
The licence fee is an absurdity, however, and is about as fair and justifiable as a tax on beards, cats or windows.
The BBC have lobbed barrowloads of cash at Deloittes to produce some self-serving propaganda and guess what? The report smells of self-serving propaganda.
If I had money to invest I would never buy shares in any company that had been audited by Deloittes. They would even advise purchasing Greek bonds if they were paid enough.
On second and third and fourth thoughts, I’m starting to think that this whole “value for money” thing is a smokescreen. It’s a red herring, a will-o’-the-wisp argument to distract everyone from the deeply entrenched and harmful bias at the BBC.
As long as people are arguing about the license fee, the high salaries of various presenters and mandarins, the volume of orchestras and light entertainment, or the non-English language services and local radio, they’re not thinking about the endemic Left-wing bias which shapes the news reporting and attempts to control pubilc opinion.
The more everyone talks about value for money, the happier and safer the Beeboids feel.
Agreed. And process over result, again.
‘Value’ is irrelevant, especially when viewed through the rosy prism of ‘stuff’, if much of what is provided as ‘stuff’ is not fit for purpose, especially at the sharp end.
During the Great War, the production of shells was down to a mostly unprofessional workforce overseen by a management keen on lowest bid contracts in a dodgy relationship with the authorities.
Hence there were a vast number of duds.
Now, one is sure that a box tick somewhere was content with the value for money, but the squaddies dying because a barrage designed to suppress an area actually only managed 30% of target probably felt different.
And that, also, served the national interest poorly.
25M are compelled by law to pay for a ‘service’ that is more propaganda than news (or, indeed, simple easy entertainment any more, from ‘documentaries’ to ‘drama’), and too often the opinions of a minority on top. With absolute control to the point of censorship in terms of feedback and/or complaint, all overseen internally.
That is unhealthy and anachronistic, especially in this day and age, with very poor historical precedent to look back upon.
Something on the news this morning about the British film industry being required to make their films more commercially viable in return for lottery funding, or something like that.
It has always reminded me of the BBC in some respects – some good films but far to much depressing, lefty, gritty “social commentary” and no interest whatsoever in standing on its own two feet.
IMO, as a film can be shown in 1000 cinemas simultaneously, it has economies of scale and should be commercially viable. Companies can, if they wish, subsidise their non commercial ventures out of their commerial ones.
Yes, as soon as British films are mentioned, BBC-NUJ is in political thrall to its Marxist film director, Ken LOACH.
BBC-NUJ politically campaigns for Loach’s Marxist ‘diversity’ which seems to mean public subsidisation of all Loach’s Marxist films made on diverse locations but all with one Marxist political message.
And who is the Chairman of the British Film Institute (which gets £20m a year off taxpayers) – but ex-BBC Director General, Greg DYKE.
So we get this ‘all political pals of the left together’ reporting by BBC-NUJ, as on Radio 5 today, and here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-16495095
“And who is the Chairman of the British Film Institute (which gets £20m a year off taxpayers) – but ex-BBC Director General, Greg DYKE. “
Didn’t know that. So there you are.
Any dictatorial organisation could claim that it increases output/income/welfare of a country by spending the citizens’ taxes.
(And get paid consultants to agree.)
That ties right in with the concept of government expenditure being a vital part of GDP.
The government tell us how much the obesity time bomb is going to cost and encourages us all to be more active by taking up sports and activities such as cycling and walking, yet at the same time it generously funds a mass broadcaster of junk TV with the full backing of the criminal law, helping to ensure that the nation’s fatties are slumped in front of their TVs as much as possible watching populist trash like Eastenders, Casualty, Flog It! and celebrity dancing competitions.
I note that Deloitte didn’t touch upon this paradox, or attempt to put a cost to the nation’s health and economy caused by the sedentary activity of watching hours of TV instead of doing something more active.
Neither did they try to put a cost on the dreadful cultural and social cost of most mainstream BBC TV and radio rubbish, which must surely counteract any attempts by the state education system to interest the population in such things as Shakespeare or classical music.