BBC is ‘constantly on the brink of breakdown’, says ex-Radio 4 boss

The BBC is ‘constantly on the verge of having a nervous breakdown’, a former executive yesterday claimed.

Mark Damazer, who used to be controller of Radio 4, revealed the Corporation gives off a ‘self-confident’ image but that this hides its internal fractures.

He said: ‘It projects to most of its competition a sense of imperialism, huge, grand, swathes of self-confidence. Inside the organisation, it’s almost constantly on the verge of having a nervous breakdown and these two anti-logical traits live side by side.’

He added that the public broadcaster spent a lot of its time meeting with people who have complaints. 

‘I think I got 90 per cent of the salary for doing the job and 10 per cent for holding my temper and being polite when actually you wanted to hit somebody who was complaining in a way that was unreasonable – whether it was a political spin doctor or a House of Lords lobbyist or a member of the public,’ he said.

Mr Damazer, who was the controller of Radio 4 from 2004-2010 and deputy director of BBC News from 2001-04, was speaking at the Voice of the Listener and Viewer conference in London. 

He also criticised the BBC for having a ‘culture where people are expected to be Humphrys or Maitlis’ but do not the take time to interview guests properly. ‘Frankly those interviews need a bit of reconsideration’, he said.

Mr Damazer, who was the controller of Radio 4 from 2004-2010 and deputy director of BBC News from 2001-04, revealed the Corporation gives off a ‘self-confident’ image but that this hides its internal fractures [File photo]

‘Because in a rush to get to the next headline… there is not enough pausing and stopping about things that are said that are implausible and don’t stand up.’ 

He gave the hypothetical example of a health secretary being interviewed and claiming NHS expenditure has risen year on year.

He said: ‘This is entirely true… it is of course nonsense. In the context of a growing population, the rising costs of medicine, expenditure per head, it is simply not true, it’s not negotiable, it’s simply not true. When somebody says that in an interview, they need to be stopped and the other parts of the interview need to be put to one side in the interest of proper scrutiny.’

Mr Damazer, 64, who earned a salary of £210,000 at the BBC, also claimed the Corporation should not come under fire for impartiality – but a lack of ‘quality’ broadcasting. 

‘I think that the debate about the BBC’s coverage has focused too much on impartiality, not enough on quality – they’re related but they’re not quite the same’, he said.

Mr Damazer also criticised the BBC for having a ‘culture where people are expected to be Humphrys (above) or Maitlis’ but do not the take time to interview guests properly. ‘Frankly those interviews need a bit of reconsideration’, he said

He added that the BBC shows a lack of a ‘proper rigorous scrutiny of statistical argument because people think that the audience is going to be bored by statistics.’ 

He called for a ‘thorough interrogation and understanding of numbers’.

Dorothy Byrne, head of news at Channel 4, hit out at the ‘obsession with due impartiality’. 

She said: ‘I am genuinely very concerned that when we have to listen to people wittering on all day about how they do and don’t agree with each other on the minutiae of what they’re trying to sort out about Brexit, I’m very concerned about the stories we are not hearing.’