AS the UK state broadcaster, the BBC is continually under pressure to appear objective in a political, cultural and social sense whilst its alleged independent status has been under a consistent threat from recent governments.

The new incoming director-general, Tim Davie, seems anxious to ingratiate himself and Auntie Beeb with the most right-wing government of this generation by allegedly seeking to restore “trust and confidence” in the BBC by targeting left-leaning comedy shows.

Mr Davie is a former Conservative party councillor and was deputy chairman of the Hammersmith and Fulham branch in the 1990s. Impartial observers may be tempted to have some serious reservations about his motives in launching pseudo-McCarthyite attacks on comedy programmes such as Have I Got News For You, which indulge in mild satirical observations about the UK and world political scene.

READ MORE: Former Tory candidate Tim Davie takes over as BBC director-general

To portray this programme as left-leaning, a viewer would surely have to be quite substantially right-leaning in the first place, and that is a concern. The BBC does not broadcast any programme anywhere near as acerbic as shows like That Was The Week That Was from the 1960s, which cut through much of the pomposity and political hypocrisy of the time.

Mr Davie is said to be keen to redress what he regards as bias in some comedies against the Tory government, Brexit and President Trump, and would like to have more right-leaning comedians on BBC in future. He is plainly sowing the seeds for a Fox News-style revamp for the BBC in the months ahead.

We have already experienced the glaring prejudice of the BBC against people and groups that favour Scottish independence over recent years, none more so than BBC Scotland itself. It is transparently clear that any existential crisis the BBC has faced of late will be postponed, as the Westminster government now has one of its own in charge of affairs. Any pretence of impartiality will be discarded and the BBC may well become the Brexit Broadcasting Corporation.

And as for right-wing comedians? There’s a reason why they’re traditionally not popular with television audiences. In short, they tend to be racist, misogynistic, homophobic, xenophobic, offensive and completely without humour.

Owen Kelly
Stirling