Ofcom oversight of BBC sites has been a long time coming

‘Because it was the BBC, this was taken as fact, everywhere’

- Stephen Pollard

WHAT is the point of the BBC? Every month, 3,500 of us are prosecuted for paying licence fee. That not the obligation to pay £159 a year for the BBC's services - works both ways. Just as each of us has to pay up, so the BBC is obliged in its Royal Charter to provide "impartial, high-quality and distinctive output and services which inform, educate and entertain".

There's an important debate to be had about the future of public service broadcasting, not least because that Royal Charter ends in 2027. But now, in 2024, it's clear that the corporation is failing to meet its current obligations, especially when it comes to news.

Communications regulator Ofcom is responsible for overseeing the BBC's TV, radio and iPlayer output. But there has been a gaping hole in that oversight BBC.co.uk and BBC.com, together the planet's most popular news sites, with more than a billion monthly visits.

Eight in 10 British adults access BBC News each week. What it does matters, hugely. And yet, until now, levels of impartiality and quality have been formally judged only by the BBC itself.