BBC future funding: oral evidence session

Prepared for the House of Lords

Claire Enders

5 April 2022

Favourable impression of BBC

• Overall, 58% of adults in the UK have a positive favourable impression of the BBC

Young people and BBC

• 62% of 16-34 year-olds say the BBC is important to them

• 4 in 10 children said they would miss the BBC if it was gone, rising to nearly 6 in 10 who have used BBC Bitesize during lockdown

BBC as a source of trustworthy source of news

• The BBC was the highest-rated source for news about Covid-19 online, on TV and on radio

• 78% of regular users rated the BBC highly as a source of TV news about Covid-19. The next highest rated sources of TV news were Sky News (76%) and ITV (74%)

• 82% of regular users rated the BBC News website and app highly as a source of news about Covid-19. The next highest rated sources of online news were the Guardian (74%) and Sky News (72%)

• 55% of viewers of BBC TV news rated it highly in terms of impartiality, compared to 65% of regular users of the BBC website/app and 61% of regular users for BBC radio

• 63% of audiences rated the BBC highly for providing high quality creative content

• The BBC was the most popular source of news among both Conservative & Labour voters, and among both Leave & Remain voters

• 80% of UK adults say the BBC is effective at informing people in the UK (versus 10% saying ineffective)

Source: Ofcom’s annual report on the BBC 2020/21, Ofcom’s News Consumption Survey 2021, Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2019, BBC Annual Report 2020/21

World Service

£315m

Misc*

£368m

£238m

BBC Public Service Broadcasting

£1,609m

current affairs

£348m

Children’s

£83m

S4C &

broadband

£105m

Obligations

£539m

collection

£119m

Distribution, content & general

£801m

£4.1bn

Radio 4

£91m

Radio

£494m

Nations/Local radio

£201m

Factual & Learning

£239m

Note: bubbles denote relative size of expenditure, but are not to scale.

*Includes: restructuring costs, development costs, PSB costs incurred to generate non-licence fee income and other costs totalling £56m.

[Source: company reports, Enders Analysis]

• According to the BBC, UK adults (aged 16+) spent close to 18 hours a week viewing, listening and consuming all BBC services on average in 2019/20

• Our own viewing estimates suggest UK adults (aged 16+) spent between 2.5 and 3 hours per week watching Netflix on average in 2020 and 2021

• We estimate time spent with Netflix is a sixth of time spent with the BBC as a whole and a third of time spent viewing BBC TV content