Grim outlook for BBC says John Simpson
on 14 Oct 2008
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BBC World Affairs Editor and
Frontline Club regular,
John Simpson, was talking at the
Cheltenham Literature Festival when he turned on his paymaster of the last 42 years,
"The future? Well, I don't think that it's going to look very good for the BBC. I think the BBC we have known, for good or worse, is now in its last stages. It pains me after 42 years of working for it to think that, but I alas do. I think the standards will be there, just as they are with other organisations which have been built on the BBC model, but it takes money. link
He went on to talk about his departure from the corporation and how maybe, just maybe, his speech at the festival might precipitate it,
"I shall no doubt be sacked under horrible circumstances. Things will be absolutely dreadful. I'll hate the so and so's - I hate them pretty much anyway, but I'll hate them even more. Then I'll be tempted to say that standards have definitely dropped, when what I mean is that I'm not around any more! I just hope - and I hope you'll keep me to it - if I were to get the boot from the BBC, perhaps after what I've said this evening, and I pop up and start denigrating it, I do hope you'll remind me how I despise that tendency among people. link
Image above taken from the Daily Mail.
Well he seems to have been frozen out already - anyone seen him reporting on the BBC in 2009, or quoted on the BBC News online for that matter...