HOWZAT

Furthermore, whole stories are completely wasted because the poor reporters in the field, who frequently have nothing to report because they have just arrived and nobody is talking, are encouraged to resort to time-filling hackery: “Residents in this small, tight-knit community are struggling to come to terms with...” Yeah, yeah, get on with it. Or, better still, go back to the studio and just tell us the facts and what they mean.

The deadness is extraordinary. I first noticed it on the breakfast show. For hours, nothing happens, over and over again. Various presenters struggle to ape the American model or to get some “chemistry” going, the odd weather girl bounces about, and capriciously dull features — the training of police dogs was one recent, brilliantly stillborn example — are stretched out from day to day. Dull and serious is just about bearable, but dull and trivial — why?

Some creeping, necrotic effect has spread to the other primary bulletins. All the main presenters seem to be suffering from a form of narcolepsy, and most of the writing is as flat as a pancake. Seesawing between boredom and irritation, I finally abandoned BBC News, with the exception of the excellent BBC4 bulletin. I should also say that the corporation’s superb website is probably the best news source in the world, and radio has yet to fall down dead. The resources and talent are there.

So, what has happened to mainstream TV news? The answer, I think, is: first, the common style imposed on all the bulletins in 1999 has placed them in an unfortunate stylistic straitjacket; second, the Andrew Gilligan affair destroyed the BBC’s confidence (unfairly — Gilligan was right); and third, a patronising tabloid style, though without the tabloid excitement, has infected the whole operation, on the advice, I would guess, of the always unnecessary and invariably annoying marketing department.

The BBC has, I think, two options. The scorched-earth policy would be to abandon news entirely. There is too much television news, and, these days, nobody loves the BBC for its news. However, we certainly do love it for Planet Earth, Bleak House and so on. Furthermore, news is incredibly expensive, and cutting the licence fee would be a smart move. The problem with this, clearly, would be that the BBC would abandon its historic identity as the organisation through which “nation speaks peace unto nation”.

The second alternative, the take-the-bull-by-the-horns policy, is to make the Great Paxo a true anchor of the 6pm or 10pm bulletins, and just sit back and watch. We have never really tried the American anchor model. Certainly, we have had a few news panjandrums, such as Alastair Burnet or Trevor McDonald, and the BBC did once specialise in rather cosy, trustworthy figures like Kenneth Kendall and Richard Baker. But there has never been a central figure who truly acts as the face of the news, whose attitudes and manner become a welcome and consoling part of national life. Paxo’s the man.

Of course, they won’t do it because they’d be afraid of what might happen and, more importantly, because they have an innate distrust of authority figures. The reflex egalitarian, anti-elitist streak in the BBC means that they prefer bland, jolly, tabloidy types to anybody with any weight or authority. It is a truism that Kenneth Clarke’s Civilisation could not be made today. But it remains shocking and sad.

Back in the States, I would guess that, with Couric on board, CBS is about to become the best TV news operation in the world. The BBC should watch and learn.

www.bryanappleyard.com