The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism‘s annual Digital News Report for 2022 is out. The data-heavy report is full of findings about how and where news is consumed. The data points that struck Guido hardest were the loss of trust in BBC News. It has fallen 20 points in the last five years, from 75% to 55%. Equally telling is the proportion who say they distrust the BBC, which has more than doubled from 11% to 26%. This the Reuters Institute says is because

“The majority of these are from the political right, echoing criticism from Boris Johnson’s government about an alleged anti-Brexit and liberal bias, but we also find that low trust in the BBC also comes from those who are less interested in news altogether. … Declining trust is a particular challenge for public media organisations, as they try to fulfil their mission to appeal to all audiences.”

As the BBC becomes a cultural pump for the woke agenda dressed up as entertainment, it loses legitimacy and weakens the case for universal funding. If it dismays a sizeable section of the population the case for moving to a subscription model funded by consenting viewers becomes overwhelmingly stronger. No doubt leftie metropolitan types will point out that the least trusting of the BBC are Brexit-backing Tory blokes without degrees in media studies, so it doesn’t matter.  It does because they are forced to pay a television tax to fund an organisation that despises them, a situation which cannot prevail for much longer…