The BBC is the last soldier still trying to fight a war that everyone else knows has already ended. After YouTube beat the BBC in Barb’s monthly audience figures for the first time, panicked ‘BBC insiders’ insist to the Times this morning that the broadcaster “continues to comfortably dominate” YouTube in more long-form content. Everything is fine, nothing to see here…
According to Barb, YouTube reached 51.9 million viewers in the UK last month, over a million more than the BBC on 50.8 million. That’s also far ahead of ITV. Even taking the BBC bigwigs’ preferred statistic points to an obvious trend: the broadcaster’s average 15-minute reach was 47 million in 2025 compared to 40.8 million for YouTube. That figure will only trend in one direction…
The BBC will stagger on with its unsustainable model for a while longer; under Labour there is next to zero chance of the licence fee being scrapped, even as millions refuse to pay it. But it is clearly an analogue product in a digital world…
Peter Mandelson has finally said sorry for believing Jeffrey Epstein over the paedophile’s victims. He told BBC Newsnight:
“Yesterday, I did not want to be held responsible for his crimes of which I was ignorant, not indifferent, because of the lies he told me and so many others. I was wrong to believe him following his conviction and to continue my association with him afterwards. I apologise unequivocally for doing so to the women and girls who suffered. I was never culpable or complicit in his crimes. Like everyone else I learned the actual truth about him after his death. But his victims did know what he was doing, their voices were not heard and I am sorry I was amongst those who believed him over them.”