Respected state broadcaster a thorn in the side of all political parties

FOR all its carefully-won reputation around the world as a model of probity and fairness, over the decades the BBC has managed to annoy British governments of pretty much every political persuasion.

With its slightly anomalous position of being both a state broadcaster funded by a compulsory licence fee and avowedly independent, the British Broadcasting Corporation, founded in 1922, has long been in a tricky position.

The corporation has been regularly lambasted by ministers for being, depending on the issue and the government’s view, a hotbed of radical leftism, or a hidebound conservative dinosaur.