How Do You Solve a Problem Like BBC's Question Time?

Every Thursday my twitter feed is filled up with people complaining about BBC’s Question Time. In fact, it seems there are more complaints than ever, as the UK seems more divided and the government makes some of its most important political and economic decisions since the end of World War II.

In this context, Question Time (QT) - a weekly debate show where the political classes are held to account by the public, and voices of key opinion formers in the UK are heard - is more important than ever.  And yet… at this crucial time it seems to be failing.

Why? Diversity isn't at Question Time’s core.

But before I explain how diversity could solve QT’s problems first let me share a short story.

In December 2010, I was the executive producer of a Panorama investigation into banker’s bonuses. It was only two years after RBS had been bailed out with taxpayers money and the idea that bankers had got off scot free while the majority of the population were suffering from austerity measures was a hot issue (including on QT!). At a planning meeting I suggested the team interview a young back bench MP called Chuka Ummuna. Chuka had just been elected to the Treasury Select Committee and at that point had done no network television.

The team interviewed him. He gave us a great interview. And for once we had a serious BBC programme about the financial crisis that was not full of just white men (with a sprinkling of white women).

But at the time none of my team had heard of Chuka Ummuna – he had been an MP for less than a year. Living in Brixton and having social and professional circles which include a lot of Black and Asian people almost everyone I knew - outside of work - had heard of this new vibrant politician, who would eventually go on to be a contender for the leader of the Labour Party and one of the leading voices of the Party (but more on that later).

The reason we were able to identify this fresh new politician was because for once a black person had editorial power on one of the BBC’s most important current affairs programme.

Which brings me back to BBC’s QT – arguably Britain’s most important news debate programme. It is currently made by an independent company, Mentorn Scotland, but its contract with the BBC has been put up for tender and will be decided in the coming months.

Now, the last time the programme was up for tender the BBC stipulated that the winning production company must be based in Scotland. More specifically, it set criteria that at least 50% of staff spend had to be spent north of the border. Why?

At the time, the BBC realised that politics across the UK was changing because of increased devolution. The BBC recognized they must enshrine regional diversity into the DNA of the programme. They had to find a way to have people with lived experiences outside of London, outside of the “Westminister Bubble”, with a different perspective, at the very heart of editorial decision-making. So they set criteria accordingly in the tender document. That’s why QT is currently made by Mentorn Scotland.

However, while regional diversity has flourished, QT’s record on Black, Asian & Minority Ethnic (BAME) diversity has not.

In 2015, research conducted by a team led by David Lammy MP found that between 2010 and 2015 almost two thirds (61%) of the episodes had no BAME panelists. And of the times BAME politicians that did appear just two, Chuka Umunna and Diane Abbot, accounted for 50% of them. I now shudder to think what would have happened if Chuka hadn’t appeared on the Panorama programme I mentioned earlier!

But why does this matter? The fact is that Britain is more diverse than ever and increasingly so. The UK BAME population is actually larger than the population of Scotland and by 2051 it will be larger than Wales, Scotland and N. Ireland combined. Most demographers say it is only a matter of time that many of the country’s major cities will be majority BAME. That means ethnicity is increasingly shaping the discussion in the UK. From the rural-urban divide, to global politics, to heated debates around immigration. Diversity is at the center. It is now totally impossible to have debates about most of the key issues affecting the UK without reflecting a BAME perspective.

That means that if the last QT bid had to recognize regional issues to ensure it works, now it has to recognize ethnicity issues.  And the country – and therefore the BBC - needs Question Time to work. Without a robust, constructive political debate open to the public once a week the electorate is less informed. In such a scenario, my twitter feed will not only become impossible, the BBC will also lose its taxpayers mandate.

How could BBC push for diversity to be better reflected in QT? It shouldn’t micro-manage. No, the BBC just needs to do what it did for regional diversity last time. Award the contract to an independent company that is brilliant AND meets certain diversity criteria – such as the proportion of staff pay going to under-represented groups (as Mentorn Scotland did for regional staff pay) and/or having BAME people in key editorial roles. These criteria just need to be put into the tender document and voila – believe me – the companies will respond!

At this time of huge change and uncertainty in the UK, reflecting diversity is the ONLY way the Question Time of the future will work. As the BBC begins the procurement process for the new independent company to run it going forwards, it has a responsibility and a role in making this happen. And I sure hope it does - at the very least to keep my twitter feed clean!