Rishi Sunak, Britain’s chancellor, has led a cabinet pushback against calls from culture secretary Nadine Dorries for an end to the BBC licence fee from 2027.
UK government insiders said that Sunak had told Dorries there had not been proper cabinet discussion on whether the licence fee should ultimately be replaced, a view echoed by colleagues.
Dorries on Monday announced that funding would be squeezed at the BBC. The licence fee, a compulsory tax that provides almost three-quarters of the broadcaster’s funding, will be frozen at £159 per household over the next two years.
But the announcement was trailed in the Mail on Sunday newspaper before cabinet ministers were given a chance to discuss the measure, and Dorries on Sunday tweeted that this licence fee settlement would be “the last”.
Thérèse Coffey, the work and pensions secretary, complained in cabinet on Tuesday that Dorries had attempted to bounce colleagues into supporting her by suggesting in the tweet that the licence fee would soon be abolished.
Meanwhile, Whitehall officials said that Liz Truss, the foreign secretary, backed Dorries but said it was vital that the BBC World Service had generous funding to counter disinformation from countries including Russia and China.
The rushed nature of the BBC announcement reflects a determination by Boris Johnson, prime minister, to set out policies that could rally Tory support behind his embattled leadership, dubbed “Operation Red Meat” in Whitehall.
Downing Street said Johnson was “fully behind Nadine” after she implied the fee that has funded the BBC for a century would be abolished after 2027.
But Number 10 provoked a backlash after ministers were asked to approve the licence fee freeze over the weekend and to give their comments on Monday, only to read about the decision in the Sunday press.
Sunak’s allies said the chancellor backed the licence fee freeze but insisted that Dorries should not repeat her threat to scrap the fee when she appeared in the Commons on Monday. In the event she did not mention the plan, to the relief of BBC bosses.
Dorries’s allies said she had no regrets about “firing the starting gun” on a debate about the future of the licence fee, which she believes cannot survive in a changed media environment.
Number 10 has also set out plans to put the Royal Navy in charge of trying to stop the flow of migrants across the English Channel in small boats, with Priti Patel, home secretary, confirming on Monday that she had been in contact with the Ministry of Defence.
But naval officials said the policy had been “rushed out” and Tory MP Philip Hollobone said: “This isn’t Operation Red Meat, it’s Operation Dog’s Dinner.” He added that “the only way this will work if the Royal Navy intercepts asylum seekers and returns them back to France”.
Tom Sharpe, a retired Royal Navy commander, said: “Only time will tell if the appointment of a naval commander here is a political stunt or not.” He added that Patel would have to empower the navy to bring together dozens of agencies and surveillance companies.
Labour claimed that the decision to deploy the military was “a desperate attempt to distract attention from accusations about the prime minister lying and partying in Downing Street”.
Meanwhile, the ministry of foreign affairs of Ghana angrily denied that it was in talks with the British government about hosting a processing centre for people seeking asylum in the UK.
The statement followed a report in Monday’s Times newspaper that the government was drawing up plans to send migrants to Ghana and Rwanda to process their asylum claims.
In a press release on Tuesday, Ghana’s foreign ministry referred to “a document dubbed Operation Dead Meat”, and said: “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Regional Integration wishes to state categorically that Ghana has not engaged with the UK on any such plan and does not intend to consider any such operation in future.
“Any publication that implies otherwise should be ignored.”
Additional reporting by Robert Wright
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2022-01-19 04:00:59Z
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