The new BBC chairman is not only a crony, he's a crony's crony
It is outrageous to call me a crony,' Gavyn Davies protested last week. This claim from the new BBC chairman merits the closest examination. Davies, 51, has been a Labour supporter all his life. Until very recently, he was a regular donor to party funds. He wept when Neil Kinnock lost the 1992 election. Reportedly a member of the Labour party since his teens, by 1974 he had become an adviser in Harold Wilson's No. 10 policy unit. He stayed there until 1979, continuing to work at Downing Street when James Callaghan became prime minister.
Davies's wife, Sue Nye, is the personal assistant to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Mr Davies and Ms Nye have homes in Clerkenwell, Devon and Provence. The Clerkenwell home, in particular, has been the scene of a number of important recent events in New Labour history. Two years ago. Gordon Brown and Peter Mandelson used it as a safe house when they met in a bid to iron out their well-publicised differences. About the same time. Davies was happy to aid and abet a tacky and shameless publicity stunt designed to promote the doubtful notion that Gordon Brown was at ease with children. Brown and his girlfriend (now wife) Sarah Macaulay were permitted to intrude, along with press photographers, on a party for the Davies children. Later, the same children were bridesmaid and pageboy at the Chancellor's wedding.
Earlier still, the man who now indignantly insists that he is not a crony hosted Peter Mandelson's 40th birthday party. This is how Donald Macintyre, Mandelson's biographer, described the event: 'Neil and Glenys Kinnock came and stayed for the evening, the enthusiastic Kinnock being outshone on the dance floor only by the indefatigable Peter Mandelson . . . there was a sprinkling of favoured journalists including Polly Toynbee . . . many of the other guests were either close Labour party colleagues or old friends.'
When he was appointed BBC vice-chairman last year, the accompanying Downing Street statement disingenuously asserted that Davies had not undertaken any significant political activity in the last five years. Even more disingenuous was Davies's own assertion this week that he had worked for the past two Tory chancellors. This statement can only have been designed to demonstrate that Davies is even-handed, and therefore cannot be described as being an intimate of any political party. Norman Lamont, the penultimate Tory chancellor, when tackled on the subject, was happy to praise Davies's talent and integrity. But he was unable to recollect ever having met Davies while he was chancellor. It is true that Davies was one of the wise men invited to advise the Treasury in the wake of Black Wednesday. But that post — as Davies would be only too well aware — involved giving impartial, entirely non-political advice. Davies's attempt to attach significance to his relationship with Norman Lamont or Kenneth Clarke and compare it to the one he now enjoys with Gordon Brown is special pleading.
The truth of the matter is that Gavyn Davies is more than a crony. He is the crony's crony. He is the commander-inchief of cronies. He is not merely a crony of Tony Blair but a crony of Gordon Brown, and, for good measure, Peter Mandelson as well. The fact that the new BBC chairman feels disposed to deny these well-attested associations is cause for bemusement as well as disquiet.
Nevertheless, the appointment to the chairmanship of the BBC of such a senior and favoured member of the New Labour establishment would not matter that much were it an isolated appointment. It is not. It follows the appointment of another member of the New Labour nomenklatura, Greg Dyke, to the post of chief executive. And not long before the last election, Robin Oakley, the scrupulously impartial political editor of the BBC (and Spectator turf correspondent), was suddenly thrust aside to make way for the New Labour columnist Andrew Marr.
The Dyke appointment, as with that of Mart, caused a fuss. But ministers at the time pointed to the presence of Tory-leaning Christopher Bland as chairman, implicitly acknowledging the need to maintain a balance and implying that it would be maintained when he left. Indeed, one of the most distressing aspects of the Davies appointment has been the readiness of all concerned — Downing Street, the BBC and Davies himself — to fudge the truth and misrepresent the facts throughout. Last week, Michael Hastings, the head of political and parliamentary affairs at the BBC, claimed that there was a precedent in the 1980s for a director-general and chairman to come from the same political party. In fact, these claims were misleading, as a letter from Will Wyatt (a very senior BBC executive at the time) in the Daily Telegraph last week made plain.
The BBC is one of our great national symbols. It stands for fairness and impartiality, and this reputation stretches across the globe. Never has this been more in evidence than in these last two weeks. As the world trembles on the brink of war, even Afghan tribesmen tune into the crackling World Service in order to get what they know will be a truthful account of events. It would be an utter tragedy and dereliction if this national monument were ever to be seen to have fallen prey to a faction, or as an arm of the British state. Yet the gift of the corporation's three most sensitive posts — chairman, chief executive and political editor — to members of the New Labour establishment during the past 18 months has cast a shadow over the BBC's integrity.
Even so, Davies's indelible association with the Blair administration is not the most regrettable aspect of his appointment. He is an outstanding economist who worked for a number of City stockbroking firms before hitting the jackpot when he became a partner of Goldman Sachs. Yet for all his wealth and success, he is little more than a skilled number-cruncher. There is no great cultural hinterland, no profound knowledge of our national literature. In his spare time, Davies watches football or plays golf. His vision is too close for comfort to that of his chief executive, Greg Dyke, with a beery passion for football and popular culture. He most emphatically does not stand in the tradition of Lord Reith or, for that matter, Lord Hussey. He is, when all is said and done, just a boring man with a beard. His appointment is an insult to the BBC and one more sad step down New Labour's degradation of our public life.
Previous page
