Liam Rudden: Brossgate puts BBC licence fee back on agenda

Published on Friday 31 October 2008 13:17

"WARNING: This account contains transcripts of the calls which include language that some readers may find offensive."

The exact wording from bbc.co.uk's timeline of Brossgate or should that be Rondgate?

What follows at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7694989.stm, as you may have guessed, are sections of Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand's well documented exchanges with Andrew Sachs' answer machine.

Of the two 'entertainers' you would expect Ross to know better – could you ever imagine the BBC's previous chat show king Michael Parkinson indulging in such a crass exploit?

But then Parkinson – love him or loathe him – at least had a modicum of finesse when it came to broadcasting, and without needing to be paid obscene sums of licence payers' money to do so. We'll come back to the money later.

All that Brossgate has done is confirm what I have always believed, that Ross' popularity is built on hype. If the BBC sing his praises often enough, and force him on the viewing and listening public at every possible opportunity, then maybe they can brow beat us into believing that he is an asset to the publicly funded station.

Personally, I've often wondered what Ross actually does to justify his fee. His interviews are nothing more than ego-trips as interesting guests are forced to play straight-man to his banal humour and adolescent questioning.

As for Film 2007/8/9 or whatever, it has to be the most pointless series ever. Although, let's be honest, it always has been, even when Barry Norman used to present it, but he didn't have an annoying speech impediment.

But back to Rondgate, at least Brand has had the decency to resign. That said, with a burgeoning career in Hollywood and a national tour in the offing, I wonder how long he had intended staying with Radio 2 anyway.

Of course, it's not the first time that Brand has found himself caught up in such a furore. Two years ago it was Rod Stewart who was gunning for the former heroin addict, after he announced during an awards ceremony that he had slept with the singer's daughter. An apology followed. Sound familiar?

However, Brand doesn't always get it wrong. Earlier this year, while hosting the MTV Awards in LA he referred to President George W Bush as a "retard cowboy fella". Obviously, not all bad, then – Brand that is, not Bush.

Tabloid talk of Sachs reporting the abusive calls to the police have so far proved unfounded but here's the rub, were the pair to be prosecuted for making a nuisance call, the maximum fine they could face is 1000 – loose change to 47-year-old Ross who is alleged to be on 6million a year.

Remind me, why does the licence fee keep rising? Oh yes, so that sad, middle-aged lads can stick two fingers up at viewers with wild abandon. Believe me, if you want to get a message through to the governors of the BBC, you can not emphasise enough the fact that the BBC use our cash to pay the likes of Ross, who is currently suspended, reports suggest, on full pay. So yes, now we are paying him to do nothing.

Will the BBC cut him loose? I doubt it, they've invested too much in him. But hopefully what this whole debacle might do is re-spark the debate over what the BBC pay their 'star' names and force them to re-access the obscene fees that they pay. No wonder some celebs believe they are indestructible.