Thompson states his case

Amidst controversy surrounding the massive job cuts and extensive reorganisation at the BBC announced yesterday by the DG, Mark Thompson last night delivered the New Statesman Media Lecture in which he placed the announcements in a context of his vision for the Corporation. The full lecture will be published in the New Statesman in full in the New Year, but until then Media Guardian has published an excerpt.

In it, he admits that his "integrated view of how the BBC should navigate through the unpredictable but also opportunity-rich waters of the next 10 years" will "mean a great deal of personal disruption." Thompson, however, is sure that "the right course adjustment now" is the best thing to do rather than leave it until later and suffer more.

Thompson gives a list of new technologies, such as mobile, on-demand, HDTV, DAB and Freeview and notes that "if the BBC doesn't keep up with those audiences, it's dead." This is no doubt true: it's also true that under Thompson's predecessor, the groundwork and much more was laid down on firm foundations. Most days I read BBC News on my cellphone and on-line. I use 'Listen Again' a great deal. I watch the new BBC digital channels, especially BBC Four and News24, avidly via satellite, and now my sister can too, via the Freeview box I installed for her for Christmas. I listen to new BBC voices on DAB. I enjoy the stunning BBCi service on digital TV. And as a long-time attendee of broadcasting conventions like NAB and IBC, I know that not only is the BBC au fait with HDTV: it's a pioneer and has been doing it for well over a decade.

The BBC has already set its feet in the future. The important thing is that it builds on that position. That it does not lose its independence either as a result of pressure from without or voluntary censorship and emasculation from within. That it does not step backwards and slip down the metaphorical EPG into multichannel obscurity, numbed and dumbed down, pandering to either the wrongly-perceived alleged dumbness of audiences or the wrong-headed demands of those, particularly in the commercial sector, who seek to silence, shrink or distort its voice.

The lecture contains some fine words about the importance of exceptional content and the unique status of the Corporation. But it remains to be seen whether the vision of the current DG and his team is able to take the BBC forward - extending, not retracting, that bridge to the future already part-built - with the same energy, and with the same support of Corporation staff as the man whose shoes Mark Thompson now fills.