Ian YoungsCulture reporter
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A committee of MPs have said they are “deeply troubled” by uncertainty over the government’s future funding for the BBC World Service.
The government provides about 30% of the budget for the World Service, which reaches more than 300 million people a week and is “a jewel in the crown of the UK’s soft power”, according to the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC).
However, its “prominence is being diminished by poor governance and short-sighted funding decisions”, the committee’s chairman Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown said.
The current funding agreement between the BBC and the government expires at the end of this month and there isn’t a new one in place.
“The PAC was deeply troubled to learn that the BBC still does not know how much the government would fund the World Service for the coming year,” the committee said as it published a report into the service on Friday.
The BBC wants the government to take back responsibility for funding all of the World Service, as it did until 2014.
The government said the World Service’s work was “highly valued” and that its next funding allocation would be made before the start of the new financial year in early April.
The committee of MPs operates separately from the government. Its report warned that the World Service is “at risk of losing its position as the most-trusted international broadcaster” because of a combination of funding difficulties and poor management by the BBC.
Its budget declined by 21% between 2021/22 and 2025/6, ma
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