Radio in the Service of Man

New Zealand Listener, Volume 18, Issue 449, 30 January 1948, Page 11

Radio in the Service of Man

HETHER broadcasting is an art is a point for sophists; what Y is important is that it is not an end in itself, said SIR WILLIAM HALEY, Director-General of the BBC, in a talk to Home Service listeners on the occasion of the BBC's Silver Jubilee. The text of Sir William’s address was received here the other day by the High Commissioner for the United Kingdom, and passed on to "The Listener." We reprint the major part of it below.

O one can doubt any longer that broadcasting has a place. At the end of 25 years it has established itself in almost every home in the United Kingdom. It has become part of the fabric of everyday life. It has had an influence on entertainment, on culture, on politics, on social habits, on religion and on morals. It is the greatest educational force yet known. It has been used in war and in peace as an offensive and as a defensive instrument by great and small Powers. Having said all this, it may seem out of perspective to be celebrating a mere quarter of a century’s existence. Silver jubilees are generally confined to the affairs of our short human span. Broadcasting has a future far beyond that. All the same, this is a good moment to take stock. Broadcasting has its place in the life of nations, of the community, and of the individual. Its use between nations has been a mixture of good and evil. On the debit side there has been-and there still is-the outpouring of propaganda, the ceaseless sapping. and erosion of other nation’s beliefs and morale, the misrepresentation and abuse of theoretically friendly peoples, which some broadcasting organisations undertake. On the credit side there is the power of broadcasting to pour out over the world a continuous, antiseptic flow of honest, objective, truthful news to which-as

Hitler found during the war-the common man cannot permanently be denied access. And in the field of news it has been found, fortunately, that the reverse of Gresham’s Law prevails. The true will, in the end, always drive out the false. d Great On the credit side, too, there is the power of broadcasting, without any unneighbourly purpose, to make the ways of life and thought of different peoples better known to each other. It has to be admitted that not enough has been done in this field. But broadcasting will miss a great opportunity if it fails in this task, particularly within a Commonwealth such as ours. I am sure that the most effective method is by the free exchange of programmes, not only ‘between ourselves and the Dominions, but also by the individual Dominions with each other. Great difficulties of copyright, of restriction, of vested interests, and also of apathy, stand in the way. But they must not be accepted as the last word. They must be overcome. Broadcasting’s place within any community is largely decided by the constitution it is given. A commercial service run for profit can do one kind of" thing. But it has to forgo a host of others. A government-controlled system can, at the other end of the scale, do a completely different kind of thing. Whether it is to the community’s ultimate good depends on the government.

4m SaTeat Oflitain Droadcasting has been established as a public service run by an independent corporation. Let us examine the responsibilities of this role. First, it can conceive that its highest duty is to the disinterested search for truth. This is a stern concept. Absolute impartiality in all matters of controversy must be its golden rule. The = tion sometimes arises whether a body of men and women — several hundreds of them in the case of the BBC-drawn from all sections of the community and from all parts of the Commonwealth (and in the case of the external services from other nations as well) can abide by such a rule. They can-and they do. What is not | sufficiently realised is the professional fascination of the work itself. For broadcasting is now a highly professional job. The staff of the BBC, whether they be journalists, authors, producers, administrators,

: RADIO AND SOCIETY

(continued from previous page) musicians, educationists or engineers, all have a pride in their profession. They are research workers. They are craftsmeén before they are anything else. In their BBC clothes they wear no labels. Secondly, where broadcasting is independent and a public service it can be used as a means of education in the broadest sense, What does this mean? It means to use the microphone to inform and interest listeners in all things that matter. It means to inculcate citizenship,y to pay proper attention to public affairs, to encourage tolerant discussion, and to seek to widen as far as possible the range of debate over the whole field of human interest. Civilisation is still a long way from that absolute tolerance and liberty of expression preached by John Stuart Mill (and the problem is complicated by the fact that there are those who would abuse it). But_ broadcasting has to face the problem with courage and with judgment. The climate of public opinion changes with the years. It is possible to do in broadcasting to-day things that were not possible 10 or 15 years ago. That is, perhaps, one of the results of public education, Broadcasting has been educated too. It has learned much about this part of its job, if only by realising more and more how much there is still to learn. This is one of the most important fields in which we have to expand and experiment. By no means all the task is done, of course, by controversy and discussion. We have also made progress in other directions. The daily report of Parliament, started two years ago, the special broddeasts we have done from the United Nations, the team sent out to cover the transfer of power in India, the features and documentaries on all manner of current affairs, the rigid standards applied to news bulletins in all BBC programmes, the major series of talks*we have undertaken from time to time such as the talks on atomic energy -all these are means to the same end; that an informed democracy shall function. Raising Standards Finally, within this sphere of broadcasting and the community there is the responsibility which a unified public service has to raise standards. There are many people who believe, this task is better done if it is not talked about. To a great extent this is true. It should certainly be avowed as little as possible in the actual process. No one wishes to feel perpetually at school. But on an occasion such as this, when one is taking stock of British broadcasting as a whole, it should be frankly stated that to raise standards is one of the purposes for which the BBC exists, The work, however, will never be successful unless it is done within the broad contract that the listener must be entertained. The BBC is a means of. entertainment, as well as of education and information. It will rightly lose its listeners if it disregards that part of its triple function. It is not a function to be lightly dismissed or despised. To be’ a source of companionship, of recreation, of good humour, of escape, and of fun to millions of people is something of which to be proud. We must strive to do better in this field as eagerly as in any other, Every listener is first of all a human being with his requirements and his rights. From the-BBC he is entitled to ask for the best in all kinds

of entertainment, whether it is high, low or middle brow. The BBC is not violating its part of the contract, if, while giving him the best of what he wants, it tries to lead him to want something better. Broadcasting should not fear to assume leadership. But an essential part of leadership is not to get out of touch. While I have been talking mainly of sound broadcasting, everything I have said is true also of television. For television is only a development of broadcasting. It is bringing into play new techniques; it is giving listeners a new range of entertainment and experience; it will eventually find its way into almost every home in the land. Years ahead, it will finally marry with sound broadcasting. No one can yet say how. But in whatever way it does develop it must accept the same responsibilities and be guided by the same sense of social purpose. Selective Listening And so we come to broadcasting and the individual. Here the public service has an exactly opposite aim to the commercial or the government service. It does not want people to be listening: all the time. Whether selective listening is on the increase is difficult to say. Certainly all too many people still use the wireless purely as a background noise. From that point of view it is possible that there is too much broadcasting; not in the range of the service but in its length. The fact that broadcasting goes on for 16-and-a-half hours a day, the profusion of material poured out, the knowledge that one variety show will be succeeded by another and that great works are sure’ to be performed again and again, the scarcity of intelligent criticism-these things make many people hold wireless cheap. They switch it on and they keep it on, doing it a favour if they give it half their attention. Yet if. broadcasting is properly used, there is hardly a man or woman whose range it cannot widen and whose experience it cannot enrich. Broadcasting will accomplish its work only if it can persuade more and more listeners to come to it with curiosity and with tolerance. Strange roads go down beyond every man’s intellectual and, cultyral skyline. Some of them can lead to lands of new enchantment. Many of them should lead beyond the wireless set. For broadcasting will mot be a social asset if it produces only a nation of listeners, Whether broadcasting is an art is a point for sophists. What is important is that it is not an end in itself. Broadcasting will bring about a musicallyminded nation only in so far as it gets people to play and to fill the concert halls. Its greatest contribution to culture would be to cause theatres and opera houses to multiply throughout the land. If it cannot give to literature more readers than it withholds, it will have failed in what should be its true purpose. Its aim must be to make people active not passive, both in the fields of recreation and of public affairs. It will gain, rather than suffer, if it can do any of these things. For broadcasting will flourish best when the community flourishes best. The wireless set or the television receiver are only signposts on the way to a full life. That must finally lie in a-+sense of beauty and joy in all things, and in the experience of participating in life as a whole.