A poll of men and women listed in Who’s Who once found that the Corporation was regarded as more influential than Parliament or the Church of England. Although not actually a government-run broadcaster, it is a body so clearly aligned with the ‘Nation’ that it often feels to us like an organ of state, as if it were a creative arm of the civil service. It exists by Royal Charter, and the licence fee that funds it is set by ministers in Parliament. If nuclear war begins, the last voice of authority we will hear before Armageddon arrives is a Radio 4 announcer.
