After speaking with some of my constituents about TV licences for the over-75s, I promised to provide my view. The BBC’s decision to stop funding free TV licences for most over-75s is disappointing. The Government’s position on the licence fee is as follows: It is important to note that this was the BBC’s decision and not the Government’s, after Parliament legislated to give the BBC the full responsibility from 2020. This was part of a deal the Government reached with […]
The BBC is one of the nation’s most important institutions which is recognised internationally as a maker of high quality content. Ten years ago, the last time the Government ran a Charter Review, the media landscape looked very different. The BBC has adapted to this changing landscape, and remains much-loved by audiences. However, hard questions must be asked during this Charter Review. This should include questions about what the BBC should be trying to achieve in an age where consumer […]
Tags: BBC, Campaigns, Government
Tomorrow, the BBC Radio 4 programme Analysis features Jamie Whyte’s Keeping the Free Market Faith at 20:30: The financial crisis has made many on the political right question their faith in free market capitalism. Jamie Whyte is unaffected by such doubts. The financial crisis, he argues, was caused by too much state interference and an unhealthy collusion between government and corporate power. Interviewees include Luigi Zingales, author of Capitalism for the People: Recapturing the Lost Genius of American Prosperity and a professor at […]
Tags: Analysis, BBC, Liberty, Markets
I was under the misapprehension that, since this is a Coalition Government, Conservatives and Liberal Democrats take the same whip. This misunderstanding was buttressed by the Number 10 website, which lists Alistair Carmichael as a Deputy Chief Whip (and number three in the Whips’ Office). via Are Liberal Democrat MPs now free to abstain if Ed Miliband tables a no-confidence vote in the Government?, by the superb Paul Goodman and well worth a read. As this inward-looking drama for political […]
Tags: BBC, Democracy, Jeremy Hunt, Media, Parliament
Zadok the Priest, I Vow to Thee My Country and Land of Hope and Glory played together on the BBC? A public and press rounding on the Beeb for their lamentable coverage of the Diamond Jubilee? A joy. Occasionally, someone – too often someone frothing at the mouth – will speak or write of New Labour’s attempt to eradicate traditional British institutions in the name of progress. There’s sometimes talk of “cultural Marxism”, which most of us know as “political correctness”, and […]
Tags: BBC, Great Britain, Jubilee, Liberty, Media, New Labour, Rule of Law
My Cobden Centre colleagues Toby Baxendale and Gordon Kerr appear in this documentary by Robert Peston, Britain’s Banks: Too Big to Save? It’s not bad at all but it’s vital we shift the focus from bashing bankers, which may be satisfying, but which is a sideshow compared to the flaws in the institutional design of the banking system which are the true cause of our present difficulties. Still, well worth watching.
Tags: Banking, BBC, Cobden Centre, economics, Media
Further to this story: Dear Mr Baker Thank you for contacting us regarding remarks made by David Baddiel about Norris McWhirter and the Freedom Association on The Alan Davies Show on BBC Radio 5 Live broadcast on Saturday 18 December. On the show David Baddiel was discussing a television film he has recently made entitled ‘The Norris McWhirter Chronicles’. The film centres around a speech that Mr McWhirter made at David Baddiel’s school in the 1970s. The young Baddiel had […]
Tags: BBC, Freedom Association
On Thursday, I gave an interview of about ten minutes to the BBC’s Daily Politics show regarding the EU budget. A section was transmitted today in their story Brussels bashing ‘back in fashion’ with new Tory MPs: They didn’t use the section in which I supported the excellent Justine Greening MP. They didn’t use the section in which I rejected the old spectrum of euroscepticism in favour of a greater free market internationalism which the EU obstructs. They didn’t use the section in which […]
Steve Baker is the Conservative MP for Wycombe.
Steve was first elected to Parliament in 2010. He was previously an RAF engineer officer then a consulting software engineer. Find out more...
Steve holds regular surgeries in High Wycombe. If you would like an appointment, please contact me.
