The BBC is such a central part of our daily lives that until a government comes along determined to reform it (and that¡¯s most governments) we tend to take it for granted. The academic community ¨C specialist scholars and others alike ¨C tend to see the BBC in a positive light, an institution that makes a major contribution to the ¡°good society¡±.

Not so Tom Mills, and if the subtitle of this book doesn¡¯t give away his argument, then his PhD thesis (on which the book is based) certainly does ¨C ¡°The end of social democracy and the rise of neoliberalism at the BBC¡±.

Mills¡¯ argument, cogently made and based on an impressive use of primary and secondary sources, represents a direct challenge to the notion of the BBC as a pillar of liberalism and social democracy, as it is so often characterised.

This is a notion that Mills contests. Making extensive use of the BBC¡¯s written archives, he argues that since its creation the corporation has been, and continues to be, a central part of the state and its security apparatus ¨C mainly because of the continuing ability of the UK¡¯s elite to capture, and hold on to, the central functions of the BBC.

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This might be a relatively uncontroversial argument to make about the pre-war and wartime BBC. During the 1926 General Strike, for example, the BBC¡¯s founding director general, John Reith, wrote that the government ¡°know that they can trust us not to be really impartial¡±; and throughout the 1930s and the Second World War, Mills illustrates, the BBC colluded with the government and security services to keep left-wing voices off the air.

However, more contentious is Mills¡¯ challenge to the keepers of the BBC¡¯s official history ¨C Asa Briggs and Jean Seaton in particular ¨C who, he argues, have failed to see that the BBC is, and remains, in essence a state broadcaster. In his analysis of the BBC¡¯s cooperation with MI5 in vetting left-wing staff or potential staff (a practice that continued until the 1980s), Mills makes a convincing case that the impetus to establish and sustain the vetting came more from the BBC than from MI5.

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He¡¯s on less easy ground when it comes to demonstrating that the BBC has continued its collusion with the state. The corporation¡¯s difficulties with governments ¨C Conservative and Labour alike ¨C over, for example, Northern Ireland and wars in the Falkland Islands and Iraq suggest otherwise. Mills argues that the BBC¡¯s apparent conflict with the government over Iraq was more a reflection of a division of opinion among the elite ¨C political and military ¨C than it was proof of any fundamental opposition to the war itself.

He makes a strong case, but given the ferocity of the events surrounding the aftermath of the Iraq invasion, including the Hutton Inquiry and the resignations of the BBC¡¯s chairman and director general, it is ultimately unconvincing.

But Mills might prove to be a better predictor of the future than an analyst of the past. Will Hutton, commenting on the government¡¯s recent proposals for the BBC¡¯s charter, wrote: ¡°The BBC is being redefined not as an autonomous organisation that expresses public service broadcasting on the licence-fee payers¡¯ behalf, but as a state corporation subject to state and party interference.¡± If Hutton is right, then Mills¡¯ challenging analysis of the BBC¡¯s past and present will become tomorrow¡¯s reality.

Ivor Gaber is professor of journalism, University of Sussex, and was an independent editorial adviser to the BBC Trust.

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The BBC: Myth of a Public Service
By Tom Mills
Verso, 272pp, ?16.99 and ?14.99
ISBN 9781784784829 and 4850 (e-book)
Published 15 November 2016