Coming soon: £40m of God-hating TV

PEOPLE will watch almost anything on TV nowadays (see the mad, inexplicable drivel of Peaky Blinders), but will they be able to sit through yet another attempt to dramatise Sir Philip Pullman’s heavyhanded anti-Christian fables, much loved by God-hating liberal parents who buy them by the ton for their innocent children?

The wholly impartial BBC, in partnership with HBO, have spent a rumoured £40 million, much of it yours, trying to give the kiss of life to His Dark Materials. It is hard to see why, since a Hollywood version, The Golden Compass, died of boredom in the cinema.

Sir Philip has long sought (in his own words) to undermine the basis of the Christian faith, and he means it. The knighted atheist was so moved a few months ago that he tweeted: ‘When I hear the name “Boris Johnson” for some reason the words “rope” and ‘nearest lamp-post” come to mind.’ It took him a while to grasp that this was a mistake and delete it. It is hard to think of the BBC devoting so much time and effort to the works of any non-liberal who tweeted anything like that, however many times he said sorry.

Can the licence fee last much longer if the BBC behaves like this? Culture Secretary Nicky Morgan certainly frightened the Corporation when she mused the other day that it might become a voluntary subscription service, like Netflix. I’d personally be very sorry if this happens, but the licence fee is given in return for a pledge of fairness. And if the BBC won’t be fair, it will lose it, possibly sooner than it thinks.