A BBC star who became appalled by Auntie’s groupthink

Yesterday I was among those who spoke at a splendid lunch in Somerset to celebrate the life of my good friend Sir Antony Jay, best-known as one of the co-authors of I first met him more than 50 years ago as one of the socalled “Young Turks” then leading the way in changing the formerly staid values of the BBC out of recognition; not least through the satire show

of which I was, with David Frost, the chief political scriptwriter.

But, unlike the others, Jay never fell for what was to become the BBC’s all-pervasive tendency to self-congratulatory groupthink. Almost his last publication was a foreword to a long report I published in 2012 itemising how the BBC has so shamelessly betrayed its statutory obligation to impartiality in its coverage of global warming. He described how appalled he had become by much of what has become of the institution where he began his working life.

He was a good, generous and clever man, who, unlike his former colleagues, knew how to think for himself. It was an honour to join in paying tribute to him.