Bbc

There’s a great revival under way in the British TV and film industry, but it’s not the BBC that’s behind it. Netflix is normally secretive about its figures but this week published a list of its most popular shows and top of the pile is Bridgerton, which imagines Regency London as a racially mixed society. Although funded with US money, it is shot in Yorkshire with a British cast, using British technical know-how, and, thanks to Netflix’s global audience of more than 200 million, this British show has now become the most-watched series in the history of television. Not so long ago, it was argued that subscription television would never work in Britain because we had all the broadcasting we could wish for.

I noticed with interest that Gigalum island — off the Kintyre peninsula in Argyll — was up for sale for half a million quid or so. Nineteen rather barren acres, slightly warmed by the Gulf Stream. These little parcels of desolation quite often become available for purchase and I do wonder if Gigalum should be purchased by the state for the dumping of toxic waste. Gruinard island, further north, was used by the government during the second world war as a site for testing militarised anthrax, for example. My proposal for Gigalum is that it should be a repository for everyone in the country with the word ‘diversity’ anywhere in their job title.

I have Asperger’s syndrome and since childhood have been watching TV soaps: mainly EastEnders and Neighbours. I found classic EastEnders from the 1980s and 1990s highly reassuring during a dark time in my life three years ago, and in lockdown. I would say, though, that in recent years these two soaps have gone downhill. They are more staged, the storylines less intriguing and the themes exaggerated. They don’t seem to be about everyday life any more. In the EastEnders of the 1980s and early 1990s you could relate wholeheartedly to the characters and reflect on their behaviour. You would feel they were real, and also that they were part of the real life of the East End.

For viewers of the BBC Olympics coverage, it’s back to the old days. Not since Sydney in 2000 has all the Games content been squeezed into the main terrestrial channels, with the red button and its one extra stream making its debut in Athens 2004. ‘The Olympics are perfect for interactive television,’ said a BBC executive celebrating the innovation, ‘because there are so many events happening at the same time.’ In the run up to London 2012 we made the promise that UK viewers would be able to watch any event they chose, from beginning to end – and the corporation delivered 24 HD television channels and an equivalent number of online streams to achieve that.

Turn aside if BBC Radio 4 isn’t your thing, still less its panel games. But for those of us who grew up with ‘Just a minute’ there was one obvious and outstanding candidate to replace the late Nicholas Parsons, who gave every indication that he was immortal until he was actually cut off at the age of 96. And it wasn’t the person who actually got the job. The obvious candidate was Gyles Brandreth – though if you’d put in a case for Andy Hamilton, the other genuinely funny man on radio, I’d give it serious thought. But Gyles didn’t get it, nor did Andy. Sue Perkins did. Brandreth is measurably better and more mellifluous than Perkins Perkins is, of course, a decent performer. She's also articulate and bossy.

A couple of decades back the Radio Society asked me to moderate a debate for its summer festival. ‘Between who?’ I asked them and was delighted when they replied: ‘It’s entirely up to you.’ I chose the charismatic hook-handed Muslim cleric Sheikh Abu Hamza al-Masri and the then leader of the British National party, Nick Griffin. They were quite big news at the time — but were not really allowed on the airwaves, still less television. Hamza wasn’t allowed on because ‘mainstream’ Muslim organisations objected and we always did what we were told by them. Griffin wasn’t allowed on because he was a ‘fascist’.