As the BBC faces increasing Conservative cuts, we look at why half-a-billion people call Auntie Beeb part of the family

It is an institution, loved as much overseas as it is at home. 

As the BBC feels the bite of increasing competition, David Hendy, author of a book on the broadcaster’s first 100 years, tells Sally McDonald the Honest Truth about the men and women who make it a cultural gem.

Why did you write a book about the BBC?

I was given the chance to poke around in one of the BBC’s best-kept secrets – hundreds of recorded interviews with former members of staff, from director-generals to lift attendants.

There were vivid, ringside accounts from the people who were there – when broadcasting began in the 1920s, when it entertained and informed us in the Second World War, when it navigated the culture wars of the ’60s. They’ve been under guard for half a century so this was the chance to write a more personal account of the men and women who made broadcasting what it is.

Was there a standout moment during your research?

Hearing about life inside the BBC during the Blitz was extremely moving.

We often imagine the corporation as a formal, slightly aloof institution. But it was on the Luftwaffe’s target list. Staff were in constant danger; several died when Broadcasting House in London was hit by bombs.

Life under siege created moments of real camaraderie. I discovered broadcasters sharing all the usual highs and lows of wartime. Their determination to stay on air while being attacked shouldn’t be forgotten.

What was the ethos behind the BBC when it began in 1922?

The idea of leaving behind a better society. The men and women who set up the BBC had gone through the trauma of the First World War. They wanted to build a peaceful world and believed that mutual understanding would thrive if only civilized values – good culture, reliable news – were spread more widely.

Radio, which could reach into every home regardless of income or education, was their means for achieving this. It meant not just that the best would be available but that it would be available to everyone equally.

Who have been the most notable people behind it?

One of my heroines is Olive Shapley, who made amazing documentaries in the 1930s about the lives of the poorest people.

An impressive number of Scots have shaped the airwaves – like Alasdair Milne, the director-general who had to stand firm against Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. And of course there’s John Reith, the BBC’s founder, a son of the manse, brought up in a deeply Christian Glasgow household where his father was a minister of the church and his mother ran charitable causes.

When he led the BBC in its formative years, Reith could be stubborn and moralistic. But he brought with him a missionary zeal to do good in the world.

How has it impacted our sense of Britishness?

The BBC has created countless collective experiences through TV or radio, from royal weddings to the finals of Strictly, so it’s been hugely influential in defining British life.

But London has long been its centre of operations and it’s often seen events from an English perspective. Its focus on the comings and goings in Westminster has sometimes been to the detriment of reflecting the issues which affect people in other parts of the country.

Why is it respected throughout the world?

Nearly half a billion people listen to the BBC globally.

The BBC is revered abroad more than in its own country. One reason is the reputation the BBC earned in the Second World War by broadcasting news that was truthful and accurate.

People in Europe, especially, felt the BBC had kept them going through the darkest years of Nazi occupation. Memories linger.

What’s the future for the BBC?

The rise of services like Netflix make it hard for the BBC to stand out. But a lot of pioneering streaming technology was created by the BBC in the first place through BBC Online and iPlayer. Nowadays, Radio 1 has a huge presence on YouTube.

So the BBC has not been left behind: it’s part of this exciting new media world.

The bigger threat comes from a Conservative Government which seems determined to kill it off through a thousand cuts. If they succeed, it will be the end of the BBC as we know it.

The BBC: A People’s History by David Hendy, published by Profile Books, is out now