Conclusion – Democratisation or bust After decades of cuts, political attacks and deregulation, UK PSM stands on a cliff-edge. Piecemeal reforms aimed at‘preserving’ the status quo of PSM will neither safeguard its future nor address the democratic disconnect between PSBs and the citizens they are supposed to serve. Advo­cates of PSM around the world can draw on many interna­tional examples for advancing PSM’s role in a fragmented, polarised and concentrated global media landscape. Den­mark’s cultural levy on streamers might offer PSBs a chance to challenge the financial drain on domestic con­tent. BBC defenders looking with great interest at the rund­funkbeitrag as a possible alternative to the deeply unpopu­lar TV licence fee. Devolution of broadcasting(as in the Basque Country and Flanders) or even federalisation(as in Germany) also offers a means to decentralise power over who makes, funds and governs public media. But even with this arsenal of progressive solutions, will forthcoming debates empower the public to express its own needs and interests? What mechanisms will enable these demands to impact on the future place and purpose of PSM? Or will these processes be captured by the usual suspects and vested interests? If the British public contin­ues to have no active or direct role in how PSM is organ­ised on their behalf, then UK PSBs will lose the essential public legitimacy necessary to sustain their fundamental purpose as independent, universal, trusted organisations for public good. November 2025 – BBC failures open the door to a political coup The words‘BBC’ and‘scandal’ are rarely far apart. As the final text for this briefing was being prepared, the BBC was rocked by another major crisis at the highest levels of its management and governance. An internal BBC report into editorial failures was leaked, detailing (amongst other matters) a prominent case of sloppily edited footage from Donald Trump’s speech prior to the January 6th Capital riots. While the BBC leadership floundered in responding, the UK’s virulently anti-BBC newspapers mounted a super­charged campaign of bloodletting, seizing on the oppor­tunity to attack the BBC’s perceived institutional biases. The pressure was enough to force the resignation of both the BBC’s CEO of News and its Director-General, Tim Davie. Early reports indicate that Robbie Gibb, the Con­servative-appointed BBC board member, played a key role in organising an unprecedented BBC Board putsch against these two major figures. 41 By time of publication, this saga may have fizzled out or snowballed into an even greater crisis for the BBC. But the immediate reactions demonstrate the emerging battle lines for the upcoming debates on the BBC’s future Royal Charter. Both sides have seized these events to condemn the BBC as unrepresentative and institutionally ungov­ernable, yet while one faction decries proof of an unshakeably left-wing and metropolitan bias in the BBC’s culture, the other blames the overbearing role of political interference and corporate self-preservation in how the BBC seeks to address and resolve major public scandals. Above all, the scandal is yet another example of major debates about the BBC – whether humiliating scandals or technocratic decision-making – taking place entirely as conflicts between different parts of Britain’s entrenched political-media elite. While rival politicians, broadcasting industry figureheads and large media cor­porations argue over which vision of the BBC they believe ‘the public’ wants the most, the British public itself is left as a passive and powerless bystander. 41  The Guardian,‘BBC board member with Tory links‘led charge’ in systemic bias claims, say insiders’, 10 November 2025. 10 Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung e.V.