The BBC thanks the NAO for its report which recognises the BBC World Service “plays a vital role across the globe at a time where there is an increasing amount of misinformation and curtailment to press freedoms in many countries”.
As the report states, the NAO assessed the World Service’s progress with implementing its savings programme. It does not provide an assessment of the value for money of the World Service overall. The report acknowledges that “wider funding pressures have necessitated spending reductions”.
It’s clear the changes implemented have already had an impact as the World Service has reduced its workforce by over 480 posts by September 2025 and has delivered £46.8 million of savings so far.
The savings have also had an impact on the World Service’s ability to reach audiences globally and, as the report acknowledges, the reduction in funding played a significant role in the subsequent fall in audience figures.
However, the World Service recognises that some of the planning processes and risk analysis need to be strengthened and applied consistently. In doing so, we recognise this will enhance our ability to serve audiences globally.
In real terms, the licence fee generates 30% less income now compared to 10 years ago. As the report notes, there has been a 21% reduction – a real-terms fall of £95m – in World Service funding between 2021/22 and 25/26. To put this in the global context, China and Russia are spending an estimated £6-8 billion on media activities.
Despite the government providing a welcome uplift in the grant-in-aid funding for the World Service, meaning the World Service could maintain all of its existing language services, this did not remove the need for difficult decisions in order to remain globally competitive and meet savings requirements. The BBC has also seen previous freezes on the licence fee, global inflation, and the need for ongoing digital transformation.
The BBC is working hard to deliver savings effectively whilst maintaining the breadth and quality of our output and providing value for licence fee payers. This involves tough choices and spending reductions across the whole of the organisation, including the World Service.
The corporation has had to make changes to the World Service to operate effectively with the resource available, strengthening digital output and creating the most impact for audiences internationally. The NAO highlights this is in line with the BBC’s overall digital-first strategy.
The BBC World Service undertook significant savings programmes within specific limited timeframes. As the report acknowledges, there remains uncertainty over its funding and the previous savings required needed to be adjusted year-on-year as they were subject to ongoing discussions.
We welcome the recommendations in the report and will seek to implement changes to address them as detailed below.
Responding to the report, Jonathan Munro, Deputy CEO and Global Director, BBC News, said:
“We’re pleased the NAO has acknowledged the World Service’s unique position as the most trusted and independent news provider internationally. The World Service has delivered substantial savings in the last few years, while continuing to provide outstanding journalism for its audiences around the world. We want to thank the NAO for their recommendations which will help us strengthen our processes and learn lessons around our approach to savings programmes, to minimise the impact on audiences as much as possible. It is critical that we evolve our services for the future to meet the challenges of a globally competitive environment, rising disinformation, and severely reduced press freedom.”
The World Service provides trusted news to radio, TV and digital audiences around the world in 43 languages including English, reaching a weekly audience of 313 million people.
It delivers unparalleled UK cultural influence around the world, and as well as bringing economic benefits to the UK, plays an important role in national security and global stability.
The BBC remains ambitious about the future of the BBC World Service and its ability to deliver more for audiences globally and for the UK. With a secure and sustainable funding base, we can significantly increase the number of people we reach with trusted news globally, counter Russian and Chinese narratives, combat disinformation and promote democratic values.
Response to the NAO’s specific recommendations
The World Service should consider how it can make better use of its extensive data on audience reach, such as its insight around audiences switching from traditional to digital platforms, to refine its assumptions about audience behaviour and ensure examples of good practice and learnings can be applied across multiple language services.
The World Service is enhancing its existing reporting systems and dashboards to further drive a culture of data-based decision making. Our digital performance dashboard will be revamped to provide an even better understanding of audience behaviour. Existing quarterly audience performance reviews, fortnightly digital strategy alignment meetings and monthly digital best practice staff calls will enhance focus on shared learnings and good practice.
The World Service should ensure that future savings and transformation programmes have clear non-financial metrics from the outset, which are then tracked during implementation.
As part of the implementation of the new global op model in News, including the World Service, a separate workstream will develop clear non-financial metrics, which will be tracked during the transformation programme.
The World Service should review the level of documentation and options considered by key decisions makers to ensure that planned changes being reviewed are likely to represent best value for money and provide sufficient clarity for why decisions were made.
World Service will review the level of documentation as part of a refresh of its governance and decision-making processes. The documentation of options analyses, which form a key part of decision making, will be significantly strengthened, including in business cases.
The World Service should update its cost and monitoring systems to enable better linking of cost information, outputs, such as amount of content produced, and audience outcomes to support a more granular picture of value for money across the World Service portfolio.
The World Service has instituted formal Quarterly Business Reviews (QBR) where inputs, outputs, and outcomes are being tracked formally. This will provide a more granular picture of value for money across multiple parts of the business. In addition, financial tracking systems globally are being enhanced as part of the global op model changes.
BBC Press Office