0:00:04 > 0:00:07By bringing unseen creatures to television,
0:00:07 > 0:00:11Sir David Attenborough has himself become the rarest of species.
0:00:11 > 0:00:14A broadcaster, his programmes reach huge audiences,
0:00:14 > 0:00:19but he's also known for the intelligence of his views on science and broadcasting.
0:00:47 > 0:00:50Sir David Attenborough has combined science and entertainment
0:00:50 > 0:00:53in a succession of natural history series
0:00:53 > 0:00:55screened and praised around the world,
0:00:55 > 0:01:00including Life on Earth, The Living Planet and The Life of Birds.
0:01:01 > 0:01:04I get to see the most fantastic things.
0:01:04 > 0:01:09We've been seeing things in the last couple of weeks
0:01:09 > 0:01:12that no human being's seen before.
0:01:12 > 0:01:13Can you imagine?
0:01:16 > 0:01:21And, as a former controller of BBC2 and managing director of BBC Television,
0:01:21 > 0:01:25he's also one of the most respected voices in the debate on the future of TV.
0:01:25 > 0:01:30But as David Attenborough ultimately found the jungle a more comfortable environment than the boardroom,
0:01:30 > 0:01:33it seemed fitting to meet at the Natural History Museum.
0:01:36 > 0:01:38You're in your late seventies now.
0:01:38 > 0:01:41Looking back, the life you've had, how does it measure up to what
0:01:41 > 0:01:45you might have imagined in your twenties, thirties?
0:01:47 > 0:01:49Ah, well, pretty well really.
0:01:49 > 0:01:53I couldn't have dreamt that I have done what I have done.
0:01:53 > 0:01:58Um, of course, when I was in my teens and thinking what I was going to do,
0:01:58 > 0:02:00I thought I was going to be a scientist.
0:02:00 > 0:02:05Um, and in many ways I regret not being a scientist.
0:02:05 > 0:02:11But I couldn't possibly have imagined that I was going to be in television because there wasn't any television.
0:02:11 > 0:02:13Not effectively, anyway.
0:02:13 > 0:02:171938, there was just the beginning of television, but I didn't see it.
0:02:17 > 0:02:24So I didn't know. And I couldn't have imagined it would have opened so many doors and paid so many air tickets.
0:02:25 > 0:02:29You're currently filming the next big series, Life in the Undergrowth.
0:02:29 > 0:02:33At a simple level, cos you don't have to do it financially, I assume, why do you still do it?
0:02:33 > 0:02:37Oh, that's not a very difficult question!
0:02:37 > 0:02:39Because it's enormously interesting.
0:02:39 > 0:02:44Um...I mean I get to see the most fantastic things.
0:02:44 > 0:02:50We've been seeing things in the last couple of weeks
0:02:50 > 0:02:53that no human being has seen before.
0:02:53 > 0:02:57Can you imagine? What a fantastic privilege.
0:02:57 > 0:02:59And the excitement, um, and also...
0:02:59 > 0:03:02Such as? Give me an example of something you've seen.
0:03:02 > 0:03:06Well, we've been watching
0:03:06 > 0:03:13ants called Matabele ants, which live by raiding termites.
0:03:14 > 0:03:16And we've been able to put
0:03:16 > 0:03:23new electronic gear, tiny little cameras, inside to see what happens.
0:03:23 > 0:03:28And these Matabele ants come along and tackle the huge soldier termites
0:03:28 > 0:03:33that have enormous armed heads, helmets of chitin.
0:03:33 > 0:03:35And they set about them.
0:03:35 > 0:03:38And nobody's ever seen or described how they do it.
0:03:38 > 0:03:44What they actually do is to seize the jaw of this termite soldier,
0:03:44 > 0:03:47and then bring round their abdomen, which is armed with a sting,
0:03:47 > 0:03:52and sting them in the one place where you can actually sting a termite,
0:03:52 > 0:03:54uh, a termite soldier anyway,
0:03:54 > 0:03:56and that is in the mouth.
0:03:56 > 0:03:58I mean, it's awful to see, actually.
0:03:58 > 0:04:03This juddering termite is hauled away by the rest of the soldiers.
0:04:03 > 0:04:06Nobody has ever watched that kind of thing going on before
0:04:06 > 0:04:07in that degree of detail.
0:04:12 > 0:04:15In the Natural History Museum, there's a fossil named after Attenborough.
0:04:15 > 0:04:17This, rather than a television series,
0:04:17 > 0:04:21would have been the ambition of a schoolboy interested in science,
0:04:21 > 0:04:23growing up in Leicester as the son of a teacher.
0:04:25 > 0:04:28You...are, to some extent, a performer.
0:04:28 > 0:04:34Your brother Dickie, better known as Lord Attenborough, he is very much a fine actor, a director.
0:04:34 > 0:04:38There must somewhere have been a showbiz gene, was there?
0:04:38 > 0:04:45Well, I don't know. I suppose there has to be some kind of histrionic gene or something.
0:04:45 > 0:04:50I never intended...could have gone into the theatre or feature films.
0:04:50 > 0:04:53I mean, that is a world I know nothing about
0:04:53 > 0:04:58and feel still very uneasy in it.
0:04:58 > 0:05:03I mean, when I'm alongside him, it's not my world at all.
0:05:03 > 0:05:09And I daresay he'll probably say that his world wasn't the world of the entomologist.
0:05:09 > 0:05:15Um, but I suppose that actually a good teacher has to be something of an actor.
0:05:15 > 0:05:18And I daresay an actor has to be something of a teacher.
0:05:18 > 0:05:20I'm interested in the upbringing
0:05:20 > 0:05:24because Richard Attenborough's films are very often liberal,
0:05:24 > 0:05:26they're campaigning films.
0:05:26 > 0:05:29Obviously, Gandhi, Biko and so on.
0:05:29 > 0:05:31Your programmes, although they're good programmes,
0:05:31 > 0:05:35they also seek to do a certain amount of good - to educate, to spread messages.
0:05:35 > 0:05:38Is that something you were brought up with, do you think?
0:05:38 > 0:05:41Yes. My parents were certainly...
0:05:43 > 0:05:45..people with strong social consciences.
0:05:45 > 0:05:49And we were certainly brought up to feel that we should have a social conscience
0:05:49 > 0:05:54and have some regard for the society of which we were a part.
0:05:54 > 0:06:00And yeah, we were taught that was a proper thing to do.
0:06:00 > 0:06:04I think during the Second World War, your family took in refugees.
0:06:04 > 0:06:06Oh, yes, and before.
0:06:06 > 0:06:14My mother...I have an early memory of my mother herding us up, the three of us, her three sons,
0:06:14 > 0:06:18and taking us to a big hall outside Leicester, where we lived,
0:06:18 > 0:06:20and said we had to clean this hall
0:06:20 > 0:06:25because there were Basque children who had been bombed during the Spanish Civil War.
0:06:25 > 0:06:28And these children had lost their mothers and their fathers,
0:06:28 > 0:06:31and they were going to live here and we've got to do something for them.
0:06:31 > 0:06:34So my mother actually got down and scrubbed the floors.
0:06:34 > 0:06:38And then they were involved very much
0:06:38 > 0:06:44in getting Jewish refugees from Germany.
0:06:44 > 0:06:46And that was because,
0:06:46 > 0:06:49and they did so through academic areas
0:06:49 > 0:06:51because my father was an academic.
0:06:51 > 0:06:57So they looked after, as far as they could, doctors, physicists, chemists
0:06:57 > 0:07:01and all kinds of people who came from Germany.
0:07:01 > 0:07:06The question of God arises, obviously, for anyone who studies the natural world, as you have.
0:07:06 > 0:07:08Was it a religious upbringing?
0:07:08 > 0:07:10Not at all, no.
0:07:10 > 0:07:13And have you, at any time, had any religious faith?
0:07:13 > 0:07:15No.
0:07:15 > 0:07:20And so...your programmes clearly are Darwinist.
0:07:20 > 0:07:25But you never seem to actually take on the creationists who, for example...
0:07:25 > 0:07:29Oh, I certainly do privately, and would be quite happy to do so.
0:07:29 > 0:07:32It's not the place to do it in the sort of programmes I make.
0:07:32 > 0:07:35Ah, but, um...
0:07:35 > 0:07:36I don't have...
0:07:36 > 0:07:39I mean, I have a very vigorous correspondence
0:07:39 > 0:07:42with a number of religious fundamentalists.
0:07:42 > 0:07:46And I have a pretty straightforward answer really,
0:07:46 > 0:07:53which is that all societies, ALL societies, have had need to find an explanation
0:07:53 > 0:07:56of the way in which human beings came into the world.
0:07:56 > 0:08:01And the Australian Aboriginals think it's a rainbow serpent in the sky.
0:08:01 > 0:08:06And the Thais think that it's a sea of milk being churned by demons.
0:08:06 > 0:08:12And a tribe of people in the Middle East thought that it was
0:08:12 > 0:08:19a garden in which the first woman was made by taking a rib from Adam.
0:08:19 > 0:08:21Now, they can't all be right.
0:08:21 > 0:08:22Some of them have to be wrong.
0:08:22 > 0:08:25Um, so which are right?
0:08:25 > 0:08:27Well, the only...faced with such conflict,
0:08:27 > 0:08:29why don't we look at the world around us,
0:08:29 > 0:08:32as in this institution,
0:08:32 > 0:08:34and try and make sense of that?
0:08:34 > 0:08:38Because THIS evidence is the same everywhere, you know.
0:08:38 > 0:08:43And I find it far more awesome, wonderful,
0:08:43 > 0:08:47that creation, and our appearance in the world,
0:08:47 > 0:08:50should be the culmination or at least
0:08:50 > 0:08:56one of the latest products of 3,000 million years of organic evolution,
0:08:56 > 0:09:03than a kind of conjuring trick from taking a rib out of a man's side in a trance.
0:09:03 > 0:09:07But the word "wonder" is important cos you get letters from creationists,
0:09:07 > 0:09:09particularly who watch the programmes in America.
0:09:09 > 0:09:13A lot of people take that leap from a sense of wonder in nature,
0:09:13 > 0:09:15to assuming there must be something behind it.
0:09:15 > 0:09:18When you look, and you clearly have that sense of wonder,
0:09:18 > 0:09:20that sense of awe at the natural world,
0:09:20 > 0:09:21you are thinking what?
0:09:21 > 0:09:24This just...it just happened? It's just...
0:09:24 > 0:09:25I, I, I...
0:09:25 > 0:09:28I don't know.
0:09:28 > 0:09:33I can't believe that each species was brought into existence
0:09:33 > 0:09:39by a merciful God who cares about human beings, for obvious reasons.
0:09:39 > 0:09:41I mean, for the fact that,
0:09:41 > 0:09:45why is there so much pain? Why so much disaster?
0:09:45 > 0:09:50Why are some animals tortured in so many ways?
0:09:50 > 0:09:53Why are human beings tortured by all kinds of parasites?
0:09:53 > 0:09:59I can't believe that God created parasites in order to torture small children.
0:10:01 > 0:10:04Attenborough's avowed secularism leaves the question
0:10:04 > 0:10:07of what drives an almost evangelical passion
0:10:07 > 0:10:10to communicate the facts and wonders of nature.
0:10:14 > 0:10:17If there were a Hollywood movie about you,
0:10:17 > 0:10:20there'd be a moment when you first looked at a fossil, or the "light-bulb moment".
0:10:20 > 0:10:23Is there such a moment when the realisation came?
0:10:23 > 0:10:24Oh, yeah, mmm.
0:10:24 > 0:10:30Um, I mean, I know its kind because it repeated itself.
0:10:30 > 0:10:33It's that moment when you hit a rock
0:10:33 > 0:10:38and it falls in two halves and there is this astonishing,
0:10:38 > 0:10:44beautiful, shining, glittering, wonderful organic shape. A shell.
0:10:44 > 0:10:49Or indeed a creature with legs.
0:10:49 > 0:10:52And nobody has ever seen that before, except you.
0:10:52 > 0:10:54You are the first person to do it.
0:10:54 > 0:10:56And that's thrilling.
0:10:56 > 0:10:58I mean, I find that thrilling, still.
0:10:58 > 0:11:00Given what happened to you,
0:11:00 > 0:11:04to become like the story of the person who said the Beatles would never come to anything,
0:11:04 > 0:11:07but you were rejected, first of all, in radio, you tried.
0:11:07 > 0:11:10Yes, and I saw an advertisement for the BBC.
0:11:10 > 0:11:13The advertisement was for a radio producer,
0:11:13 > 0:11:16and I thought, "Well, I'm supposed to be thinking up ideas
0:11:16 > 0:11:20"for books, for science books, why can't I think up ideas for radio?"
0:11:20 > 0:11:25And so I applied and didn't get an interview even.
0:11:25 > 0:11:28But a fortnight later I got a letter from someone saying,
0:11:28 > 0:11:32"We've got this new thing, it's only been going for a couple of years, three years,
0:11:32 > 0:11:37"and it's called television and a lot of people are rude about it,
0:11:37 > 0:11:40"but we think there could be something there,
0:11:40 > 0:11:43"would you like to come and have a go?"
0:11:43 > 0:11:48And I took a rather high line, actually, I said, "Well, what security have I got?"
0:11:48 > 0:11:50I was married, I have got a child...
0:11:50 > 0:11:57And they said, "We can't guarantee that we'll give you a job for more than three months."
0:11:57 > 0:12:01And I thought, "Well, I can't do that." So I said, "Certainly not."
0:12:01 > 0:12:06And they said, "You know it's only...", and I've forgotten the figure, a tiny figure,
0:12:06 > 0:12:09but it was three times as much as I was earning in publishing,
0:12:09 > 0:12:10so I thought, "Well, I'll give it a go."
0:12:10 > 0:12:14So I went up to Alexandra Palace and just had the time of my life.
0:12:14 > 0:12:16I thought it was absolutely marvellous.
0:12:16 > 0:12:20When you look back at people's careers, often there's an element of luck,
0:12:20 > 0:12:23that something happens that leads them to what they did.
0:12:23 > 0:12:27That happened to you, cos Zoo Quest, you should've been a producer and you ended up presenting.
0:12:27 > 0:12:29Yes. I put up an idea
0:12:29 > 0:12:35that we should cover an expedition, on film, to West Africa.
0:12:35 > 0:12:38The London Zoo was sending to collect animals for the zoo.
0:12:38 > 0:12:42And the idea was that the man from the zoo,
0:12:42 > 0:12:45a nice man called Jack Lester, who was curator of reptiles,
0:12:45 > 0:12:51we would film him pouncing on some Gaboon viper, or enormous python or something,
0:12:51 > 0:12:56and then we would show that sequence, and then from the film we would come to Jack in the studio
0:12:56 > 0:13:02wrestling with this python, you see, while he told us about the intimate details of its anatomy.
0:13:02 > 0:13:08And, poor Jack did the first programme, but he was very ill
0:13:08 > 0:13:10and he really couldn't do the second.
0:13:10 > 0:13:12I mean, he had to go to hospital.
0:13:12 > 0:13:15And because it had this live element, the head of television said,
0:13:15 > 0:13:18"It's in the Radio Times, someone's got to do it.
0:13:18 > 0:13:20"You'd better do it, you're the only bloke there."
0:13:20 > 0:13:23So somebody else took over the cameras and I went and did it.
0:13:23 > 0:13:29But "staff, no fee", I hasten to add, as the phrase was in those days.
0:13:29 > 0:13:35A month ago, Charles Lagus and I returned from spending four months in search of a dragon.
0:13:35 > 0:13:40And for the next 10 years we went on doing that sort of thing,
0:13:40 > 0:13:43but my job was a producer, I was paid as a producer.
0:13:43 > 0:13:47And the fact I appeared in front of the camera was incidental.
0:13:48 > 0:13:50But in theatre when that happens,
0:13:50 > 0:13:53an understudy or an extra gets to go on and become a star,
0:13:53 > 0:13:56it's what they've been waiting for, dreaming of.
0:13:56 > 0:13:57But it wasn't in your case?
0:13:57 > 0:14:03No, not at all. But you still saw that it was...it gave you a weapon.
0:14:03 > 0:14:08I mean, it gave me a chance to say I wanted to do this, that and the other,
0:14:08 > 0:14:13which I might not have been able to do so quite as effectively
0:14:13 > 0:14:16if I didn't appear in the thing.
0:14:16 > 0:14:20You have good nerves though, cos something happened, I think it was the fourth series,
0:14:20 > 0:14:23you went to New Guinea and something alarming happened,
0:14:23 > 0:14:25and you do seem to have strong nerves.
0:14:25 > 0:14:29No, I don't think so. I don't think I have.
0:14:29 > 0:14:36I know a lot of people who are much, as it were, strongly nerved than me.
0:14:36 > 0:14:41I mean, that one you're talking about was just, I couldn't think what else to do, really.
0:14:41 > 0:14:46It was that we met some people at a tribal frontier
0:14:46 > 0:14:49and we thought we had been ambushed by them.
0:14:49 > 0:14:54And they came galloping down the path waving spears to us.
0:14:54 > 0:14:56I simply couldn't think what else to do.
0:14:56 > 0:15:00I mean, the camera was turning when it happened.
0:15:00 > 0:15:03Um...because I had been talking about where we were
0:15:03 > 0:15:07and suddenly these people burst out from hiding.
0:15:07 > 0:15:12And the only thing I could think of doing...I mean, no point in running, I mean, you couldn't run.
0:15:12 > 0:15:16So the only thing to do was to go to them and say, "Hello".
0:15:16 > 0:15:17Which I did.
0:15:17 > 0:15:21'To my enormous relief, they greeted me not fiercely,
0:15:21 > 0:15:23'but with considerable enthusiasm.
0:15:23 > 0:15:26'Laughing at myself, I discovered that this, in fact,
0:15:26 > 0:15:29'is merely the normal New Guinea welcome.'
0:15:30 > 0:15:32And were are you scared?
0:15:32 > 0:15:35Yes, I suppose so.
0:15:35 > 0:15:37I scare quite easy.
0:15:37 > 0:15:42I mean, there's times when...I have been frightened quite a lot, really.
0:15:42 > 0:15:48If we talk about the moment that turns up in all those programmes - the greatest moments of TV ever -
0:15:48 > 0:15:52in Rwanda when the gorilla comes up behind you.
0:15:52 > 0:15:54I'm interested in what you were thinking.
0:15:54 > 0:15:57Were you thinking this is an astonishing thing to happen
0:15:57 > 0:15:59or were you thinking this is amazing TV?
0:15:59 > 0:16:01Is that calculation ever there?
0:16:01 > 0:16:06No, I mean, I think that was such an overwhelming experience,
0:16:06 > 0:16:08and caught me so by surprise,
0:16:08 > 0:16:15that the television part of it is, well,
0:16:15 > 0:16:19it's a long way down on the priorities, really.
0:16:19 > 0:16:23There I was thinking that this gorilla was going to be behind me
0:16:23 > 0:16:26and that I was going to be talking,
0:16:26 > 0:16:29and then suddenly these little baby gorillas come
0:16:29 > 0:16:32and started taking my shoes off.
0:16:32 > 0:16:36And the female put her hand on my head!
0:16:36 > 0:16:40Um, and you don't think, "Is this going to be a terrific shot?"
0:16:40 > 0:16:42I can tell you.
0:16:42 > 0:16:45I mean, you think, "Holy mackerel!" You know.
0:16:45 > 0:16:47This is this extraordinary thing
0:16:47 > 0:16:51and she's treating me in this amazing way.
0:16:51 > 0:16:55There is a temptation - dealing with animals, wildlife, nature -
0:16:55 > 0:16:59towards sentimentality, which Disney represents obviously.
0:16:59 > 0:17:02You have resisted that, quite deliberately.
0:17:02 > 0:17:07Yes, I think that what interests me about the natural world
0:17:07 > 0:17:10is the way it works, which is, um, er...
0:17:10 > 0:17:13And trying to really understand how it works.
0:17:13 > 0:17:18And that involves understanding about violence,
0:17:18 > 0:17:24understanding about predators and, um, and, er...
0:17:24 > 0:17:26understanding about insects
0:17:26 > 0:17:31and the way they affect the way the whole machinery goes,
0:17:31 > 0:17:36which is nothing to do with sort of "up popped mummy frog", you know.
0:17:36 > 0:17:41We're at a stage now, technologically, where anything can be faked, essentially, visually.
0:17:41 > 0:17:46There've been cases in wildlife films where things have been computer enhanced, have been faked.
0:17:46 > 0:17:50Animals that don't exist are shown moving around, does that worry you?
0:17:50 > 0:17:52Yes, a lot.
0:17:52 > 0:17:56Um, and I, er...
0:17:56 > 0:17:58I worry that people...
0:17:58 > 0:18:01The natural world is so astonishing that every now and again...
0:18:01 > 0:18:03I mean, the series I'm doing now,
0:18:03 > 0:18:07which is about earthworms and scorpions and stuff,
0:18:07 > 0:18:09that people will say,
0:18:09 > 0:18:13"Oh, well, it's not really true. They don't do that sort of thing.
0:18:13 > 0:18:15"They don't communicate in that sort of way.
0:18:15 > 0:18:18"That's just the way that they are doing it these days.
0:18:18 > 0:18:19"They can model anything.
0:18:19 > 0:18:22"They can make dinosaurs come to life, you know,
0:18:22 > 0:18:25"and who knows, they don't really do that sort of stuff."
0:18:25 > 0:18:27And that's terrible.
0:18:27 > 0:18:31And so, I think one of the few justifications
0:18:31 > 0:18:35for having people appear in natural history programmes,
0:18:35 > 0:18:36in the way that I do,
0:18:36 > 0:18:42is that people may say, "Well, if he says it's right, it's right."
0:18:42 > 0:18:48And the presenter can give veracity
0:18:48 > 0:18:52and persuade people that it IS true.
0:18:52 > 0:18:54And that's why it's extremely important
0:18:54 > 0:18:57that I don't ever move into that area
0:18:57 > 0:18:59and try and deceive people about things.
0:18:59 > 0:19:02But in one of your own series, there was an instance,
0:19:02 > 0:19:06in which a polar bear is seen giving birth,
0:19:06 > 0:19:09and the birth, it turns out, was filmed in a zoo,
0:19:09 > 0:19:11put together with footage from the Arctic.
0:19:11 > 0:19:13That WAS justifiable?
0:19:13 > 0:19:16In my view, totally, because what the programme was about
0:19:16 > 0:19:21was trying to tell you about the natural history of polar bears.
0:19:21 > 0:19:25And one of the important things to understand about bears is that they,
0:19:25 > 0:19:27particularly polar bears,
0:19:27 > 0:19:29is that they give birth during hibernation
0:19:29 > 0:19:31and they produce this tiny little baby.
0:19:31 > 0:19:33I mean, that's a key thing.
0:19:33 > 0:19:38And so I had no hesitation at all about putting together footage from all over the place,
0:19:38 > 0:19:44including unique material of a female polar bear giving birth,
0:19:44 > 0:19:46which was shot in Hamburg Zoo.
0:19:46 > 0:19:50Now, if I had said, "Well, here I am in the Arctic
0:19:50 > 0:19:53"and I'm trying to stalk this polar bear,
0:19:53 > 0:19:56"and I'm trying to get a look inside her den",
0:19:56 > 0:19:59and THEN put that in, then that's a lie.
0:19:59 > 0:20:03I mean, that is totally unjustifiable.
0:20:03 > 0:20:06But if you're saying, "I'm trying to tell you about polar bears -
0:20:06 > 0:20:09"how they swim, how they give birth, how they hunt",
0:20:09 > 0:20:12and you put together stuff from all areas, that's fine.
0:20:12 > 0:20:14AND we didn't make any secret of it.
0:20:14 > 0:20:17We gave a credit at the end of the programme,
0:20:17 > 0:20:21saying thanks were due to the Hamburg Zoo.
0:20:24 > 0:20:30Many people have compared the higher levels of management at the BBC to a jungle
0:20:30 > 0:20:35and Attenborough is one of the few people to have direct experience of both savage environments.
0:20:45 > 0:20:48Apart from your many, many appearances on screen,
0:20:48 > 0:20:51you had a brief spell as a BBC manager, running BBC2,
0:20:51 > 0:20:54and then running the television service.
0:20:55 > 0:20:59In general, was TV better at that period,
0:20:59 > 0:21:02in the '60s and '70s, than it is now?
0:21:03 > 0:21:07Well, it wasn't all that brief. I mean, I was there for eight years.
0:21:08 > 0:21:13And, of course, it would be dishonest of me not to say
0:21:13 > 0:21:16that I thought that we did some good things in that time.
0:21:16 > 0:21:20I mean, I would be ashamed if, after eight years,
0:21:20 > 0:21:24you said, "Oh, well, it was all... it was a failure".
0:21:24 > 0:21:27Um, but we had the opportunity to do things
0:21:27 > 0:21:31which are much more difficult to do now.
0:21:31 > 0:21:36Um, there were only three networks in the country.
0:21:36 > 0:21:37The BBC had two of them.
0:21:37 > 0:21:44And if the BBC didn't use that position of great scope that it had
0:21:44 > 0:21:49of two networks to produce something that wasn't pretty good,
0:21:49 > 0:21:53and was more adventurous and experimental and took risks
0:21:53 > 0:21:55and doing all that sort of thing,
0:21:55 > 0:21:58then I would really be ashamed of myself.
0:21:58 > 0:22:00Um, and I think we did do those things.
0:22:00 > 0:22:05We introduced all kinds of new kinds of programme genres.
0:22:05 > 0:22:11And we were able to go for audiences of a size, in proportionate terms,
0:22:11 > 0:22:16which you couldn't possibly do now.
0:22:16 > 0:22:19You say its key was that there were three channels,
0:22:19 > 0:22:22now that there are hundreds, and may eventually be thousands,
0:22:22 > 0:22:26is it impossible to create the kind of television that was created then?
0:22:27 > 0:22:31Well, it only is impossible if you set yourself the wrong targets
0:22:31 > 0:22:34or say you're working within the wrong parameters.
0:22:34 > 0:22:40And the BBC is continually on a pendulum, you know.
0:22:40 > 0:22:42At one end, they're saying,
0:22:42 > 0:22:44"Oh, you're doing all these highbrow things
0:22:44 > 0:22:47"and unpopular things and you are up in the ivory tower.
0:22:47 > 0:22:52"A lot of people resent paying - your licence holder -
0:22:52 > 0:22:55"because they don't see those kind of programmes,
0:22:55 > 0:22:58"therefore loosen up and get more popular."
0:22:58 > 0:23:01And then so you do and then the poor old BBC, having done that
0:23:01 > 0:23:05and proved itself to be more popular than commercial television,
0:23:05 > 0:23:07people say, "Oh, what a terrible thing,
0:23:07 > 0:23:11"that you aren't doing your public service obligations, you should...
0:23:11 > 0:23:12And so it's continually doing that.
0:23:12 > 0:23:16And it's battered over the head whichever way it does.
0:23:16 > 0:23:22And it was certainly the case five years ago that everybody -
0:23:22 > 0:23:25politicians and people running the BBC,
0:23:25 > 0:23:27and all kinds of other people were saying,
0:23:27 > 0:23:29"The BBC's got to be more popular.
0:23:29 > 0:23:33"We won't be able to get the licence renewed unless we are."
0:23:33 > 0:23:37So they did move that way, but now they're moving back again.
0:23:37 > 0:23:42We hear that phrase so often, and it's crucial in this period when the BBC is seeking a new charter -
0:23:42 > 0:23:46"public service broadcasting." What, in your view, does that mean?
0:23:46 > 0:23:49It doesn't mean there's any such thing as a public service programme.
0:23:49 > 0:23:55Public service broadcasting is using a broadcasting network NOT to make money,
0:23:55 > 0:24:01but to try and cover the widest possible spectrum of viewer interests.
0:24:01 > 0:24:05And your success as a public service broadcaster is measured,
0:24:05 > 0:24:09to a very considerable degree, by the width of that spectrum,
0:24:09 > 0:24:13the number of people who come for all kinds of different kinds of programmes.
0:24:13 > 0:24:15So it's a schedule, it's a total schedule.
0:24:15 > 0:24:18And you don't call yourself a public service broadcaster
0:24:18 > 0:24:21just because you happen to do a programme about Norman architecture
0:24:21 > 0:24:23and put it out at 3.15 in the morning.
0:24:23 > 0:24:26That's not public service broadcasting.
0:24:26 > 0:24:32And also the news is a crucial thing in public service broadcasting.
0:24:32 > 0:24:38News which stands up for its values, not simply political values,
0:24:38 > 0:24:41as we've had the horrible example of that,
0:24:41 > 0:24:45but also popularity values.
0:24:45 > 0:24:51Your news ought to do things because you think it's important news.
0:24:51 > 0:24:55And even if it's unpalatable news, and even if the audience turns away
0:24:55 > 0:24:59cos they don't want to hear that particular aspect of the news,
0:24:59 > 0:25:01that's neither here nor there, you've got to do it.
0:25:01 > 0:25:07You can make it as accessible as you can, and as interesting as you can, but you've got to do it.
0:25:07 > 0:25:10That's what public service broadcasting is about.
0:25:10 > 0:25:13The horrible example of what can happen in political news,
0:25:13 > 0:25:16- I assume is a reference to the Andrew Gilligan affair. - Of course, yeah.
0:25:16 > 0:25:18And what was your view of that?
0:25:18 > 0:25:23Oh, well, I think it pointed up, very importantly,
0:25:23 > 0:25:27the bad condition we've got
0:25:27 > 0:25:30vis-a-vis the governors of the BBC and the governance of the BBC.
0:25:30 > 0:25:32There wasn't any question, in my view,
0:25:32 > 0:25:35that the correct thing that should've happened,
0:25:35 > 0:25:40that had the governors been properly divorced from the executive,
0:25:40 > 0:25:44that when the Government, the Prime Minister or whoever else said,
0:25:44 > 0:25:48"We're going to have an inquiry", the chairman of the BBC should say,
0:25:48 > 0:25:50"Thank you, you've no need to do that.
0:25:50 > 0:25:52"That's what we're here for, that's our job.
0:25:52 > 0:25:55"You mind your business and we'll mind ours.
0:25:55 > 0:25:58"We will have an inquiry because we're public-spirited people
0:25:58 > 0:26:00"and we're NOT part of the executive
0:26:00 > 0:26:02"and WE will get to the bottom of the question."
0:26:02 > 0:26:09Now, they didn't do that because, for the last 20 years, the executive and the governance have been merged.
0:26:09 > 0:26:13Now, the dangers of that are now very, very apparent.
0:26:13 > 0:26:18And people, at the moment, are making sure, within the BBC, that that is being...
0:26:18 > 0:26:22I mean, the present chairman and the governors, are bringing them apart,
0:26:22 > 0:26:23and a very good thing too.
0:26:23 > 0:26:27- Are you confident that the licence fee will survive?- No.
0:26:27 > 0:26:30Nobody should be confident the licence fee should survive.
0:26:30 > 0:26:33The licence fee happens to be the most important element
0:26:33 > 0:26:36in broadcasting in this country, in my view.
0:26:36 > 0:26:40And it is SO important that nobody should ever take it for granted.
0:26:40 > 0:26:43Everybody should be saying, "Yes, we understand why that is there.
0:26:43 > 0:26:48"And we understand that the quality of broadcasting that there is in this country
0:26:48 > 0:26:55"is actually a direct consequence of having one major organisation
0:26:55 > 0:26:57"which broadcasts with a licence."
0:26:57 > 0:27:00So once you have hundreds of channels, as we have now,
0:27:00 > 0:27:02we have the Internet, we have everything else,
0:27:02 > 0:27:05why should British people, if they want to watch the BBC,
0:27:05 > 0:27:08still be required to pay a licence fee and go to jail if they don't?
0:27:08 > 0:27:13Why should you or I pay for our rates for a public library
0:27:13 > 0:27:16even though we never use it in our lives?
0:27:16 > 0:27:20Why should you or I pay for a swimming pool for people if we don't...?
0:27:20 > 0:27:24The notion of having a society that is sufficiently integrated
0:27:24 > 0:27:28with a sufficient sense of social responsibility
0:27:28 > 0:27:32to pay communally to make sure that everybody in the society
0:27:32 > 0:27:35has the right sort of facilities that they need -
0:27:35 > 0:27:36that's perfectly clear,
0:27:36 > 0:27:40and that applies to broadcasting just as it does to public libraries.
0:27:40 > 0:27:43The sense, which when I read and talk to you about the early days in TV,
0:27:43 > 0:27:48that sense of wonder and hope, that can never exist again in TV?
0:27:48 > 0:27:53No. I mean, I do remember very clearly
0:27:53 > 0:27:56thinking that this was wonderful because,
0:27:56 > 0:28:01and it was a monopoly situation, because the entire nation -
0:28:01 > 0:28:04bank clerks in Surbiton could understand
0:28:04 > 0:28:06what coalminers in Durham were talking about,
0:28:06 > 0:28:11and musicians could hear what writers were talking about,
0:28:11 > 0:28:15and the nation would come together and that we would be all...
0:28:15 > 0:28:21have a social cohesive, and be that much better as a community as a consequence.
0:28:22 > 0:28:28And then commercialism came in.
0:28:28 > 0:28:32And that distorted - that ideal couldn't survive that.
0:28:33 > 0:28:34Sir David Attenborough, thank you.
0:28:40 > 0:28:42Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd, 2006.
0:28:42 > 0:28:44Email subtitling@bbc.co.uk