Tony Hall came in to the BBC as a new broom saying all the right things – the new director general wanted more access for consumers, creating "some of the greatest, boldest, most imaginative work of our lives", and promising a "bonfire of the boards".
Today we heard what that bold and important work would look like in the first instance: Nicholas Hytner from the National Theatre joining the BBC executive board, with Nicholas Serota from the Tate and Vicky Featherstone from the Royal Court as advisers. Rupert Goold of the Almeida will create new dramas.
Yes, these people have amazing track records (discounting Hytner's dismal lack of women writers and directors during his NT tenure), but while the BBC may perceive the Royal Court and the Almeida to be cutting edge, the truth is that they are now – rightly, after all this time – establishment theatres that work largely with establishment theatre-makers.
In the same breath that Hall promises "arts for everyone", he also offers us the Hay book festival, opera from Glyndebourne, and yet another Shakespeare festival (other playwrights are available). Hay's great – I've read there, I've struggled to carry home the cava, but the chances of seeing a non-white face in those fields (that doesn't belong to a writer) are slim indeed. Glyndebourne is probably brilliant too; I've not been. Like many people born into working-class families in the 1960s I have never felt I had much access to opera.
That's changed, yes, especially as I work with people who direct and sing opera, but I have the privileged access of someone who works in the arts. The truth is, no matter how hard we in the arts try – every one of us genuine in our desire to reach further and wider – we know that we are not yet reaching all the people everywhere. And a programme citing opera, ballet and still more Shakespeare is most definitely not "arts for everyone".
Where is the experimentation? Where are the emerging artists? (And without BBC3 how will they find out what they can do?) Where are the companies that do make art for everyone? Maybe Hall has them on his list, but I don't see Streetwise Opera or Tête a Tête Opera named in the press coverage; I don't see advisers named from the dozens of astonishing theatres outside London, such as Live and Northern Stage in Newcastle, Liverpool's Everyman and the Royal Exchange in Manchester, all of which, among many others, are truly innovating when it comes to making new work and bringing in new audiences.
If Hall really wants to make arts for everyone, he needs to go beyond the confines of London arts and London boards, and also look to some younger practitioners. The young artists I work with don't only want to watch comedy, especially not when the comedians that get on telly are in their 30s and 40s. They don't only care about Glastonbury – they're too young to care about Glastonbury, not least because they can't afford the tickets, what with austerity biting them hardest and this government encouraging local authorities to cut back on youth services anyway.
In the Fun Palaces campaign, based on Joan Littlewood's dream of a true democratisation of the arts, we've been contacted by companies across the UK, all of them signing up to make quality arts for and with local people. Because these people are "everyone" too – they pay their licence fees, they watch BBC television and listen to BBC radio.
By all means, let's welcome highly skilled arts practitioners into the BBC and use them to help us share the best with everyone. But it is useful to remember that "best" is highly subjective, and sometimes the best is made outside the shiny publicly funded buildings, by people under 40, and well beyond the M25.
