Alex, I can't say who would fill any vacuum that may be created absent the BBC (or rather, absent a tax-funded BBC), but I don't believe quality television and radio programmes would disappear. It shows a real lack of faith either in the people of this country or in market capitalism to doubt that there is a demand for intelligent television and the free market is quite up to the task of supplying it. It's also easy to point to the occasional great programme produced under our present anachronistic broadcast media structure and treasure it, fearing we would not see its like again in a deregulated market. It's much harder, but equally valid, to consider what quality programmes are never made because we retain the BBC poll tax and hold back major reform year after year.
Theory aside, there are already plenty of television and radio programmes that easily match or better the BBC in their quality and intelligence. Channel Four is one major channel that makes this point rather well. Of course it hosts Big Brother and the like, and even in its more serious output, the channel certainly produces its share of dreary anti-British programmes and documentaries which I wouldn't seek to defend. But it also produces plenty of quality history that can more than hold its own against anything the BBC has to offer.
