Nadine Dorries came out fighting over the weekend to declare it was time to discuss new ways to fund and sell the ‘great British content’ produced by the BBC. But it turned out she had little in the way of ammunition once she reached the Commons yesterday.

There will be a two-year freeze in the £159 fee — a measure that will represent a real-terms cut in the corporation’s funding, but hardly the ‘mortal threat’ some alarmists have declared.