JEREMY CLARKSON: A Tory BBC? Everyone I met there in 25 years was flaming red.

It’s often said that when someone emerges into the world from university and likes what they see, they will go into the City or into business and they will devote their lives to making money and going to parties and having fun. However, if they leave university and think the world is all broken and full of injustice, they will try to change the system. Which means they will add a rainbow emoji to their Twitter bio and join the BBC.

Of course, in recent weeks we have been told over and over again that this is emphatically not the case. Many angry, red-faced people have pointed out that the present chairman of the BBC is a Tory party donor and that Tim Davie, the director-general, once stood as a Conservative candidate in the local council elections in Hammersmith & Fulham. The message, then, is clear. At the very top, the Beeb is a festering maggot pit run by the bastard love children of Margaret Thatcher and Gordon Gekko.

* * * * * * * *

The mob, however, is wrong. Yes, at this precise moment of history it’s possible that the two people at the top of the BBC might at some point in their past have voted Conservative, but what about everyone else? All the other 22,000 people involved in running this broadcasting giant? The army that creates and writes and presents all the shows it produces? Well, I worked at the BBC for more than 25 years, and I can tell you that almost everyone I met was redder than the end of a dog’s lipstick.

I was once told when visiting the Simon Mayo show that I would have to leave my copy of The Spectator outside as “extremist material” was not allowed in the Radio 5 Live offices*. And then, while I was waiting to go on The One Show, a producer said that I had to agree with the public sector strikes that were happening that day or it would be “awkward”.

I know someone who was told to take down his Union Jack because it was “offensive”, and I was asked to remove my poster of Mrs Thatcher because it was upsetting people who walked past. I did, and replaced it with a picture of Kate and [Prince William], which somehow made them even angrier.

* Gentlemen, you can’t have differing opinions here, this is a broadcast network!