The Church of England's senior spokesman on communications has said that the BBC must "safeguard its religious programming", and not allow cuts to force reduced Christian broadcasting, according to The Church of England Newspaper.

|PIC1|The statement comes as the BBC announced that it will increase licence fees by 3 per cent over the next 2 years.

In response, the Rt Rev Nigel McCulloch, who is the Bishop of Manchester, explained that he would be watching closely any further developments on the issue, in particular, any specific effects on the BBC's programmes and schedules.

It was widely reported in media that the BBC chiefs had been pushing for a licence fee increase of 2.3 per cent above the rate of inflation. However, the lower settlement was agreed and it is now rumoured that programming may be affected. Some of the BBC's departments have already announced their move to Manchester.

The Bishop said: "I welcome the acting Chair of the BBC Trust, Chitra Barucha's recent comment that the BBC should not 'shave bits off' its services and that the BBC's management will need to argue the case for any cuts," according to The Church of England Newspaper.

He added: "The BBC Trust must be especially careful to safeguard the BBC's expertise in a number of areas, including religion, and not allow cuts to threaten the viability of specialist departments which contribute to the depth of much BBC output."

In his statement, Bishop McCulloch explained that the Church of England wanted to see the BBC's strong influence remain, and said: "To serve the public interest, it must be able to bring news, religion, science, children's television, programmes reflecting community and culture as well as other 'public service' content to television, radio, internet and mobile phones, subject to the test which was recently put in place that its services provide public value."

Bishop McCulloch has extensive experience in the broadcasting field, and has previously been a member of the House of Lords BBC Charter Review Select Committee in 2005 and 2006.