If you give people decent television, they will watch decent television.

Richard Branson: In Britain we’ve just banned smoking in public. And it’s working. People who were smoking in public are looking like they’re going to give up smoking in public. And I think the same applies to television.

If you give people decent television, and there isn’t absolute garbage next door to that decent television, people will watch decent television. Maybe they’ll learn a lot from watching decent television.

If you sit in front of American television networks, finding a story about almost any country outside America, apart from Iraq at the moment, is impossible. There is a war going on in Somalia at the moment. Ethiopia has invaded Somalia in the last three months. I don’t think many people in America would know that. It could have enormous ramifications for the whole of Africa. And you know, if militant Islam react really badly as a result of that invasion--

It just needs to be more debate, more discussion.

Recorded on: July 5, 2007