The BBC World Service is celebrating its 80th birthday. With a change in funding in the pipeline, what does the future hold?

Director of the World Service Peter Horricks told the Today programme's James Naughtie that the World Service has an audience of 225 million around the world, which they have ambitions to increase.

He pointed out that Kofi Annan called the World Service Britain's gift to the world, and he did not believe that taxpayers would want that withdrawn.

Journalist John McCarthy, who recently wrote a report on the world service for the Commonwealth Broadcasting Association, said that the radio station "had a real value for the UK as well as the world".

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