David Hare on the state of TV drama

In The Times, David Hare lays into what he sees as the poverty of the BBC's ambition for drama.

The revival of Doctor Who sends the BBC into a well-merited orgy of delight, precisely because it inherits a known form and succeeds in regenerating it. It conforms, if you like, to the Trojan Horse model of drama, by taking something already familiar and cleverly smuggling in some exciting new ideas.

But with very few exceptions - inevitably, you think of Paul Abbott, the author of State of Play and Shameless - it is very hard to see the same commitment being brought to bear on wholly original work. The Wire and Heimat remain in their scale and ambition the two global television series the corporation seems least keen to emulate.