Sir Francis Christopher Buchan Bland (29 May 1938 – 28 January 2017) was a British businessman and politician. He was born in Yokohama, Japan.
He was deputy chairman of the Independent Television Authority (1972), which was renamed the Independent Broadcasting Authority in the same year, and chairman of London Weekend Television (1984) and of the Board of Governors of the BBC (1996 to 2001), when he took up a position as chairman of British Telecommunications plc. He left his position with BT in September 2007.
Before leaving BT, he became chairman of the Royal Shakespeare Company, in 2004.[1]
Bland died on 28 January 2017 in Clanville, Hampshire from complications of prostate cancer, aged 78.[2]