BBC NEWS CUTS

The vast majority of the News job cuts, 450, were announced in January and were part of a £800m savings programme that started in 2016.

Since Covid another 70 have been added but I suspect some of those might also be attributable to other factors, such as increasing drop in TV licences bought generally - separate to the over 75s scheme.


The quote is from Gavin Allen, Head of News Output, in a message to staff.

Isn't that going to be an ongoing situation, as more and more people turn to streaming services (other than BBC iPlayer)?

All the time you have a telly in the house, you need a licence. If there's been a drop of TVL revenue since the lockdown, then I assume a significant number of people cancelled their direct debits etc ?

My local authority gave a 'payment holiday' for council tax, and we had no payments in April and May. Mind you our council are so flush with money, they actually lend it to other councils !

Touchscreens seem very 2006, I don't think it adds much. Something like what Sky had at the election, with graphics making use of empty space is far more impressive I think. I know the BBC do this a bit with the papers.



In regards to the "main" BBC news studio in the newsroom (E I think), I have always seen this as a temporary studio. It is just a bit of glass dividing an open space at the end of the day. Yes I know it is all wired up and far more complex than that. At some stage the set and the background (i.e the newsroom) is going to look dated and old, and you can't do much with it at that stage. It is fine at the moment. You can perhaps change a few colours and shapes etc and give it a bit more life, but I can't see it lasting too long beyond 2025. At which stage they will need to move somewhere else. A studio with more space where they can actually build something new. The "old" Newsnight studio would be a good choice?

Speaking of modernisation, why is it that British news channels seem to spend an age getting to reporting the news at the top of each hour? They start with video clips of each story, give a short explanation, then have a big introduction, and then finally we get the news. This is far too slow. It takes about a minute and a half for the BBC to actually start. I found a German example where is takes about 20 seconds. As much as I love the big introductions, especially the old Sky News style (Live from the Sky News Centre, this is Sky.... etc) the world has moved on. People want things to start quickly. Not visit the Newsroom for a tour.

That's not actually true. It hasn't been the case for quite some time, as long as you are not watching or recording live TV broadcasts on ANY equipment.

I have a smart TV, as do many others, and if I decided to only watch catch-up services (except BBC iPlayer) and other streaming services (Netflix, Amazon etc) then I would not need to have a TVL.

TVs are now used for things other than live broadcast services.

Totally unenforceable rules then, so the licence fee revenue will dwindle away over the coming years, it's becoming nothing more than an 'honesty box'

True, which is the point I was originally making. It's why they really need to come up with another funding model within the next 10 years.

I'm not keen on the concept of a 'Government Grant' as that smacks of state control. A 'local levy on every household' as in some countries, would have the Daily Fail screaming for years. Subscription may see the end of too many niche services.

Perhaps 'embracing the devil' and using advertising revenue in the UK is the only answer.

What will already-commercial broadcasters say to that? Plus, if the reason for this is people moving away from TV screens (as we previously understood them), advertising revenue will dry up before long anyway (like with newspapers). Though you can, of course, have adverts on streaming services.

The big drop in TV licences held predates Covid. There was a drop of 82,000 licences held in the five months to March this year, which equates to nearly 200,000 a year and over £30m in revenue. Financial hardship as a result of Covid will only exacerbate those figures. Added to that problem is the task of persuading three million over 75s to buy a licence in a weeks time.

All the time DTT (aka Freeview) is a major platform, the TV licence revenue is going to get harder and harder to enforce and collect. However, about a third of the UHF spectrum (that existed 1964 to 2012) has now been given over to non broadcast users, (not just here, but across Europe (and nothing to do with the EU)) it's therefore only a matter of time before the rest of it goes.

Personally, I think it'll be gone by 2030. At that point, it'll be possible to make BBC services 100% conditional access, how the BBC deal with the coming years is quite another matter. If people think they can get away with not paying, they will, I think the BBC grossly underestimate the (at best) ambivalence of the UK public.

The Swedish model of a personal public service levy is an interesting take. It's only - I believe - levied on income tax payers (so gets round the low-income issue). However Sweden has accepted that strong, independent, public service TV and Radio are worth paying for...

I'll need to dig it out (I can't remember where, may have been Guardian) where there was a piece on how the BBC could cope if it turned to a commercial model.

It suggested taking into account advertising on all stations TV/Radio/Online, sponsorship and less red tape over commercial operations it said that the BBC could emerge quite well out of it to the point it could be better off.

Though the commercial sector won't be happy with such a move.