The Newsroom

The Cuts - Spending Review Coverage

Licence fee freeze for 6 years, World Service funding withdrawn ? (October 2010)

This site closed in March 2021 and is now a read-only archive
GS
Gavin Scott Founding member
Steve in Pudsey posted:
ok let's look at the evidence - the BBC Annual Report

http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/annualreport/pdf/bbc_ar_online_2009_10.pdf

BBC News Channel cost £61 Million but of that (see note vi) £41 Million is the general newsgathering and content/production cost for BBC News as a whole. Therefore the cost of packaging up that newsgathering as the news channel costs £20 Million - which in the scheme of things is sod all. It's two thirds of what the BBC Red Button service costs.


I'd pay twice that not to see Kay Burley and fatty Boulton.
JO
Joe
I always had you down as rational, Gavin. Wink

gilsta posted:
breakingnews posted:
The BBC has less money and it needs to make cuts. I'm suggesting that they scale back on their news output. Is the size of the BBC News department really justified...Seems like to me they waste a huge amount of their money on the BBC News Channel, something they lived without up til 1997.


And it was pointed out to you the News Channel doesn't cost that much to run and the media landscape has evolved since 1997. Or do you ignore that because it doesn't suit you?


Yes - breakingnews seems to be saying that BBC News has been exactly the same throughout its existence, save for the channel introduced in 1997. Whereas of course, it hasn't - we've gradually had more bulletins, programmes and ways of accessing this content. The launch of the news channel is just part of that.
BR
breakingnews
Steve in Pudsey posted:
ok let's look at the evidence - the BBC Annual Report

http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/annualreport/pdf/bbc_ar_online_2009_10.pdf

BBC News Channel cost £61 Million but of that (see note vi) £41 Million is the general newsgathering and content/production cost for BBC News as a whole. Therefore the cost of packaging up that newsgathering as the news channel costs £20 Million - which in the scheme of things is sod all. It's two thirds of what the BBC Red Button service costs.


£20 million! Wo that's an enormous amount of money. What a waste.
DV
DVB Cornwall
... in your view. I'd even with today's news increase that to enable it to run 24/7 again with no BBC ONE bulletins.
BR
breakingnews
DVB Cornwall posted:
... in your view. I'd even with today's news increase that to enable it to run 24/7 again with no BBC ONE bulletins.


You don't think £20 million is a huge amount of money?
DV
DVB Cornwall
Not in the context of BBC News, no.
BR
breakingnews
DVB Cornwall posted:
Not in the context of BBC News, no.


BBC context or not, it's a massive amount of money.

Let the BBC News Channel go commercial.
JO
Jonny
Quite right, let's not attempt to put things into context and just shout opposing views at each other.
TH
Thomas
I don't think the News Channel should be scrapped or go commercial. I think there is certainly ways to make it more efficient though, such as reducing the number of staff on-screen and obviously there will be waste in the NC that can be found and removed. The BBC is, and should, cut back on spending and should become a more efficient organisation than it currently is. Axing a reasonably popular news channel isn't necessary, I'm sure there are other ways to find savings within the news department and the corporation as a whole.
BR
Brekkie
Funny how one idiot representing Lord Murdoch has turned this thread into talking about an absolute non-issue. There are much bigger concerns here than the BBC News Channel, both in terms of where the axe may fall and also, more importantly IMO, how the government are attempting to strengthen their grip over public service broadcasting under the guise of this spending review.


One relatively small issue - but when suggested by the BBC a few years back considered a waste of the licence fee - is the local TV services. Apart from Jeremy *unt, who actually wants these services?

And talking of local TV, I assume the winning bids for the ITV regional news services have now officially been torn up.
MB
Media Boy
This makes very interesting reading....

http://www.beehivecity.com/politics/bbc-versus-conservatives-inside-the-battle-of-the-licence-fee/
DO
dosxuk
Thomas posted:
I think there is certainly ways to make it more efficient though, such as reducing the number of staff on-screen


As pointed out earlier in the thread, these staff don't just present on the news channel - they have other roles and responsibilities, which would still need filling even if you took them off the news channel output. Would it really be a problem if every member of BBC News staff appeared each week provided they continue to do their normal jobs as well?

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