Television News | “Trustworthiness & Reliability”

So basically everything that doesn't affect you is "woke" and you don't want to hear about it. How very 2020.

No.I do want to hear it but as a rational debate in its own space.

5 News used to be an asset. Now it’s an obligation. BBC regional news seems to be heading in a similar direction...

I remember 5 News in 1997 - it really felt like they had a purpose, and produced a lot of news content during the day. All that seemed to dry up by the year 2000.

I don’t watch 5 News so can’t comment but I agree with you about BBC regional news. Being able to see the likes of Amy Garcia keeping us up to date with the regional reactions to Covid 19 has provided that indefinable something that London despite their incredible hard work can't do.

Or is it more a case of ITN just providing what the client wants? There's no evidence to suggest that ITN has gone rogue. I strongly suspect that the powers that be at 5 News are employed and directed by Channel 5.

5 News seems heavily skewed towards female interest stories compared to the BBC and ITV bulletins.

As someone else mentioned above, it's become an obligation rather than being a core element of the Channel 5 brand. They shoehorn a pointless 6.30 bulletin to meet the hours because they know nobody is watching when the regional news bulletin is on BBC One.

The truth is they could axe the news, replace it with another inane Australian soap and it'd rate better with the average C5 viewer not being upset at not being able to see Sian Williams.

The passion went out of 5 News once they left the CityTV style format in 2000., not to say the current journalists don't work their backsides off working on the bulletins.

M6 is the closest I can think of both presentation and editorially to 5 News and they do it a lot better.

Look at some Channel 5 pres from the late 90s - the news is there on all the menus and talked up as must-see. One of the line-up trailers I saw even used the news music in the background.

The news was the backbone of the channel at launch as frankly they didn't have much else to sell it around. It worked well though for them, both advertising the less stuffy main evening bulletin and then the hourly update service, used to drive viewers to the channel.

It certainly lost it's way by the time Sky took over and never really found it again. Arguably using the BBC cast offs has just left it as a functional bulletin rather than trying to do something others aren't. Of course too over the noughties especially the BBC and more specifically ITV and C4 adopted so much of what C5 were doing that C5 lost it's USP anyway.


As for trustworthyness of news - no doubt the BBC has taken a battering over the last couple of years largely due to organised campaigns, but sometimes they don't help themselves either. We hold the BBC to such high standards that when they even fall slightly short of them, but probably still above their competitors, the perception becomes that they're failing.

On the whole though the BBC and ITN, as well as Sky, are all by far the most trustworthy news sources in the UK, but I think ITV News and Sky News have more protection of late in a world where the government makes threats against the BBC and C4 seemingly everytime they broadcast something (i.e. the truth) that the government disagree with.


What was a real shame this week was to see the BBC, C4 and Sky sink to the depths of the likes of the Express and Mail in their coverage of the migrants crossing the channel.

C5's strongest point is their factual documentary strands. If C5 were allowed to replace their news obligation with topical docs instead, it'd be an improvement on the current situation.

Interesting idea. You have to wonder what the point is in insisting on a news service that few people watch.

On the point of trust in news, it’s pretty clear that trust has declined whilst social media has grown. The biggest irony is that those with the least trust seem to get their “news” from the most dubious places. I do feel that we’re reaching somewhat of a turning point and contrary to some of the arguments here, I actually think that the cuts to the BBC may restore trust overall. My biggest issue with it is that it feels bloated. In my job I have to work efficiently, minimising waste and maximisIng productivity, and I’d guess that the vast majority of viewers work in a similar environment. For better or worse that’s the way of the world now and I don’t feel like the BBC reflects that.

5 News is never going back to its original format unless the channel goes younger skewing again, it's a much more older skewing channel now as the royal docs indicate.