Delivering Quality First

What would we all be saying if the government hadnt put a cap on the licence fee, especialy in the rather though climate. It would climb, and climb, and climb and there would be certain people on here who would not like that in todays current economic situation.

One of the main flaws in the DQF review in my opinion is it hasn't placed enough focus on managerial level. From my own experiences I've found the BBC to be a wash of red tape, jobsworth managers and an absolute nightmare logistically to get anything creative done. It's a shame they're cutting away the real creatives from the BBC, and not the deadwood middle management that merely hinder the productivity of the corporation.

In fairness people power saved 6 Music.

There is a BBC Trust consultation on the DQF proposal http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/consult/delivering_quality_first.shtml

Although nothing big, but in the official document, it states the morning and 3pm News summaries on BBC One are to end aswell, (assuming the regional bulletin is counted in that too) not surprising if CBBC on One is to end too.

I'm not so sure it's the cap on the licence fee which is the only issue - it's more the extra burdens the BBC have been expected to pick up with World Service, S4C etc. plus the costs associated with relocation all in combination with the freeze - though of course alot comes back to the licence fee being allowed to rise above inflation for too long. In the short term a cap was probably the right decision, but I think it should have been for three years rather than six, and then capped at inflation beyond that.

So BBC2 might simulcast more of BBC World during lunchtime? This could also force some schedule changes for BBC World then.

That's certainly the impression it gives. Makes total sense economically and offers something new to the public. Presumably as well the only change would be UK-based reports during what is usually commercial breaks (as seen during Newsday and GMT)?

Although a lot of things are thrown under the red button branding, including the text service, considering they're closing all but one stream on Sky/Cable a saving of 11% (£1.9m) leaving a budget of £16.9m seems very low.

But what "inflation" figure would you use?

RPI, CPI ?

The BBC previously managed to convince parliament that "Broadcast inflation" (i.e. the cost increases associated with broadcasting) were greater than RPI - and they were probably right...

I'd have thought it a better move to sack off the interactive streams entirely and save the money. Then, when YouView launches, they can offer IP based interactive streams without paying transponder costs. I suppose it's got a lot to do with 'platform neutrality' and that, but for once they should suck it up and say 'we can't afford to put this on every platform, so we're putting it on the free ones' - Freeview and Freesat.

It's really galling that they spent £21million on the rights to 'The Voice' in face of all these cuts.

While there are plenty of other technical reasons why you couldn't do a news bulletin from TVC's weather studios, it is perfectly possible for a forecast to be live from one on the news channel while the other is being fed to, say, BFBS. (But hello, and welcome to TVF.)


In which case, maybe what's needed is a PR campaign to point out what tremendously good value for money it is. £145.50 is a bloody bargain, though I suspect I'd be preaching to the converted if I started arguing that here.

I've not had a chance to read the proposals fully yet, but I suspect the unions will have a beef with some of the changes to pay and conditions - particularly in relation to redundancy pay, and allowances for shift workers. (No more UPA, and new employees taken on under days not hours conditions). That's not a good way to attract new staff to the organisation. (Or maybe they're just taking advantage of the fact that the rest of the media industry have ended up in a race to the bottom for pay and conditions and has decided that they may as well join in.)

Strikes ahead, anyone?

They're looking at taking two English Regions off DSAT, saving £500k a year for each stream apparently. They haven't decided which regions they'll be but Oxford and one of the East regions look likely (interesting that it's not automatically Cambridge that's being mentioned).

The number of Red Button streams is to be reduced to one after the Olympics, which will make Multi-Stream Wimbledon coverage far less comprehensive, if not impossible. Wimbledon Multi-Screen is considered by many to be the flagship red button service (and I think the first red button Multi-Screen application the BBC ever did).

The loss of daytime summaries on BBC 1 also includes the regional opt at 3pm, the last remaining daytime opt slot (there used to be regional summaries after all the morning bulletins too).

CBBC programmes on BBC Two in the mornings and BBC One in the afternoons will end after DSO.

While none of these decisions are popular with BBC staff, the thing that is likely to bring them out onto the pavements is that along with all of these reductions and 2,000 associated job losses, for those that remain there are proposals to radically alter the pay structure, redundancy terms, and allowances some have for having unpredictable work patterns.

While some regional TV news services have come out of DQF relatively unscathed, there are still Creative Futures efficiency savings to be made by April 2012 - which has its own, separate, job-losses.