Scottish Independence

I've been thinking about this for a while and seeing as Scottish Independence is in much debate at the moment, I thought I'd bring it up.

If Scotland were to become independent, what would happen to television? I don't know the ins and outs of this but my theory would be most commercial entities would stay the same but perhaps not the BBC. I would have thought Scotland would stop paying the licence fee and hence wouldn't receive the same service. In addition, would Scotland then be able to legally receive BBC World News?

I thought it was an interesting one for people to discuss. Maybe I'm wrong and nothing would change, we shall see.

Well at least BBC1 and 2 are available in both The Netherlands and Switzerland, and I know for certain that BBC3 and 4 are also available in The Netherlands (at an extra cost to the TV provider)

I expect any post-Independence Scottish TV scene will resemble the Irish model.

I dare say itv / stv will become like Eire. Ch4 and 5 no change. BBC we will continue to pay for the licence fee but I bet Glasgow will be told to make few more programmes.

If we did become independent, would Holyrood have the power to abolish the Licence Fee? Although I guess this would mean removing all the BBC Channels from Scottish TV's....

I'm not sure what the SNP's policy on broadcasting post-independence is, but surely if Scotland were to become independent we'd have our own version of the BBC?

Perhaps splitting BBC Scotland from the rest of the network and making it a 'partner' of the BBC, but funded separately would be an idea. But then again the quality of programming would surely go down with a smaller income, and we'd probably end up with a STV/ITV situation.

But what do I know?

Assuming the BBC don't just shut down the Glasgow base and move everyone to, say, Coventry.

I wonder BBC Scotland could sustain its current output from just the revenue from Scottish licences ?

Funny you mention that, I just edited my post to include that point.

God; I don't know what's worse between Glasgow and Coventry!

Yep, I'm pretty sure Scotland would be following the Irish model. Salmond brought up many comparison to Irish TV in his recent interview on The One Show - batting away questions about what would happen to EastEnders by saying it was shown at the same time on RTE. The SNP has made reference to Scotland having its own broadcaster before.

So you would have a Scottish Broadcasting Corporation along the lines of the Irish model, with a licence fee and adverts, probably with two channels. I would imagine STV would be retain its position, but no longer as part of the ITV network (see TV3). If we follow the Irish model then SBC Alba would probably take the fourth channel slot.

The BBC would probably still be available in Scotland on cable/satellite, depending on how acrimonious things got. Is Channel 4/5 available in Ireland? As for the rest, Sky channels are freely available in Ireland, so there'd be very little change.

So, in such a situation, what happens to the rather nice shiny new building by the Clyde, paid for by the licence fee? The transmission contracts the BBC has with Arqiva to carry its networks throughout the whole county - presumably agreements with BBC Distribution, not BBC Scotland. The Astra satellite transponders shared with the BBC which are for the BBC's use, unless they decide to lease them to third parties? The technology contract with Atos (including, er, running a control room remotely from London?)

Yes, an SBC could pay for all of this, but the buy-out costs with the BBC would be massive.