Great Scott !

Let's walk through last night's pub discussion (mine, not yours) again. 

The BBC is currently built on 'universality', something for everyone, and measures success by the size of audiences.  In the old linear tv world, this meant plenty of jolly stuff, mass audience entertainment, to keep the viewing figures in a tight line for as long as possible in the evenings. Sitcoms, to drag you through Panorama, panel games to get you past Tomorrow's World, That Was The Week That Was to keep you awake and interested beyond some Previn-conducted Symphony Concert, no hammocks to lead you away to Minder or Sunday Night at the London Palladium.  

But the world of the set menu is gone. Programmes matter more than channels and perhaps even more than streamers. Slow Horses gets talked about more than Apple TV.  Ted Lasso. Clarkson's Farm. The Crown.  Games of Thrones. Which is on where, again ?

So the BBC has to decide, I think, on a long-term vision of its programme portfolio, which ditches low cost, low public value schedule fillers. Can it - should it  - really sustain Pointless, House of Games, Wisdom of The Crowd, The Inner Circle, Answer Run, The Finish Line, Bridge of Lies, The Weakest Link in an on-demand world ?  How would you defend a household tax that pays for Antiques Roadshow, Bargain Hunt, The Travelling Auctioneers, The Bidding Room, Flog It, Road Trip and more ?

The case for a BBC channel built around a newsy breakfast show and three main bulletins looks to have legs for a couple of Charters; but I would argue it could take more, not less, current affairs in its schedule.  Newsnight, Politics Live etc should be continuing BBC products. Turn The One Show into a properly funded Michelmore-era Tonight. Then Tentpole stuff 8pm to 10pm.  Satire, jazz, comedy, Brains Trusts, reviews at 11pm. Back to the future, eh ? 

And then, an on-demand portfolio of seriously good programmes that reflect and celebrate British culture, arts, drama, music, and yes, comedy. Programmes that encourage family viewing, programmes that educate, gently, programmes that last.  Can you do that, Matt ?

Not the issue

 An excellent piece of misdirection by BBC DG Matt Brittin in his pre-recorded interview with Laura Kuennsburg. 

 “We might have some channels and services where maybe 100,000 people are watching the broadcast service, but 500,000 are getting those programmes on iPlayer. When’s the right time to migrate that service fully to being on demand? "

The problem is, Matt, that your managers are now cutting the programmes, and whether they're delivered 'on-demand' or 'broadcast' is a secondary issue. Neither forms of delivery are 'free', and the savings in going down to 'on-demand' only, if chased too early, mean an end to the channels which showcase good material and bring it to the attention of wider audiences.  

Take that

Given that it's now regularly the most-watched slot on BBC1, you'd think the regional news shows at 6.30pm would get a bit of protection from the latest round of cuts. 

Not so, if  I've go this right. Each BBC region will reduce its current range of specialist correspondents by 1/3 with the gap to be filled by  "two dedicated multi-platform correspondents" (a current favoured management trick - 'specialist generalists'.)  

Specialist regional correspondents got a huge boost in numbers from around 1990, as Ron Neil rolled out the Birtian edict that the BBC must have its own experts in many areas of journalism traditionally left to large newspapers.  In the regions, there were suddenly "Home Affairs Correspondents", "Business, Industry and Transport Correspondents", "Health Correspondents", "Enviroment Correspondents", "Education Correspondents" and massively increased numbers of "Political Correspondents". 

This is not the first reversal on this front, and there's a lack of consistency around the English regions, but the process of reduction will be bloody. 

Rivals

 But....BBC Sport does have £1.2m standing by for this tender, now open: 

"Sport+ is BBC Sport’s cross-platform audience offer dedicated to the best stories in sport - evergreen, impactful and designed to resonate with audiences wherever they are. This tender is focused on ideas that meet the requirements for three of its strands: Rivals, 24 Hours with & Unfiltered.  

We are seeking to commission up to 6 hours of content, with long-form versions of each proposal expected to be between 30 minutes and 60 minutes in duration. An extensive range of other content deliverables will be required. 

This ITT is open to producers that meet the requirements outlined herein. Producers may submit one or more ideas. The BBC is open to working with more than one producer. "

In charge is Ben Gallop, Head of Content Strategy and Platforms at BBC Sport; last year's salary £178k. Also alongside Alex Kay-Jelski (£290k) are Philip Bernie, Head of Sport (£210k); Mark Hughes, Head of Sport (Stories) £200k. 

Matt and Alex

I'd rather hoped Matt Brittin's sporting instincts might override those of BBC Sport boss Alex Kay-Jelski. Sidebars on whatever strategy was behind the latest round of cuts are alarming: The Times' Martyn Ziegler quotes a source saying the department "will focus on "most-read" stories on website using audience data." Another source tells The Telegraph "They are obsessed with numbers, social media impressions, short clips and videos for reels". 

I think Matt Brittin has already had an impact on the dinosaurs driving the trails on BBC1. Recently I've seen trails for "Global Eye"  and "Finding Britain's Slave Traders" just before the Six O'Clock News, where normally there'd be relentless promos for Strictly and Blue Lights. Mr Brittin 'gets' the range of the BBC. I also think Mr Brittin understands that the currency used to demonstrate alleged social media success is as firmly based as bitcoin. And he definitely knows that there has to be a public service rationale for aiming effort and content at Tik-tok, Instagram, Facebook and others beyond 'metric fixation'. 

The question is; has he told Alex ?

Downhill

The defeatist attitude of an ITN-trained management at BBC News in April 2023 effectively closed down the BBC News channel in favour of a "World News" offering absolutely focused on an American audience. 

At the time of the 'merger', BBC Sport Today became BBC Sportsday.  Last year "Sportsday" branding was dropped, in favour of shorter BBC Sport bulletins. At the time of the merger, BBC News in the UK was reaching 9.7m a month. The BBC is no longer obliged to disclose weekly reach in the UK; Ofcom's latest annual survey suggests it's reaching 31% of all adults in the UK over 16 each week. 

It's clear that the current BBC Sport management have made a choice between live sport coverage and 'news', so, as a result of today's cuts, there'll be almost nothing 'Made in Manchester' for the BBC News channel, and the downward spiral of the reputation of the BBC News channel in the UK, ceding ground to GB News, will continue. 

Not a lone voice

Finally, someone on my side. The Social Market Foundation, sponsored by 38 Degrees, says the licence fee should be replaced by a levy on home broadband connections, which it calculates at £11 a month.  They haven't quite spotted that they need a combo levy, cos more and more people are watching 'tv' on smartphones, and 'mirroring' the output on larger screens. 

A combination of levies on broadbands, mobile and streamers is the best replacement for a tv licence, as it's at least related to the means of consumption, and can be 'progressive', given that people pay for more bandwith for more detailed pictures and ever-faster streaming... 

Time for tv

Leading Radio 4 on-demand show In Our Time is now recorded on screen for delivery on iPlayer. Wood panelling and books form the background. Host Misha Glenny has a short-sleeved t-shirt, and appears to be wearing shorts.  He seems to read the introduction from autocue.   In America, the video version is now available as part of the BBC Select subscription offering. 

Peaky

John Lucius MacAndrew appeared on Newswatch this week to explain the move of Friday's edition of Newsnight - 'a real opportunity to bring the programme to new audiences'. 

The first 7pm slot attracted 500k viewers.  It boasted Neil Kinnock, Rory Stewart, Alva Ray of the New Statesman, and an extended interview with Kemi Badenoch.  On YouTube, Newsnight is cut up into bitesize chunks under the banner BBC Politics, with added big capital letters. The Badenoch interview has so far achieved 19k views.  Maybe it will build - Paxman v Russell Brand, from 12 years ago, has clocked up 13 million views. 

Meanwhile Strictly launched with an average of 5.3m viewers, and a healthy 50% share (up from 42% in 2025) 

2025 - 5.4m

2024 - 5.4m

2023 - 6.2m

2022 - 6.8m

2021 - 7.0m

2020 - 8.6m

Eyeballs

The Newsnight team have invested a lot in promoting the 7pm Friday slot, including a three minute sizzle reel at the end of last night's show.  But phrases like "Prime time" and "Peak time" are dangerous hostages to fortune, and people will be chasing the overnight figures for a quick judgement. 

Channel 4 News has been the Royal Television Society's news programme of the year for the past three years.  Yet it's coy about viewing figures.  In the networks annual report, it talks about "an 8% linear growth in 2025", without hinting at a baseline.   The same report baffles this reader with very big numbers for social media, without giving real confidence that the figures are better or worse than other similar size operations - make sense of this, if you can...  

"In 2025, annual digital views reached 2.1 billion, up 12% year on year, supported by a global following of 16 million across platforms. 

"Social platforms delivered over 700,000 UK views a day from 13-34-year-olds, alongside 3 million TikTok followers and 6 million on Meta. Original vodcasts averaged 100,000 views, with TrumpWorld topping Spotify’s UK podcast charts. 

"Channel 4 News is powered by an always-on, fully integrated digital newsroom, designed to reach younger audiences on the platforms they use most, while remaining fully Ofcomcompliant. The result is nearly 900 million minutes watched annually. 

"New editorial products – including FourNow, FourSight, and Substack – deepened engagement with loyal audiences, while YouTube continued to scale, attracting 4 million subscribers and averaging 20 million monthly views."

Newsnight is already in similar digital lime-washing; expect more soon.