Quota quotes

Twitchy times ahead if you are a tv programme maker at the BBC. Unholy alliances are ranged against you. The big indies want to maintain growth in a recession, and used the Edinburgh TV Festival for the traditional, but shameless call for a further increase in the indie quota, which they now prefer to phrase as "a reduction in the protected levels of BBC production".

This sits well with some BBC Controllers, who see indies as cheaper, sharper, more directable - and more likely to buy them lunch. It sits well with a new cadre of BBC Executive Producers, who sit on top of these indies, giving them the benefit of their wisdom without financial or critical risk to their career path inside Auntie. It sits well with some BBC senior managers, as a way out of the DQF conundrums. Fewer BBC producers in tv and radio creates exponential savings - in HR, IT and training support, in care and career development, and in simple office space. It helps close White City, as well as Television Centre. It sits well with Tory MPs. Staff, unions, etc are nothing but trouble.

So far, the only voice raised in their defence is that of Pat Younge, Chief Creative Officer of BBC Vision,  "The attack isn't unexpected. I don't think in-house is the big threat to the BBC. I think we've got our challenges and I'm glad it's George [Entwistle] not me who's got to deal with them, but we'll get through. But this fixation on 'in-house is the problem' - there's no evidence that we're even more expensive [than independent productions].....I want to see George put creativity back at the heart of the BBC. Sometimes it feels like making programmes is an inconvenient obstacle to running the BBC."

You'll notice this makes no reference to scale or size. For tv and radio production across the UK, the reality is that the BBC and indies now have a shared interest in increasing casualisation of the industry....