Use it or lose it

Cost per user/hour is a blunt tool in judging BBC success - but it's fun.

My chums at the Gaelic TV service, BBC Alba, entering its fifth year, look to have had a grand 2012/3 - in BBC terms, their cost per user/hour has tumbled from 22.0p to 7.4p. This is judged on a BBC content spend of £4.9m - though the channel's total costs are £15m (and it's getting an extra £1m direct from nervous Danny Alexander this year). The audience figures are collated by TNS Scottish Opinion Survey, not BARB - their estimate is weekly reach is up from 436,000 to 637,000. They've undoubtedly been helped by the move which kicks much of BBC network radio off Freeview at night, to create bandwith for Alba - and a hefty dollop of Scottish football - happily re-transmitted in pubs with the Gaelic commentary turned down.

Sadly, things are going the other way at the BBC Gaelic service on radio (from which Alba sprang). BBC nan Gaidheal is up in cost per user/hour from 12.9p to 15.6p. This puts in second only to BBC Radio Cymru, up from 14.5 to 20p per user hour. The only other service to break into double figures in this measure is CBBC - suffering from the removal of programmes from the BBC1 schedule, and now delivering at 11.1p per user hour. I feel a children's classic serial coming back - say, tea-time Sundays ?