To the trenches

The National Union of Journalists is upping its oppposition to a merger of the production teams making Newshour on the World Service and The World Tonight, on Radio 4. It quotes members' views, thus....

“This is madness, unless the idea really is to throw The World Tonight under the bus. It would also do great damage to Newshour. The idea that one team can make two good and different evening news programmes with one presenter back to back is extraordinarily ill-conceived and impractical. All we are asking is that one of the most fundamental and precious public purposes of the BBC, to provide accurate and impartial news, current affairs and factual programming of the highest editorial standards so that all audiences can engage fully with issues across the UK and the world, should not bear the brunt of cuts when money needs to be saved.”

Management want to close six posts, and say that will produce a remarkable saving of £567,000 a year. Newshour, launched in 1988, is one of the World Service's flagship offerings, on-air twice daily at 1400 and 2100 GMT. It's believed to make money from re-broadcasters in the States. The World Tonight, launch in 1970, claims an audience of 1.5m - and 10% of the available radio audience at 10pm.