Ofcom opines

Some bits and bobs that caught my eye from Ofcom's fourth annual report on BBC performance. Its moans are mainly about public perceptions, and it occasionally acknowledges the BBC had a very good year. It's bulked out to 85 pages by re-running pompous complain assessments, none actually upheld.

The BBC launched its online audio service, BBC Sounds, in 2018 as part of its strategy to meet changing audio behaviours, particularly among younger audiences, and this service has grown in popularity. However, according to BBC data, less than a third of its users are aged under 35 and this proportion has not grown. Just 27% of BBC Sounds account holders are aged under 35, down from 29% at the same time last year.

In 2021, based on data the BBC provided to Ofcom, around twice as many people working for the BBC UK public services attended private schools as the UK average (14% vs 7%) and had parents in professional occupations when aged 14 (61% vs 33%). The trends are similar for the broadcasting industry as a whole, based on the limited data that we have.

Total BBC spend on original TV content has been in long-term decline, reducing from £1.6bn in 2010 to £1.2bn in 2019, although the number of hours of content each year has remained relatively stable. (Quizzes, antiques etc: cheaper programmes in longer series....)

The average weekly reach of the BBC News website has increased across all demographics this year (from 29% of adults 16+ in 2019/20 to 36% in 2020/21). BBC News had a stronger presence on YouTube this year, posting 60% more videos than in the previous financial year; the total number of UK views of those videos has doubled since last year. 

We note the BBC’s plan to have nightly news bulletins, tailored to the interests of young people and presented by young people on the broadcast BBC Three channel which we have agreed it can relaunch

We note from our research that the BBC website/app and BBC radio both perform better in terms of perceptions of impartiality than BBC TV: 65% of BBC website/app regular news users rated it highly, and 61% of BBC radio regular news users rated it highly. The BBC website/app also saw its performance on impartiality improve compared to last year. 

There has also been a significant reduction in total news and current affairs spend from £344m to £294m this year, with spend on this content for the nations and regions falling by a larger proportion than network spend.

In the current reporting period we have not found any BBC content to be in breach of the due impartiality or due accuracy requirements of the Code.