The case against the existing format and for devolved news is made here. If you support it would you do your best to influence the Governors and public opinion formers by writing of your concerns.
Letters should reach the BBC before the next Governors' meeting on 10th December
They should be sent to Sir Christopher with a copy to Rev Norman Drummond at the address given below
The more letters to the Press the better
Letters should make in the first point below plus any others you think appropriate:
| Write
to: |
Copy to: |
| Sir Christopher Bland Chairman British Broadcasting Corporation Broadcasting House London W1A 1AA |
Rev Norman Drummond National Governor for Scotland BBC Scotland Broadcasting House Queen Margaret Drive Glasgow G12 8DG |
The proposal by BBC Scotland that the two part format for early evening news is replaced by a single integrated programme has revealed an astonishing degree of ignorance among some of our politicians about the limitations of the current service. Indeed a Downing Street spokesman, was reported to have said there is nothing wrong with the present arrangements. The reality is that the faults are manifold and longstanding.
Back in 1987, John Pollock, General Secretary of the Educational Institute of Scotland, and I watched from the gallery of the BBC News studio in London as the Six O'Clock News was broadcast to Britain. There was something very strange about it. Not once did the bulletin mention that Scotland's schools were closed by a teachers' strike led by my companion. Instead a refinery fire in Lyons and a whimsical item from New York were deemed editorially more important. Afterwards the producer explained with brutal honesty that a school strike affecting five million people around Southampton would have been reported because it spoke to more of the audience.
BBC London has difficulty reflecting Scotland. Usually the format stumbles over mainstream items like health, education and law, all different in Scotland, but a spy trial in Edinburgh needs to be moved to the Old Bailey and a trawler has to sink off Beachy Head to be certain of making National News. It took a riot in a court in Reading to force the Poll tax to the top of the bulletins. Only 1% of the items in The Six O'Clock News will come from Scotland and some will be devoted to reinforcing London's tartan view of Scotland.
It is small wonder that the rest of Britain has so little understanding of Scotland. When a BBC Governor revealed that she did not know Scotland had a separate education system is that her fault or is the picture BBC television news paints of Britain incomplete?
Practical problems occur on a daily basis. London covers a Scottish item so briefly that it has to be repeated in Reporting Scotland at greater length, or it may drop an item from the bulletin so late in the day that it cannot be reinstated in Reporting Scotland and is not reported at all. London may lead the bulletin with a major announcement say by Frank Dobson on health directly affecting only viewers in England and Wales while ignoring a fishing issue from Brussels vital to Scotland.
When the economic, social welfare or health agenda is covered how relevant does it feel to a Scottish audience when the filmed examples are invariably taken from the south east of England?
Switchboards and surveys tell the same tale: the audience in Scotland are irritated by these lapses and less supportive of the BBC than the rest of Britain. A result that weakens the oft repeated BBC claim that it binds the nation together. Perhaps the most revealing reaction comes from English people newly posted to Scotland for, within a few months, they will robustly criticise the disenfranchisement of Scotland by BBC London News.
These contradictions are insoluble in the current format. As the Producer all those years ago saw making the programme more appealing to Scots risks alienating the rest of the audience.
The proposal by the Governors to include more Scottish and Welsh and Westminster news to the current Six O'clock News will be a poor substitute for all viewers - and a turn off.
For many years a solution along the lines now proposed was resisted by London as technically impractical despite contrary evidence from broadcasters in American cities. The rapid advances of recent years have removed this objection putting the BBC in the awkward position of improving its journalism with technical innovation on every front except Scotland.
The new bulletin might reduce the length of the Frank Dobson story and give it a Scottish context explaining its relevance to the viewer. Then there would be room for the fishing story from Brussels. It is the editing that changes, not the reporters. Gavin Esler would still come from Washington because all this news is already flowing into London. But the choice of what is shown and the emphasis given would become a Scottish choice. This is not Reporting Scotland writ large. It is a new programme for an new Scotland.
The objections that Scotland does not have the skill or enough news to make an hour long programme can be brushed aside. The seam that provided Naughtie, Wark and Mair has not been exhausted and the editors at BBC Scotland instead of working in a creative straitjacket will at last be allowed to share the world class news resources of the BBC in a new editorial partnership with London. To protect its brand, the BBC will ensure the new programme is made to the highest standards. The result will be a massive improvement in the journalistic outcome for Scotland.
The integrated Six O'clock News is long overdue and not dependent on devolution. But devolution, by moving 60% of MPs' mailbags from Westminster to Edinburgh, will break the back of the present format and convince even those politicians who take a minimalist view of devolution that the merit of the case is journalistic not nationalistic
The Governors of the BBC may take some account of politicians but I hope greater weight will be given to its own Broadcasting Council for Scotland and the audience here. The Governors should set aside their own centralist instincts and usher in a new era of news reporting in Scotland thus ensuring that the BBC's commitment to the highest standards of journalism prevail throughout the Corporation.
Now that a Scottish Parliament has arrived the democratic argument can no longer be ignored. In the modern Broadcasting, particularly on television has become the most important way for democratic governments to consult and achieve consent for its actions. The Scottish Parliament will be spending more than half of Scotland's taxes and making most of the decisions on home policy. That Scotland should continue to report in the same way as East Anglia is obviously inappropriate to the scale and aspirations of such a major constitutional reform.
The BBC runs no risk of being ahead of opinion in Scotland. It could for the first time catch up
24.11.98.