Official Report 724KB pdf
Welcome back, everyone. Our next item is to take evidence from the BBC. I welcome our colleague Jackie Baillie MSP, who is joining us for this session.
From BBC Scotland, we are joined, not for the first time, by Hayley Valentine, director, and Luke McCullough, head of corporate affairs and corporate affairs director of nations. We welcome for the first time to the committee Rhodri Talfan Davies, the BBC’s director of nations. A warm welcome to you all.
I will invite Ms Valentine to make a short opening statement before we move to questions from our members.
Good morning, everyone, and thank you so much for the invitation to speak to you today. I understand that you want to talk about our drama investment strategy, and about my priorities, now that I am six months into the post. As you know, I came to the committee in January, when I had been in the post for only a few weeks.
First, let me address the decision to end “River City” next year—to commission it for only one more year. That decision was not taken lightly, as you can imagine. None of these decisions are. It was an editorial decision based on changing viewing habits and on audiences moving away from long-running dramas to high-impact, short-run drama series, and we must deliver what the audiences want to watch.
As you know, £9 million is currently invested in “River City”, and we are choosing for editorial reasons to invest that money differently. We have announced three new series, “Counsels”, “Grams” and “The Young Team”, which we might talk about a bit more later, but that is just the start. The total investment in BBC drama from Scotland is expected to rise to £95 million over the next three years. That £95 million of BBC money will leverage significant third-party investment and will see Scotland and Scotland’s stories increasingly represented on the global stage as well as at home.
We are expecting to deliver six scripted series a year across drama and comedy. That might be slightly more one year or slightly fewer the next because of the way that drama schedules sometimes work. Some of those will be network returners—we have talked about “Shetland” and “Vigil” coming back. Some of those will be those new commissions such as “Counsels”, “Grams” and “The Young Team”. To be absolutely clear, we hope that our new commissions might also become returners and enjoy that annual success. Let us look at “Shetland” as a model—it is currently filming its 10th season.
10:15As I said, when I was last before the committee, I was new in post. I am now six months into the role and I am keen to tell you a little bit more about my priorities. I really want to build that relationship with audiences in Scotland. We are an audience-focused broadcaster: serving audiences is core to our mission and a key factor in all the decisions that we make. I want to maximise content from Scotland and representation of Scotland for all of our audiences and all of their diversity.
It is also important to me that we make BBC Scotland the best possible place to work in. We can do that by creating ambitious, bold and distinctive content; by seeking collaborations and partnerships with internal partners and external partners at home and across the world; and by being laser focused on the audience whom we are trying to reach and serve with content that they want in a way that they want to consume it. We have to respond to our audience. When they change their habits, we need to change to meet them.
That is the context in which we make these decisions. As I said, they are not easy decisions—we totally understand that—but, in this changing and competitive media landscape, we need to commit to creative renewal in order to deliver for all of our audiences. Thank you.
I will ask a quick question to start us off. The Scottish Government is absolutely committed to the fair work agenda and is worried about precarious working practices. How will the BBC, in taking that new direction, ensure that it meets its commitments and its responsibilities to employees and those who are involved in production?
That does not change any of those fair working practices. We will hire people as we do now. We hire a large number of people in Scotland on permanent staff contracts, more on the production PSB side of things, and we commission content from the external market—from the independent sector—and we expect companies to comply with those fair working practices, too.
None of the changes in the way that we are moving and the direction that we are going in will change the way in which we operate and our commitment to fair working practices.
Thank you. I will move to questions from committee members. I will bring in Mr Bibby first and then Mr Stewart.
I have said before that it is not for politicians to make editorial decisions at the BBC, either at a UK or at a Scotland level, but we have questions on value for money, about the BBC meeting its objectives, about fair work and about ensuring Scotland’s TV and film sector is properly invested in.
On the issue of value for money, you mentioned “River City” has an annual budget of £9 million. I understand £1 million of that goes back into BBC Scotland as charges for the production being on the site and for using the studios. It produces 66 30-minute episodes a year with the remaining £8 million, which works out at around £122,000 for each episode. All that is spent in Scotland. “River City”, therefore, costs significantly less to produce than the vast majority of TV dramas. Is that correct?
Certainly, the cost of drama is going up, so the high-impact drama that we are talking about will be more expensive than that. However, that will reach much bigger audiences.
I did not take the decision on “River City” lightly. I thought about the consequences for cast, crew and people who are impacted by the decision—of course I did. However, we have to put the needs of our audience first. The audience for “River City” has declined significantly over the past five years, which means that the cost per viewer is much higher than it was.
In addition, the cost of producing the show has gone up. As you will know, we reduced the number of episodes because we could not make the same number of episodes for the budget. Yes, the new dramas will absolutely cost more to make, but we expect them to deliver much bigger audiences than “River City” does. In terms of value for money for the audience, I am afraid that “River City” did not pass that test for us any longer. We really hope that the new dramas will.
Let us look at the dramas that we currently make. “Shetland”, for example, delivers an audience of about 700,000 in Scotland and about 7 million or 8 million across the UK. “River City” is delivering 200,000. “Granite Harbour” is delivering 500,000, and programmes such as “Rebus” and the other dramas that we make are delivering much higher numbers. Therefore, they are more value for money for our audience.
In terms of the number of hours produced, though, “River City”, with its 66 half-hour episodes a year, produces 33 hours. My understanding is that the three new shows, “Grams” “Counsels” and “The Young Team”, will produce only 18 hours of television. “River City” costs significantly less but delivers significantly more content. With the new shows, there will be 15 fewer hours compared with what is currently provided by “River City”.
That is true. Actually, it will be 20 hours across the three new shows, initially—eight episodes of “Counsels” and six of the other two shows that we have announced.
I will make a couple of points. I just do not think that our audience judge us on volume. They do not go to the iPlayer and say, “There is not enough stuff”. They judge us on quality. They come because it is something that they want to watch. The argument that we should make more hours of content that the audience is not consuming in large numbers does not really stack up.
We know that we need to make content that will make the audience think that we are value for money and that the licence fee is value for money. If we go down to 20 hours of the new dramas, as I said, they are not the end of the story—they are the beginning of the story and we have more coming down the track. That is a massive investment in drama in Scotland. We will increase the amount of money that the BBC puts in and we will also get third-party investment. Volume is not the measure that we are looking at, primarily. We are looking at value for money for audiences and, crucially, at what they want to watch.
Volume is an issue. I agree with you that quality is an issue as well. “River City” is a quality product—it won the Royal Television Society Scotland awards in 2023.
We heard from the cast and Equity last week. Part of the problem that we have is that the BBC has not done enough to market the programme, it has moved around different slots and there has not been enough trailing of episodes. Do you not think that the BBC has a good product and that you could do more to sell it? Linear television viewing figures are declining more generally, but could you not ensure that “River City” gets the support and the marketing that it needs?
Look, I am not disputing that “River City” is a quality product. I like it. However, I do not make programmes for me; I make programmes for the audience.
On marketing, before we had the BBC Scotland channel, “River City” was on BBC One only and was occasionally moved around the schedule. When we launched the channel, we were able to put “River City” where it currently is, which is twice a week in a fixed slot on the channel and twice a week on BBC One on alternate nights—that is, it is on BBC Scotland on Mondays and Wednesdays and it is on BBC One Scotland on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Occasionally, because of—I do not know—live news events it gets moved around on BBC One, but that does not happen terribly often. We also drop it on iPlayer on Monday morning at 6 o’clock. As we have heard, audiences are increasingly consuming our content digitally and it is available for them there as well.
I might let Luke McCullough pick up on the promotion of “River City”, because it is his department more than mine that looks at that. We do promote “River City”. It has three dedicated social media feeds for fans. No other programme has that. We promote new series and when it is coming back. We also promote storylines and we promote cliffhangers. We give it promotion like we do our other products.
It is not that we have been ignoring “River City” and that is why the audience is not watching it. The audience has every opportunity to see it. It is in a fixed slot on two channels. It is on BBC One as well as on the channel, and we promote it.
The programme also comes up on people’s recommendations on iPlayer. If people have watched one drama from Scotland, the iPlayer algorithm will recommend “River City” to them. They are just not watching it when they find it.
As Hayley Valentine said, we have three different social media accounts to support the programme. No other BBC Scotland drama has ever had that support. Those accounts exist both when the programme is on air and when it is off air. When it is taking its breaks, those social media accounts are still engaging with fans of the programme and trying to keep them interested. I am not sure what more we could have done.
I am not sure that I have seen as much of the marketing as has been suggested.
Ms Valentine, you said that you do not just make programmes for yourself; you make them for the audience. You will be aware that the BBC charter talks about the need
“to reflect, represent and serve the diverse communities of all of the United Kingdom’s nations and regions and, in doing so, support the creative economy across the United Kingdom.”
In the earlier evidence session, we heard from Ofcom about the need for the BBC to do more to engage with working-class audiences. How does scrapping a working-class drama and working-class voices help build support and audience reach for working-class people?
We are aware of the challenge in relation to lower socioeconomic groups and, indeed, younger people consuming the BBC. We think about that in our commissioning decisions all the time. As I say, we are here to make programmes that people want to watch. We are here to make sure that the universality of the BBC applies to everyone.
Of the new dramas that we have commissioned, one is set in Springburn. It is a comic thriller about a working-class community and features working-class characters. It is written by a writer who is based in Springburn and has been his whole life. Another is about knife crime and gangs and the friendships, agency and hope that comes from those experiences. That is also set in the west of Scotland, in North Lanarkshire. The third one, “Counsels”, is about young lawyers making their way in the scene in Glasgow. Education is free in Scotland—anyone can be a lawyer. All these dramas will have working-class characters. We are aware that we need to make programmes for all our audiences.
May I add to that? The categorisation of soap operas as being for working-class audiences is not evidenced by the data. Soap operas can draw audiences from all sorts of backgrounds.
I would also make the point that the dramas that Hayley Valentine has already mentioned—“Granite Harbour”, “Vigil” and “Shetland”—all attract significantly more working-class audiences than “River City” does. It is true that “River City” has a more working-class skew in the audience that it attracts, but it is a much smaller audience. We need to be careful that we do not see soap operas just as a vehicle for so-called working-class audiences. A lot of our drama portfolio works harder in reaching working-class audiences than “River City” is able to do. That is not a criticism of “River City”; it is a reflection that soap operas generally have been squeezed by changing audience behaviour.
I accept that different people will watch different programmes, but this is a soap about a working-class community with working-class voices. I very much welcome more investment in production in Scotland in different areas, but I find it hard to see how that will replicate what exists with “River City”.
In terms of the fair work agenda, you mentioned, Ms Valentine, making sure that the BBC was the best possible place to work. There has been a lot of anger from the cast and crew about the BBC’s decisions around the ending of “River City”. You mentioned that it was an editorial decision, but the cast and crew were told that there was no option to renew the lease for the site and that that was instrumental in ending “River City”.
To be clear, it was an editorial decision. Clearly, we had a lease at Dumbarton, but that is a distraction. This was an editorial decision. I ask Luke McCullogh whether he wants to pick up on the detail.
Yes. The cast and crew were told in person by BBC Scotland’s Louise Thornton, our head of commissioning, who has appeared at this committee before. It was important that BBC Scotland joined the cast and crew to share the decision. It has not always been the case when programmes have been decommissioned by the BBC that the BBC has talked with the cast and crew, but we were clear that that was the right thing to do. Louise explained her decision and, right at the top, she said that it was about changing audience habits, which is exactly what Hayley Valentine has said.
Was the lease mentioned in that meeting? Quite probably—I was not at it. However, there is no viable option for us to extend that lease for a bucketload of reasons, which are commercial matters between the BBC and the landlord. The main reason why the lease was mentioned in the meeting is to do with the timing. We did not choose to end “River City” now; no more “River City” was commissioned at all at the point at which we decided what was happening with it. However, we decided to run for an additional year, which would tie in with the end of the lease. The lease ends next year, and that is the relevance of why we said that to the cast.
The other point to make is that the BBC is a big organisation and regularly deals with lots of big-ticket commissions. Had we wanted to continue the series, we could have sorted the issue. You can relocate, or you can discuss it with the current landlord—there are ways of making the drama work. However, it comes back to what Hayley Valentine said right at the outset. The first decision is whether we want to continue or whether we want to pursue other projects. The decision in this case was that we saw other projects that we thought we should invest in creatively.
The cast and crew were not just told that the lease was coming to an end; they were told that it was coming to an end and that there was no option to renew it. That is very different.
We cannot get into commercial discussions between the BBC and the landlord, but we are pretty clear—
I am talking about discussions between the cast and the BBC.
—there is no viable option for us to extend the lease at the moment. There are issues on the site. The cast are aware of them, because we wrote to them last year to explain, for example, the presence of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete on the site. The BBC would not renew leases on sites with RAAC. There is no viable option for us on that site at the moment but, as Rhodri Talfan Davies has said, had the BBC wished to continue making “River City”—if it was the right thing for the audience and if it was attracting more audience than it is—we would have found a way to make it.
10:30
My colleague Jackie Baillie contacted the owner of the site, who confirmed that they were surprised by the BBC’s decision to end the lease. The cast were told there was no option to renew the lease. Why were they told something that was categorically untrue?
There is no viable option for the BBC to renew that lease given the state of the site at the moment, but I cannot go further than that because it is a commercial discussion between the BBC and the landlord. The landlord has not come to us and said that anything that we have said is out of line with the discussions that it has had with the BBC. I am confident that there was no viable option to renew the lease.
However, I would stress again the reason to end “River City” had nothing to do with the lease. The timing of when we are drawing it to a close ties in with the end of the lease, but the reason that we have ended “River City” is because, on average, it is getting 200,000 people per episode watching it when every other BBC Scotland drama that we make gets more than double that figure as a minimum.
I am conscious of time. I will come back to you if we have more time, Mr Bibby.
Sure.
Mr Adam, you wanted to come in. Do you have a supplementary question?
I have a couple, if that is okay.
Good morning. It will come as no shock to you that I welcome the £65 million for drama over the next three years, but why can we not have both? There is no way that you will replace a long-term serialised drama with six episodes of three shows. It will not be the same level of work or the same guarantee of work. We heard about that from members of the cast and technical staff. You will not create new technical staff and give writers and actors give their first opportunity. It just will not have the same effect.
Yes, television is changing, but we are not having this conversation about “EastEnders”, and its ratings have tanked over time. Why does it always seem to be that we in Scotland are the ones impacted? Why can we not have both? People will not be having this conversation at the BBC down in London.
I sat here in January and made it clear that, for everything that we want to do that is new, we have to stop doing something. We know the situation with finances and the BBC. I do not have the money to do everything that I want to do. I would like to do a million things that are not possible. I have to make difficult decisions.
This decision, as I say, was made because the audience figures are not performing for us in the way that we need them to.
Things will not be exactly the same. As I say, fewer episodes and short-run dramas are what the audience is asking us to do. That is what the audience is showing us that they want us to do.
The “EastEnders” question is slightly different. It is made for a UK audience. Actually, its audiences are not tanking; it is slightly defying gravity at the moment.
“EastEnders” is not the monster that it was back in the day. It has the exact same challenges as a show such as “River City”. People watch it in different ways. You cannot necessarily judge a show on the live figures; there will be more watching on iPlayer and everything else.
Indeed, but “EastEnders” does significantly better in Scotland than “River City” does, both on iPlayer and live. It does better among younger audiences than “River City” does. It does better on geographic reach than “River City” does. We took all that into consideration—of course we did.
On the point about access—
Sorry to interrupt, but does that not give you an example to show that there is a market for a serialised soap opera in Scotland? Maybe relaunching “River City” might be an idea, rather than—
We looked at all the options, I am afraid. We have changed the format of “River City” in terms of the number of episodes per week. We have changed where it is on. We have given the audience the opportunity to access it on iPlayer. I am afraid that that just has not worked. It has had a really good run. When it finishes, it will be 24 years old. That is longer than most long-running series last for. We have given it a really good run, but it is time to do other things.
On the point about access to first jobs, training and so on, these new dramas will have that. There will be a wider range of them and there will be more of a geographic mix, so perhaps there will be access for people around different parts of the country, although, intentionally, these three dramas are based in the same geography as “River City”.
We need to think about making new products that the audience wants more of. “River City” is not the only game in town in terms of access to drama in Scotland. Whether you are an actor, a director, a producer or a trainee, we offer opportunities across a wide range of content. It is not just “River City” that does that for us.
No, I agree with that and I said right at the start that I welcome the investment, but anywhere else in the UK the argument would simply be that you can have both and you can find a way to make that work. I find it difficult that we in Scotland seem to be the ones who have to make sacrifices, whereas elsewhere, the BBC is carrying on business as usual.
I have one other thing to say. This is not a sacrifice. We are reinvesting all this money in Scotland. We are getting additional funding from network and, hopefully—in fact, I know this for a fact in terms of the things we have already announced—additional funding from third parties. This is an increase in the investment. I want to see more money spent on screen in Scotland, not less.
I have one final thing to say before I hand over to Rhodri Talfan Davies, who can talk about the UK picture and “EastEnders” on my behalf. You mentioned long-term jobs—jobs for life. The vast majority of the cast of “River City” are not on long-term contracts. They are contracted year to year. We have only ever commissioned it 12 months at a time. Once, during Covid, we commissioned it for a little bit longer for specific reasons, but we only commission a series at a time. The vast majority of people who work on the show have short-term contracts, like most people who work in this area of the industry, whether they are actors, directors or producers. You do not go into it thinking that you will work on the same project for life.
Twelve months is still a better deal than six episodes.
Can I clarify? Almost all of them are not on 12-month contracts; they are on 12-week contracts. “River City” films for 12 weeks and then they go off and make other stuff. They will appear in pantomime if they are actors. The contracts for the vast majority of people are very short. They will get a 12-week contract to do the work and be off. “River City” films in two 12-week blocks, whereas “Shetland” is currently filming for six months. A lot of these products have a longevity that maybe is not in some of the churn of a soap opera.
Can I make one other point? I will make it quickly. I reiterate that this is a strategy to increase investment and opportunity in drama and comedy in Scotland; it is not about a reduction. On the idea that something is being done to Scotland, this is about a creative opportunity and it is about growth.
Is “River City” being picked on? There is a challenge across all soap operas in the UK. It is true that “EastEnders” is one of the big beasts. Its audience in Scotland is 20 per cent or 30 per cent higher than the audience for “River City”. However, we have seen the end of “Doctors”, which was produced in the west midlands, and we have seen the end of “Holby City”, which was filmed in Elstree in London. The pattern reflects a changing audience habit.
I will ask you some questions about Scottish production at the moment. The change in approach to commissioning acknowledges that the BBC has underdelivered for Scotland over at least the last 10 years—people have that opinion. What resources are you offering for commissioning? Will the BBC now look at Scotland’s production companies, writers, directors and crews to ensure that the corporation’s obligation for Scottish production is and continues to be met?
I do not recognise the underdelivering that you mentioned. We exceed our quotas for network production made in Scotland and, as you know, we have our own Scottish budget. We spend a lot of money on co-productions with network, which we commission and deliver for both Scottish audiences and broader audiences. We spend a lot of money on programmes that are specifically for Scottish audiences.
In particular, we got a big investment for the launch of the BBC Scotland channel, and since that stage we have been making a lot more content that reflects the lives of people in Scotland back to themselves and out to broader audiences. I want to expand that. I want more of our money to be spent on portrayal and on representation of all Scotland; I want Scottish audiences to see themselves reflected back and for the Scottish story to be told more widely—across the UK and beyond. I do not think that we are underdelivering, but do not get me wrong, I am ambitious for more.
Could you repeat the second half of your question?
It was about ensuring that you look first at the Scottish production companies and their crews, writers and directors to make sure that they get the opportunities.
Yes. The vast majority of the commissions that we have made in the past year, 90-odd per cent, have been to Scottish companies—it is companies that are based here that have done the work. If you look at the examples of the dramas that we have commissioned, the vast majority of the talent that we hire—the production talent, the on-screen talent and the writing talent—is all Scottish. Our ambition is to grow the industry in Scotland and grow the sense that someone can be in Scotland and make world-class content.
I do not recognise the underdelivering. We are committed to growing the industry in Scotland so that there is a brilliant creative sector and brilliant opportunities for people who work here, through which we grow the economy and the quality of the content that we make so that Scotland feels that the BBC is delivering for it. Rhodri Talfan Davies will probably want to pick up on that.
You have covered everything.
I challenge the point about underdelivery. The BBC as an organisation invests the best part of £300 million a year in Scotland. To put that into some context, that is three times more than Channel 4, Channel 5, ITV and STV combined. It is an extraordinary level of investment into Scotland.
The point of the changes that we announced last week is that we think that we can go further. We can give you more assurance and we can give the sector more assurance that our priority is that all our big network productions deliver on employing and using local talent across Scotland and spending the vast majority of their production budgets here in Scotland. It is about going further.
As you heard from Ofcom earlier, we want to set a standard that goes beyond the current Ofcom rules. It is the right thing for the BBC to do to give everybody confidence that our intent is clear and our ambition is underlined.
It is good to note that you have that aspiration and that ambition.
Can I ask about the commissioners and how they are tasked with providing and selecting new projects for Scotland? How does that come about? Do they meet with drama, culture, comedy and entertainment? How do they select and choose the next opportunities?
You have talked about how you are changing some of the structures and adapting and you have said that you want to see different aspects coming into the sector and greater opportunities. How is that approach and the general fiscal arrangement managed to ensure that you capture the comedy, drama and entertainment for Scotland? How do you ensure that the production opportunities are grasped, kept here and managed effectively to enable Scotland to flourish? That is our ambition and it should be your ambition to achieve that for the corporation and to see where BBC Scotland can go in the future, even with the demands on financial resources and tasking to ensure that you can manage it.
I do not think that you are asking for a completely technical answer. We have 14 commissioners based in Scotland; that is a combination of commissioners who work directly for me, commissioners who work for network looking for Scottish ideas that we can co-commission together, such as “Shetland”, and commissioners who work for our Gaelic services. You will all know already the massive success that we had with the first high-impact Gaelic drama—there have been 1.8 million iPlayer views of that drama so far. It is absolutely mainstream and is winning awards left, right and centre.
Our commissioners are on the ground, here in Scotland. They talk to the sector all the time. We have a strategic briefing this afternoon with 80-odd people coming into Pacific Quay to talk to us about our strategic priorities. It is not a commissioning briefing as such, but it is about strategic priorities so that people know the direction of travel, what the broader BBC is thinking—which is why Rhodri Talfan Davies is part of that briefing this afternoon—and BBC Scotland’s priorities. I know that you are not looking at the technicalities of exactly how it all works.
We are not short of good ideas in Scotland. We know the sector; we know the individuals; we know the companies. We do a lot to grow smaller Scottish companies. We have a small indie fund that is currently supporting four companies on specific projects, but we also work with the bigger companies. We work the full range. People send us ideas all the time. As you can imagine, having more ideas than money is always a mixed place to be.
We also put out specific commissioning briefs. We mentioned earlier that we have issues around younger audiences. We will put out specific briefs saying that we are looking for ideas that will try to attract that audience and ways in which we can reach certain audiences. We look for gaps in what we are doing as well as building on success stories.
We have close relationships in Scotland. It is a close community. We benefit from having all those commissioners on the ground who know what Scottish audiences want; they are across the data but they are also looking for something that we have never done before.
10:45
Since Hayley Valentine arrived as director, she has driven the conversation around, first, how we ensure that the money spent in Scotland works for Scotland and Scottish talent and, secondly, the creative ambition. Part of that creative ambition is things like securing the men’s internationals and putting the footie back on the Beeb, which has been a huge win in Scotland. Part of that ambition is looking at how BBC Scotland and the BBC network teams come together to drive—as you were talking about with Ofcom—an authentic portrayal of Scotland. Under Hayley’s leadership, we have created a framework for that, which will mean that at least 30 to 40 per cent of network expenditure in Scotland in the coming years will deliver genuine, authentic portrayal. That is important. The investment numbers are good and we have made real progress, but we want to demonstrate—and I know that Hayley is ambitious to demonstrate this too—that we can deliver creatively in reflecting Scotland on the screen.
Good morning. Sorry, not sorry: I will come back to “River City” for a couple of questions first but then I will move on to the recent announcement on regional production.
You have said clearly that ending “River City” was an editorial decision and I accept that that was the motivating factor, but one thing that has left a bad taste in the mouth for the people who received that distressing news was their strong perception that they had been misinformed that the landlord wanted to sell the site for housing. If we can tie that off and put that issue to rest, I would welcome that. Can you confirm whether the “River City” team were told that? If they were not told that, how has the perception arisen that they were misled?
Again, I do not know exactly what was said in that meeting, but I know that I was on the set of “River City” about three weeks before we announced the decommissioning of it. While I was there, about three people said to me, “Have you heard that the landlord wants to sell the place when the lease ends and build houses on it?” I said, “I had not heard that, actually”. It was very much being spoken about openly in and around the set.
If our commissioners were asked about that and if they were asked to speculate, I do not doubt that they reflected that speculation back. However, I have no clear information that the landlord wants to sell the land for housing. As Mr Bibby mentioned earlier, the landlord has said that he would have been quite happy to extend the lease, but—
Are you saying that the BBC was not the source of that perception?
As I said, three weeks before the briefing I was asked by three people on the set about that. I do not know what the source of that perception was.
I am not asking if you personally were responsible for where that suggestion came from.
I was absolutely personally not.
Was the BBC responsible for that?
It was already being discussed well before the commissioning briefing because I experienced that myself. I do not believe that the BBC was the source because, three weeks prior to it, it was being openly discussed.
It still feels as though there is quite a lot of confusion about where that came from and the way it has been handled is extremely unfortunate. If there is any suggestion that anybody at “River City” was told something that was not true by the BBC, you should investigate that seriously.
I move on to the impact of the decision. Hayley Valentine clearly set out the issue of making sure that the BBC is producing output that people want to watch. Even the folk at “River City” understand that there are changing tastes. They do not have their heads in the sand. However, the BBC needs to do another thing beyond producing content that people want to watch—it also needs to create the ecosystem for the industry, including training opportunities and first job opportunities, on a scale that justifies it. One reason why I think that there should be a broadcaster like the BBC—a large, dominant, publicly funded broadcaster—is to create that ecosystem, because nobody else will do it.
Can you confirm that you do not expect the new six and eight-part productions to create the same level and scale of career opportunities and training opportunities as “River City”? How do you intend to replace that for the longer term so that the BBC is making that permanent, on-going investment in opportunities that mean that in 10, 20 and 30 years we will have an increasing and diverse cohort of folk working in the industry?
That is a good challenge because the work that “River City” has done, particularly around training, has been exemplary. We thought long and hard about what that would look like going forward in a different ecosystem that does not have a long-running drama in the mix.
The broader thing to say is that the BBC provides a lot of training opportunities that are not connected to “River City”. It is not the only game in town. We do a lot of training across our existing projects, some of which I have mentioned today. At the moment, the BBC has 50-odd apprenticeships. When I came to the committee previously there were 60. There is a bit of flux because some people have graduated and the new ones start in September. We support a lot of training in the BBC across all our projects. It is built into most of the work that we do. Apprenticeships are a big part of what we do.
On that diversity piece, “River City” has brought people in from a wide range of backgrounds, as we have talked about. We monitor all our training across our own diversity targets. Across the piece, the BBC is a world leader on diversity targets. We will continue that, particularly around the socioeconomic targets, because we know that that is where “River City” has done some good work.
We are building a framework around all the new projects where we will put training in place across all of them. You will not be surprised to hear that I do not have all the details for you today because these projects are not up and running yet. None of it is like for like. We have talked about the number of hours and training, and none of it is exactly like for like, of course. However, we are committed to creating quality opportunities to bring people into the industry, whether that is bringing in people in their first role on or off screen or bringing in people at mid-level, for example, shadow directing in a project that is bigger than they might have worked on before.
The truth is that we need the training, like the work itself, to match the way that the industry is going. Training a high number of people to work on soap operas only will not deliver for us into the future and will not deliver for the trainees. In the end, having the opportunity to work on a project like a high-impact drama, as a trainee at the bottom level or your first role or mid-career, and put that on your CV is probably more valuable.
I will not say that I know that the opportunities will be exactly like for like either in terms of volume or across the year or whatever, but I will say that we are working hard on it. I would be happy to come back to the committee in the autumn or whenever I am next asked when we should have more detail, because some of the projects will be up and running by then.
I appreciate that it will not always be a like-for-like replacement, but there will be a strong expectation from the committee and from others that you are able to demonstrate that what is being created afresh will be at least as valuable in terms of those new opportunities as what you have decided to close.
Yes. I am happy to take that challenge. As I say, I do not have all the facts and figures yet because we are working on that framework. One of the projects starts in August, one starts in February and one starts later next year. We are working on the training as we develop the projects. We have not cast or crewed those shows yet. However, we are committed to that training. I would like there to be more working-class development in BBC Scotland, not less, as a result of this.
I will move on to the recent announcement about qualifying criteria for regional production. There has been a broad welcome for that. Would you accept that it is, in a sense, an admission that the situation has been not always wholly honest in the past? For example, a report from Screen Scotland last year showed that of the top 15 “Scottish” producers by hours commissioned, only five were based in Scotland—two thirds of them were headquartered in London. Only two of the 11 suppliers mainly used by the BBC in that list were companies formed and headquartered in Scotland.
Is it fair to say that the way in which those issues have been handled in the past has failed to create the level of benefit and investment in a broadcasting and production ecosystem in Scotland that there could have been and that we therefore have to catch up a bit, which is why the changes are long overdue?
You will not be surprised to hear that that is not how I see things. It is an admission that we can do even better than we are doing today and that we can give even more clarity about our commitment to drive expenditure in the local economy and to drive expenditure with local skills and craft.
We have been consistently above our target for network expenditure in Scotland for many years. As I said, we make a £300 million investment every year in Scotland. However, when we were looking at the Ofcom criteria, which we follow along with all the other public service broadcasters in the UK, our view—and it is a conversation that Hayley Valentine and I have had over many months—is that we could do even better. We could do that by making sure that, in future, when we look at fresh network commissions, our expectation is that every production will meet at least two of the three Ofcom criteria and that a qualification on base only, which is allowed under the Ofcom rules, is not where the BBC wants to land. The regulatory structure has evolved. Ofcom has its view on how it wants to set it out and it is our regulator, but our view is that we can do even better.
Can I pick up on your original question around those numbers? We are conflating two things, which is easily done. In relation to the Oliver & Ohlbaum and Screen Scotland report, we talked about companies having Scottish headquarters. We welcome working with companies that are based in Scotland, that are committed to growth in Scotland and that want to tell Scotland’s stories. Of course we are keen to promote companies that are Scottish root and branch. The small indie fund demonstrates that we want to grow those businesses. However, what we are really after are the best ideas. We will not discriminate against companies because they have headquarters elsewhere. If you are highly successful and you are bought out for whatever reason—because you need or want to be—by a company with headquarters elsewhere, wherever that might be, it does not change our relationship with you.
I get the point, but part of the BBC’s purpose and value is to shape that landscape; it is not just to say, “We want to get the best ideas so we’ll go to a company that is based in London to do it”, but to say, “We want the best ideas to be coming from companies based here”. That is what you have the opportunity to grow.
Do you expect those numbers to be reversed as a result of the changes, such that two thirds of companies will be based here and occasionally you will use one that is based in London?
This is what I mean about conflating the issues. We are not talking about things that are made here. By that definition, “River City” has London headquarters; “Shetland” has London headquarters; “Landward” has London headquarters; “Debate Night” has London headquarters. We all know that those are highly successful properly Scottish projects that are made here for audiences in Scotland.
I want our content to be made here. I want people to have successful, ambitious careers here and not to have to go elsewhere to find success. Of course that is what I want. All I am saying is that the fact that a company is part of a bigger company elsewhere for whatever reason—we know that the industry is precarious and there are many good reasons why a company might accept an offer to be bought by a bigger multinational or UK-based company—that does not mean that the work that it does for us is less valuable.
But you expect the numbers to change to some extent as a result of the decision that was announced last week?
We have only a small handful of productions that do not already qualify on two of the Ofcom criteria in Scotland, and as a result of the changes that we have announced, we expect that number to get even smaller. That will mean that more money is being spent on the ground in Scotland and it will mean that more professionals in the industry in Scotland are employed on those productions.
It is a more modest change perhaps, then?
It is not about the ownership structures of the indies. What is important is opportunity on the ground and spend on the ground.
I go back to something that you heard from Ofcom earlier. My view is that it is important not to disincentivise other organisations from wanting to do business in Scotland. The key thing for the sector is a mixed ecology of companies and genuine opportunity. Ownership structures are a distraction from the successful growth of the sector.
I could probably go further on that point for quite some time, but I am aware of time. We will have to come back to that as we see the effect of the decision.
We are very tight for time, and I still have three members—and possibly Mr Bibby—to come in.
You are right, convener; we do not have a lot of time. Let me get to the point. The BBC has begun its own consultation on the BBC charter renewal, “Our BBC, Our Future”, which is not the Government-sponsored one. What are you doing to engage with the viewers in Scotland specifically to get their direct feedback as part of the consultation?
The consultation is across the UK, as you know. You may have seen that we have specific adverts going out in Scotland with Scottish talent on them to attract people to that consultation, but the consultation is going out to audiences in Scotland in the same way that it is going out to audiences across the UK. We will receive that information and, as I said in January, we will be led by what the audience tells us.
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How will you measure the success of the engagement that you plan in Scotland?
We look at what people tell us.
I mean in terms of reach.
We hope that as many people as possible engage with the consultation. I do not know whether any of you have received it, but it is being pushed out there. Somebody said to me recently, “Tim Davie wrote to me—very nice.” We are writing to a lot of people to ask them to engage with us, and we hope that as many people as possible do. There is a universality issue around the BBC and we hope that we get as many responses as possible so that our decision making can be based on the largest number of voices.
When we undertook an engagement during the last charter process, the number of written responses from the public in Scotland was around 5,000 to 10,000, and I think that we will easily surpass that this time. Alongside the consultation, we will do representative research so that we get the fullest possible picture in Scotland.
Part of the charter renewal process concerns the model by which the BBC is funded. Currently, the number of people who are not paying their TV licence is rising. The number looks like it is increasing exponentially, particularly among younger people and other demographics. What is the BBC’s response to that? Do you expect funding to be a crucial part of the review of the charter?
I have two things on that point. There is not exponential growth in evasion or unwillingness to pay the licence fee. In fact, last year we saw the rate of decline slow. We are still losing some people, but that rate of decline has slowed and significantly more than 20 million households in the UK pay the licence fee.
The number in Scotland is pretty high compared to the rest of the United Kingdom—and that is growing.
There is no doubt that it is a little higher in Scotland, and it is growing across the UK. I am saying that, with regard to the rate of decline of the number of people paying the licence fee, the picture last year was better than it was the year before.
Funding will be a critical dimension of the charter review. There are three fundamental issues. The first is how we protect the independence of the BBC, and the second is ensuring that we have a sustainable funding model, and we are pretty open minded about that. Clearly, there will be engagement with the UK Government on that and discussions, no doubt, with the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government.
The essential question is whether we believe as a society that a continued large-scale public intervention in the media space is the right thing for this country and for these four nations. That is the starting point. If we believe that, I believe that the right funding solution will follow that.
The case for the BBC—whether that is in relation to misinformation, as you were discussing with Ofcom, whether it is about supporting creativity across the whole of the UK, or whether it is about communality and bringing people together—is strong and we will be making it as strongly as possible. We will also be looking for support across the sector and across all four nations.
Funding will be critical. We have lost the best part of a £1 billion in real terms over the last 10 to 12 years, and we are in an incredibly competitive landscape, in which we are going up against very well-resourced global competitors. It is critical that we get the right funding settlement.
There are so many aspects to this question that it could almost take a session in its own right. I do not have the time, unfortunately. I would also like to ask you about how you are engaging younger audiences because, as I think the BBC acknowledges, it is losing under-35s.
Across all the public service broadcasters that is the biggest strategic challenge. Younger people’s viewing habits are different and their use of services such as YouTube is growing each year. If public service broadcasting is to thrive in the next decade, we have to address that issue head on.
How we are engaging on the charter is one thing. The truth is that all this comes down to what content we make, how we push it out to people and how they receive it.
We are acutely aware of the young people challenge, particularly in Scotland. We were talking about commissioning briefs earlier. One of the commissioning briefs that we put out a couple of years ago was around younger audiences in particular. We made a programme called “The Agency”, which you may or may not have watched. Interestingly, it did not do massively well on linear television. It was designed for normal young women, basically.
Not my demographic.
Probably not your demographic. When we put it out on linear, it did nothing. When put it out on iPlayer, it went through the roof. We are now on series 2 or 3 and we won a BAFTA for it last year. We are thinking about how we attract younger audiences and, once we have them, how we keep them.
In the earlier session, you talked about misinformation. We are thinking about how we deliver our news. We deliver our news in lots of different ways. As you know, we have just changed how we deliver our news. We have changed our funding model so that we can launch new products. We have just launched vertical video news, because we know that that is how young people receive their news.
This is a constant conversation. We can talk about the BBC making the case for younger audiences, but my strong belief is that the biggest piece of work that we do is on screen, on air, on radio and on digital. We attract those audiences by making the right content for them.
The right content is a good lead-in to my last question. I am mindful of time and I will be quick, convener. My question is about the launch of “Scotcast”. Since you were last with us—I know that you are relatively new in your role—you have launched “Scotcast”. What have you learned about offering news content as a podcast? What can you transfer to improve coverage of the Scottish Parliament—which you would expect me to mention?
That is the least surprising question today. “Scotcast” has been an interesting project and I am really proud of it. I like the tone and the style. It is dealing with serious subjects but slightly more informally and, ideally, it is attracting a different audience. It is still new—four or five months into a project is still pretty new.
One interesting thing that we have learned—we should know this but, again, I am not 25—is that people want to watch podcasts more than they want to listen to them, and we get big numbers watching it. We have invested heavily in visualisation at a number of our studios around Scotland, including in Inverness, in Edinburgh, where the studio is being kitted out in the next couple of months, and at a couple of studios in Glasgow. We are making a bespoke podcast studio because we know that—
What about here, in the Parliament?
Upstairs?
Yes.
We are looking at it. We do not have much leeway in what we can do in this building because it is not ours.
It is a short walk to the BBC Edinburgh studio.
I know. It is around the corner.
It is 10 steps up the road.
There is something around the informality or the tone of voice. “Scotcast” also allows us to do subjects in more depth. The accusation around news is that we hit something and then we leave. Giving that time—it is not infinite, but at least 20, 30 or 40 minutes—to a subject is a different way of telling people about things. We know that news is often off-putting because people do not understand the terminology or the headlines. We have learned loads from that project.
That does lend scope to the coverage of the proceedings of Parliament, does it not? It has done a bit of that.
Indeed. It has done a number of stories about the proceedings of Parliament, and in some depth. If you get invited on to “Scotcast”, I recommend that you all say yes because—
I am still waiting for the invitation.
I will have a word.
You have some excellent journalists here—you know that. They are some of your best, and the product or the vehicle that is used to deliver what is happening in this Parliament through the medium of those journalists is critically important to all of us on this committee.
Agreed.
I will bring in Mr Brown.
Rhodri Talfan Davies said that you currently spend around £300 million a year. What proportion of the licence fee raised in Scotland is that?
It is 90-odd per cent, but no more than that.
Would that be unchanged over the last five years?
It has increased over the last five years.
No, it has increased. Five years ago, the percentage was in the 70s or 80s. Luke McCullough has a better memory for numbers than me, but it is now 94 per cent or 95 per cent in the last annual report and accounts.
When the annual report and accounts were presented to the culture committees that came before this one, the BBC spent in Scotland 55 per cent of the licence fee that it raised in Scotland. Last year, it spent in Scotland about 97 per cent of the licence fee raised in Scotland. That number will move. It is tied to transmission times, so the expenditure for something will appear in our accounts in the years when it is transmitted, not the year we spend the money. The figure has moved in a remarkably positive direction, not least because of the discussions that we have had in this Parliament about it.
This committee got figures in 2021 that said it was 90 per cent at that time. Leaving that aside, Mr Kerr raised the point that the tail-off of people willing to pay the licence fee was more pronounced in Scotland than it was elsewhere in the UK. I should say I told this committee two weeks ago that I had just got my licence, having moved into a new property, and then this week I got a letter saying I am being investigated for not having a licence. A strange thing, but there you go.
I will venture some reasons for that difference in the drop-off and I will be interested in your view on them. Some are small things that may seem trivial. First is the almost constant overruns of UK programmes that eat into programmes that people want to tune into in Scotland. Those are usually news programmes, but I can think of an England women’s rugby match that stopped coverage of the early parts of the Scotland-Greece football match. It is irritating when you are waiting for two or three minutes for some little conversation between a couple of presenters on a news programme down south.
The second one relates to news coverage. You do an incredible amount of news coverage in Scotland on devolved issues. You have special investigations and you marry up your radio and TV coverage to cover devolved issues exhaustively. It certainly exhausts me sometimes. You do that all the time. However, when it comes to reserved issues—and it is the position of the BBC that there are two Governments in Scotland—the coverage is completely absent. I have raised this on air, going right back to Gordon Brewer and latterly with Martin Geissler. They both had the same reason, which was that they could not get UK ministers to appear. Important issues such as high speed 2 being cut from Scotland or the overrun on aircraft carriers are not covered by the BBC in Scotland at all and that seems very partial.
The third point is on sports. I mentioned earlier that we talked to Ofcom. I have campaigned since 2007 to have Scotland football matches deemed to be part of the crown jewels, or listed events, and that has not happened. I know that that is not in the gift of the BBC, but when you did eventually get a Scottish match, the production of the programme was appalling. It was late. You missed the early part of the proceedings. There was no commentary at all. You allowed the overrun from the previous game. That was because the programme was on pitch, as was the case for the FA Cup final on Saturday, rather than being studio based.
To me—and certainly going by my mail bag—those are the reasons why people are losing faith in the BBC in Scotland. I would be interested in your views on those points.
Everyone we meet has something to tell us, as you can imagine. This job does not make me short of opinions on things that we do well or less well.
On the politics point, we are committed to covering everything that impacts Scotland. We are not ignoring reserved issues if they impact Scotland—of course not. We cover those things across the UK in our programming as well—
Covering them across the UK is not the point. The issue is about covering them in Scotland. They involve a Government that is active in Scotland and is impacting on Scottish people. You do not cover those things. I can give you 100 examples of things you have not covered—reserved issues that impact directly on people.
We have some specific television programming about Scottish issues. We have expanded the number of news programmes that we make, as you say, and we produce extensive news coverage. We have just launched “News at Seven” and “Scotcast”, and we have three hours of “Good Morning Scotland” in the morning. The point of those programmes is to view the world through a prism of a Scottish audience—the world, the UK and Scotland, probably in reverse order. We are absolutely committed to covering everything that impacts Scottish audiences.
If you have some specific examples I am happy to take them away, but it is clearly our ambition in our news coverage to look at Scotland, the UK and the broader world through the prism of the eyes of the Scottish audience. That is what we try to do. As I say, I am happy to take the specific examples away.
There will always be scheduling issues and overruns. On Saturday we knocked half of the schedule out to cover extra time and penalties for the cup final. That will always be the case and not everyone will be happy with those decisions, but we make those decisions based on what we think are the most important needs. Things will always overrun.
To get people to pay the licence fee, we have to create the programmes and the coverage that people want. Scotland international games are a case in point; I know how important football is to a Scottish audience. It was absolutely worth fighting for those, irrespective of the crown jewels argument, which is not mine to have. Our job is to create the best content. People do not stop paying the licence fee because of things around the edges. Our job is to make sure that we are delivering content that they want to watch, whether that is in the drama sector, the sports sector or the news sector. We are increasingly important in the world of news and I take my responsibilities in that seriously. Those are the arguments that we need to win in order to make the public feel like we are worth paying for.
I should say for the record that, if you had more politicians on your podcasts, I am not sure what that would do for viewing figures.
I could not possibly comment.
I know.
Trust in the BBC is important to parliamentarians, but it is important to us as viewers, too. Let me take you to the “River City” workplace meeting of 18 March, where the clear impression was given to staff that one reason for ending the show was that the site lease would end in 2026, with no option to renew. I have a recording of that meeting and I have a transcript that I am happy to share with the committee. At 3 minutes and 57 seconds, Gavin Smith said:
“The site lease comes to an end next year without the option to renew. This is a clear obstacle and it’s inevitably prompted a decision to be made.”
11:15At 4 minutes and 25 seconds, when he was speaking about the prospect of relocating, Gavin Smith said:
“It would ... mean significant additional investment for rebuilds.”
Counting in the rebuilding of the set was part of the decision to halt “River City”, as it would have inflated the cost. There was no need to rebuild if you could have continued on site.
When she was asked specifically by a member of staff whether it was the landlord’s decision or BBC Scotland’s decision, Louise Thornton said, at 7 minutes and 35 seconds:
“So it’s our understanding that there isn’t an option to renew the lease, that it’s come to an end ... And so when we were looking at all the options, that wasn’t on the table”.
Why did the BBC tell the cast and the crew that the lease could not be renewed? That was clearly not the case—I have spoken to the landlord. Why did the BBC seek to deliberately mislead the cast and the crew of “River City”?
I will start, because I do not recognise that characterisation at all. We have been pretty clear, as we said a few moments ago, that there is no viable option for the BBC to extend the lease at Dumbarton, particularly because of the presence of RAAC on site. We cannot expect the public broadcaster of Scotland to extend a lease in premises where it does not—
Can I deal with that point, which is important? RAAC has been known about on site for more than a year, and nothing has been done—you have carried on with production. It is in an insignificant part of the site, and the position is stable.
This is a red herring. I invite you to address the issue rather than hiding behind RAAC.
I am sorry—I disagree with that. There have been a number of workarounds for RAAC, including having three inspections a day and putting in place temporary roofing. You cannot expect the BBC, as the public broadcaster, to renew a lease where there are defects.
However, the whole thing is a red herring. The timing of the lease relates to when we end “River City”, not the decision to end “River City”. Louise Thornton was quite clear that, because the lease was ending, that was where the focus of her decision was. She is not ending “River City” now; she is ending it in a year’s time, when the lease ends, for audience-related reasons.
Of course, as I said at the beginning, this is not an easy decision. We looked at all the options, including whether we could move somewhere else, temporarily or permanently, because of the issues of rebuild and repair. We looked at everything, but the truth is that, in the end, that would not be value for money for the audience. We do not have enough of an audience to make it value for money for the audience.
That is a different argument, and I would respect that argument if it had been advanced at the meeting on 18 March. Instead, cast and crew members were misled about the basis for the reasoning. In the transcript, the option to remain was not on the table at all—it was not considered.
We were not considering the option to remain because we were not considering staying beyond the end of next year’s series. In remarks that you have not quoted, Louise Thornton was really clear that the prompt for the decision was changing audience habits, which Hayley Valentine has walked us through over the past hour. We cannot keep making something that not enough people are wanting to watch.
No, and indeed that is an argument that you could advance, but I am specifically addressing the fact that you misled cast and crew members. The option to renew the lease was clearly available to you; you chose not to renew, and there were diversionary tactics to blame the landlord. Just fess up to it—just be honest with people.
I am sorry; I do not agree that the option was there to renew the lease. The landlord might have wanted to renew the lease, but that is different from whether the BBC had a viable option to renew it. However, it is a smokescreen. If people discussed the landlord’s intentions, I am completely unsurprised by that because, as I said earlier, I was asked three times, three weeks earlier than that, about the landlord’s intentions. It was an open topic of discussion.
Yes, but where did that come from?
Look—I am a member of Equity. I fully understand how important it is to treat cast and crew with respect. I have been a member of the acting union for more than 20 years. I am not shy of making sure that we communicate with actors properly. I used to earn my living in a freelance capacity, and I understand the fragility of working in that space. I think that the whole story was available to the cast, and it was expressed pretty clearly.
They think that you misled them. They cannot all have got it wrong. Thank you, convener.
Mr Bibby, do you have a final question?
Yes. The issue is not just that cast and crew were misled at the meeting that has been mentioned. There was no consultation with the union or the workers at “River City” before the decision was made; the press release went out at the same time as the meeting took place. The workers have every right to feel angry and betrayed, and they certainly feel angry and betrayed. Given the answers on those points this morning, they will not feel that any less.
It is not just the cast and the crew that have serious concerns about the ending of “River City”. We have also seen letters signed by Ewan McGregor, Brian Cox, Blythe Duff, Lorraine McIntosh, Richard E Grant, Irvine Welsh and hundreds of members of Scotland’s and the UK’s cultural sector who are calling on the BBC to reconsider the decision to end “River City”, particularly because of the impact that it will have on training opportunities that are important to Scotland’s film and TV industry going forward. Do you think that those people, with their wealth of expertise and experience in the creative sector, are wrong to tell you to think again? Given their representations, will you reconsider?
I respect the fact that some extremely experienced people are on that list who fundamentally hope to protect Scottish production, the Scottish drama sector and training for Scottish talent and who want to give people opportunities. Some of them worked on “River City”, and some of them did not, but they feel empathetic towards their colleagues who do, and they want to make their voice heard.
We are saying today that we will absolutely grow the drama sector in Scotland and that we will continue those opportunities. We will make content that we hope will get big audiences and grow the representation and portrayal not just across Scotland but much more broadly. We will really work on the training opportunities to make sure that they are still there at all levels.
However, I am afraid that the “River City” decision has been made and has been made on good grounds. We will absolutely reinvest that money, and we are excited for the growth that we can create for Scotland and Scotland’s industry. I absolutely respect those people’s empathy and their commitment to the industry, which I share.
I do not just respect those people’s empathy; I respect their expertise and knowledge of the sector, too.
Absolutely. I had a conversation with somebody who worked on “River City” who had not heard that we were going to make new things—they just knew about the cut. I hope that people will hear about that from today’s session and in other ways that we can tell them. We have launched all the new programmes publicly, and those three programmes are the start of something exciting. There is more to come. We plan to advance and grow our industry in Scotland in the drama field and make ambitious formats and ambitious programmes that we hope will reach all of Scotland and beyond and will represent all our stories. I hope that people will hear that and think that that is exciting, because I certainly think that it is.
That exhausts the questions—thank you very much. I am sure that there is a lot of interest in areas that we want to follow up and particularly in the charter commitment about Scottish voices. I am sure that you will hear from us again soon, but that ends our session.
We have another agenda item, which will be in private. I am sorry, but I ask the witnesses to leave the room quickly, because we have to finish at half past 11 in time for general question time. Thank you very much.
11:23 Meeting continued in private until 11:28.Previous
Ofcom