Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1129
- 1139)
WEDNESDAY 5 DECEMBER 2007
Ms Jenny Abramsky, Mr Mark Damazer and Mr Stephen
Mitchell
Q1129 Chairman: Good
morning and thank you very much indeed for coming. Originally,
we had Bob Shennan coming, but I gather that the prospect of appearing
before our Committee made him resign from that job. Is that right?
Ms Abramsky: That is absolutely right. Bob is
going to be the Director of Radio for Channel 4.
Q1130 Chairman:
So, he is even leaving the Corporation?
Ms Abramsky: He is.
Q1131 Chairman:
Stephen Mitchell, have you taken on his role?
Mr Mitchell: No, I have not thankfully, but
I am responsible for the news content on Radio 5 Live among other
things. We have an acting arrangement while we find another Controller.
Q1132 Chairman:
But you do not have it under control at this moment?
Ms Abramsky: We do not, no. Bob only announced
that he was leaving about 48 hours ago.
Q1133 Chairman:
It is a very intriguing area to go into but I will not! Not so
long ago, people were saying that radio was dead and on the way
out, television was taking over, and there was no future for radio.
You and others seem to be demonstrating that that is not the case.
Ms Abramsky: I believe that radio is still one
of the most important media in the UK today. Over 90% of the population
listen to radio every week and people underestimate it at its
peril. I have worked in the BBC for a long time and, in the 1980s,
I remember sitting next to a rather senior person in television
who told me that radio would be dead by the millennium. In the
BBC, radio is contributing over 50% of the consumption of the
BBC in terms of just the hours that people spend with radio and
I think that it is one of the great strengths of broadcasting
in this country that radio is so strong.
Q1134 Chairman:
Do you see it continuing? Are you optimistic about the future
as well?
Ms Abramsky: I am optimistic about the future
of radio as a medium, yes. I think that there are really great
challenges for commercial radio in terms of their business model
which is facing real challenges as a result of the Internet, but
I feel very confident that they are going to overcome those problems.
In terms of listening, it is not declining and I think that the
interesting thing about radio in this country is that radio really
has led the way in terms of convergence with online and broadband
and, if you look at just some of the statistics that we have to
deal with, the way people are listening again, are consuming pod
casts and are actually listening to radio through the web, what
you are seeing is that people are using whatever medium they can
to get hold of quality audio.
Q1135 Chairman:
Tell us about the way that BBC News actually works as far as radio
is concerned. You have been having this interesting and doubtless
slightly tedious issue about whether it is BBC News for Radio
4, but actually it is BBC News for Radio 4. I do not say that
that is how you should label it but that is right, is it not?
Ms Abramsky: It is right and I will leave my
colleagues on either side to answer the actual phraseology and
how we describe it. In terms of news on radio, I regard news as
the spine of all our radio networks with one exception and that
is Radio 3 where we do not see it playing that role. If you look
across all the other networks we run, news is absolutely central,
be it just through hourly bulletins, either on the hour or half
hour, or the combination of in-depth news programmes which run
on every single network. We are running a portfolio of radio stations
and Radio 1 is clearly our youth station, Radio 2 with a mass
appeal with an average audience age of about 50, through Radio
5 Live and Radio 4. What we are trying to do is ensure that for
every audience and every licence fee payer, we are offering them
news in a form that is relevant to them. Radio 1 is running news
every hour but it is also running two news programmes at lunchtime
and at drive time called Newsbeat and they are a very, very important
part of the way Radio 1 delivers its public service remit.
Q1136 Chairman:
Mr Damazer, tell us about Radio 4. Do you get this central production
of news from a central newsroom? Is that how it works?
Mr Damazer: Yes, broadly. My colleague Steve
Mitchell is in charge of the radio news operation and has been
for many years. I used to work in the news division myself, so
in some senses it is home-from-home. The day-to-day operation
of news bulletins and news programmes on Radio 4 is left to Steve
Mitchell and his editors but, in terms of where they are placed,
who the presenters are and a broad strategic remit—and,
it being Radio 4, there is no reason to change it very radically
from one year to another—that is set in conjunction between
myself, Jenny Abramsky and Steve Mitchell. We have frequent conversations
about issues to do with presentation and with tone but, in terms
of what actually happens on a day-to-day basis, I would not expect
to intervene in advance of any bulletin to discuss the running
order or a particular line being taken by a particular correspondent.
Q1137 Chairman:
Mr Mitchell, would that be down to your organisation?
Mr Mitchell: Yes, it is. We provide the content
and produce most of the talent, as it were, the on-air talent
and off-air talent.
Q1138 Chairman:
When it comes to a programme like Today which I suppose is one
of the best listened to, or is it the best listened to of the
Radio 4 programmes?
Mr Damazer: It is by a big margin.
Q1139 Chairman:
You take your news but you also have your presenters and the Today
programme has its own staff as well, does it not?
Mr Damazer: Yes.
Mr Mitchell: The Today programme has the most
important thing. The Today programme has a single editor who is
responsible editorially for everything on Radio 4 between 6 a.m.
and 9 a.m. Within that Today programme, there are news bulletins,
there are newspaper reviews, sport, Thought for the Day and the
weather. Editorially however, one person is answerable for the
whole package and he has his own staff who generate content in
terms of interviews, in terms of some of the more in-depth journalism
and so forth; he has his own staff who work for him as well as
taking this material from other parts of the BBC.
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