The UK’s public service broadcast (PSB) channels spent a total of £2.85bn on content in 2014 – an increase of 2% in real terms from the £2.79bn spent in 2013.
The commercial PSB channels – ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 – contributed £1.49bn, while the BBC contributed £1.36bn, according to the latest PSB annual report from Ofcom, published on Monday.
However, the same report notes a continuation of the longer term decline in PSB TV viewing observed since 2012 – with daily viewing hours to all TV channels falling by 11.4 minutes per person a day from 2013 to 2014.
The BBC’s spend on content increased by £50m (4%) in real terms and that of the commercial PSB channels increased by £11m (1%) over the same period.
Spend on first-run UK originated network content by the PSB channels increased by 3% to £2.52bn between 2013 and 2014.
However, with 2014 featuring the Brazil World Cup and the Commonwealth Games, the growth is predominantly driven by the 36% increase in first-run UK originated sport spend year-on-year.
While spend on peak-time first-run UK content remained relatively constant from 2013 to 2014, spend on original content during daytime hours increased by 10% year-on-year to £652m.
This followed three years of decreasing daytime spend as PSB broadcasters focused their original content spend on evening peak-time programming.
Despite the longer-term drop in PSB viewing, the main five channels still represented over half of TV viewing in 2014, a similar picture to 2013, which suggests the longer term decline is stabilising, Ofcom suggests.
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Average daily viewing hours to all PSB channels has fallen by 0.1 hours (around 6-7 minutes a day) in each year since 2010, to 2.1 hours per person aged 4 and above in 2014.
By comparison, viewing hours to all TV channels held constant between 2010 to 2012 (4 hours a day), before declining in 2013 (to 3.9 hours) which continued into 2014 (to 3.7 hours).
The proportion of the TV population who tuned in to any of the main five PSB channels in an average week has been in decline since 2011. However, collectively the main five PSB channels continued to deliver mass coverage in 2014, with 85.2% of the UK population tuning in each week.
There was a very modest year-on-year increase in the combined share of the main five PSB channels (from 51.1% in 2013 to 51.2% in 2014), the first annual increase across the long term.
The share increase was driven by BBC One (up 0.7% percentage points from 21% share in 2013) and BBC Two (5.8% to a 6.1% share). This was alongside stable shares by Channel 4 (up 0.1 points to 4.9%) and Channel 5 (0.1 point decrease to 4.0%).
Following an increase between 2012 and 2013, ITV’s share fell 0.6 points to 14.7% in 2014.
Ofcom notes that, in line with 2013, overall satisfaction with the PSB channels remains high, with just under four in five (79%) of those who ever watch any PSB channel claiming to be ‘quite’ or ‘very satisfied’.
Access the full report on Ofcom’s website.
