BBC – Fewer Repeats This Summer

The BBC has announced its spring/summer schedule, promising to avoid a repeat of last year’s season when 25% of its schedule was made up of repeats.

Eastenders is to be given an extra third episode a week from the middle of next month, it was announced, although there were no such plans for Casualty, which had been widely expected. It is not as yet confirmed which day the extra episode will be transmitted, although it is unlikely to compete directly with Coronation Street. Alan Yentob said that the corporation had made efficiency savings of £25m which had been spent on new productions. There will be new drama series; Cardiac Arrest set in the National Health Service, Chandler & Co, a detective series, and Love on a Branch Line, a comedy. There is a new 6-part series on The Human Animal, a documentary on the Foreign Office and a new series of QED.

New leisure series include Rhodes Around Britain, with Chef Gary Rhodes sampling regional cuisine around Britain, and The Great Antiques Hunt in which contestants will test their knowledge of antiques.

LWT’S COSTS CUT WITH DYKE

Charles Allen, the new chief executive of LWT following Greg Dyke’s resignation yesterday, is widely expected to cut costs more enthusiastically than Dyke. Yesterday on news of his appointment Granada’s shares rose by 4p.

Allen said, “We would have liked to have kept Greg Dyke on, but it had to be on the right terms”. Dyke would have stayed if he had been offered oversight of Granada Television as well as LWT and a seat on the main Granada board.

Sir Christopher Bland, chairman of LWT leaves next week; Gerry Robinson, Granada’s chief executive, will takeover as chairman.