Watershed Likley To Remain

Weekend press reports that Peter Brooke intends to move the 9pm watershed to 10pm are groundless, the Department of National Heritage has told MediaTel this morning.

The Heritage Secretary is to meet media regulators in the near future to discuss violence on television, but the moving of the 9pm watershed is not on the agenda.

Currently the 9pm timing restriction does not apply to advertisements; the cut off point for ads is “to avoid children’s programmes”, for which 7.30pm is used by the ITC. Ads on the whole are far less explicit than programming, the ITC told MediaTel.

BBC SAVINGS LIKELY TO DOUBLE

The BBC is expected to achieve more than double its planned savings of £50m this year, and the money will go mainly towards new programmes and services. In the current year the BBC expects a gross saving of £125m.