DCMS to increase funding for regional news pilots
The Department for Culture, Media and Sport is set to provide an extra £7 million funding for the regional news pilots in Scotland, Wales and England.
The funding for the Scotland pilot will be increased from £16 million to £18.8 million over two years, while fundnig for the Wales and Tyne Tees & Border region will both go up from £12 million to £14.1 million.
The government has made the additional money available to cover the cost of VAT, according to reports.
The pilots have been set up by an independently funded news consortia to replace the ITV1 local news service in each area.
Each pilot will be funded by excess BBC licence-fee money, which was originally set aside for the digital switchover help scheme.
In January, the DCMS confirmed that eight bids met its criteria in the first stage of the government’s news consortium scheme (IFNC).
DCMS’s selection panel, which is headed up by Richard Hooper, said it had accepted three bids for Wales, another three bids for England and two for Scotland.
In Wales, ITN (with Newsquest, Northcliffe Media, Tindle, Boomerang and ITV Wales news staff), Tinopolis and UTV with NWN Media will be invited to “move forward into detailed dialogue” with the panel.
In the Tyne Tees and Borders region, ITN (with Johnston Press, Newsquest, Metro Radio, the University of Sunderland and ITV Tyne Tees and Borders news staff), Trinity Mirror with the Press Association and Ten Alps, and UTV will go through to the next stage of the procurement process.
Finally, in Scotland, Johnston Press (with the Herald and Times Group, Tinopolis and D C Thomson) and STV (with ITN and Bauer Radio) will be given a chance to follow up their initial bids.
At the time, Hooper said: “Let me be clear about what we are looking for: quality news reporting with a mix of local, regional and national (in the case of Wales and Scotland) audiences firmly in mind; genuine innovation, not just business as usual; strong multiplatform applications working together across the web, local newspapers, local radio and television where appropriate, utilising each different medium’s special characteristics; and finally, a revenue generation model that aspires to longer term sustainability.”
A final decision is expected to be announced in March.