Local TV: Roger Gane & Steve Harris comment

Governments and regulators have been obsessed with ‘local’ broadcast media for decades. Where is the evidence that there is an untapped demand for this?

Potential audiences have the choice of local BBC and commercial radio services, significant amounts of local TV programming both commercial and BBC (+ heavily subsidised minority language services in Wales and Scotland).

They also have community services and RSLs in some areas. They are served by paid for and/or free daily and weekly newspapers – and these, like some commercial radio stations, are finding things tough. In some cases, radio stations are deliberately becoming ‘less local’ by networking significant periods of their output; whilst the effect of this on audience levels and engagement has still to be seen, they are obviously making this move at least partly in response to financial pressures.

It may be regrettable but as populations become more heterogeneous and family links with particular areas or communities weaken, I think demand for real local information and entertainment (as opposed to ‘parish pump’ news and tittle-tattle) will continue to decline. The government should not be diverting scarce financial resources into this venture – it will fail not least because the available budgets will not support the quality of programme that potential viewers will expect.

Why is the whole debate about Local TV so apparently myopic, and entirely backward facing? Raymond Snoddy presents the Top Down network vision as the only option and appears not to deal with any of the detailed alternatives set out by those who believe in genuinely local TV.

The BJTC identified the opportunity to create a strong credible alternative local TV strategy nearly three years ago, building from the bottom up around the huge and untapped resources of our Colleges and Universities, and the communities in which they are sited. I have argued this case very strongly to Jeremy Hunt and sent a copy of that argument to the MediaGuardian and Maggie Brown, but the lette was studiously ignored by the Guardian. The FT and other newspapers also seem to wish to be oblivious, and the only person who seems to be getting any publicity is this guy Horwood. But there is a cogent and remarkably well thought through alternative.

For a start, there are certainly lessons from history and the best one is the development of Independent Local Radio in the seventies and eighties. I know, I was there too. I started Pennine Radio in Bradford – it worked, it made consistent profits and it’s still going strong through sadly called, The Pulse. It never made a loss.

A network superstructure for the new independent local radio stations very quickly developed – national news, national sales and a ratecard based on local audience research. When ILR started we only had the traditional BARB methods for measuring audiences, but ILR soon developed its own reliable systems for measuring purely local audiences – and they were very quickly found to be equally satisfactory for national advertisers. But, what was more important was the development of a new type of local advertising, in many cases the ILR stations were taking a higher proportion of their revenues from local, as opposed to national advertising. I have already approached a major media research company who have come up with a highly cost effective methodology, which every local station should be able to afford.

Traditionally, television was technically far more complex and vastly more expensive, and of course local radio could fall back on recorded music, but digital technology is transforming the cost base of television production, while technical advances are putting fairly sophisticated editing and post production processes within the easy reach of the competences schoolchildren, thus making local TV possible in a way we could barely have dreamed off when I was involved with the analogue local TV stations at Southampton and Portsmouth ten years ago.

But then we were skewered by a whole range of factors as well, not least that local TV had the lowest priority when it came to the use of spectrum, so we even had to fall in behind the walkie talkie folk. We were also skewered by exorbitantly expensive transmission charges, but again, there are highly effective and vastly cheaper self help alternatives that can deliver a great service.

The real priority now is not simply pushing through this bottom up model, but ensuring that each local station owns the means of production and transmission – both processes can be done remarkably efficiently and at cost that the folk from big TV and I guess, even the DCMS cannot even imagine. As for EPG and the argument for a place at the top table is not the deal breaker the top downers seem to suggest. As long as the local stations are somewhere in the Top 100, provide good and involving local news, current affairs and general programming content and local advertising, above content across the day that has a distinct brand and image the, in the words of Kevin Costner, they will find us.

As it happens, the Broadcast Journalism Training Council, which is the largest Journalism Accreditation body in the UK, already representing more than 60 courses across the UK will be holding a special conference in the morning of July 7th in London, with speakers from all over the country telling and showing how this could be done, and in fairness, this also includes those who currently believe that the Top Down approach might work better. The core message remains – the Higher and Further Education sector has a massive role to play in Local TV, something which was entirely ignored by Roger Parry, Nicholas Shott and, for that matter, Richard Horwood, until I pointed out the omission at the Westminster Media Forum in January.

This is a crucial time because it is probably the last viable opportunity to create an entirely new and stimulating level and layer of media enterprise. And this movement will encompass not just the journalism courses, but also a range of media production, graphics and animation courses across the country. I have been calculating the massive public investment in new accommodation, facilities and equipment that has been made across this sector of Higher and Further Education – and even at the early stages of my calculation I am at into the hundreds of millions of pounds. That’s a public taxpayer investment, and every institution I have spoken to is eager to be fully involved in the leading the development of local TV in their areas partly as a means of paying back something to the communities in which they work and operate – and increasingly, from which their students now come. Some already have their own full service community radio stations, others are involved with local newspapers and magazines, but Local TV is the ideal vehicle to express this massive pent up creative potential.

There is a a wealth of new and developing talent out there, and I see it a great deal as I travel round the country. While I could simply and blandly claim that this is the talent which will lead our industry in the future, there is a far more serious and fundamental issue here. At local and regional level the vital first rung up the ladder to a sustained and sustainable media career, is being rapidly eroded. Local press, local radio, both BBC and commercial, together with regional television are all in rapid decline and there is a massive gap opening up in terms of opportunity. Looking at the issue from a broader ‘Big Society’ perspective, there is also a massive democratic deficit opening up, in that communities are no longer able to communicate with themselves in the way they used to only a short time ago.

It’s a small, but significant point – but how many new jobs and work opportunities will the top down model create, compared to a Local Television network?

Genuinely Local TV is an exciting opportunity to address all these issues. There is an alternative, it might also be surprisingly viable as well. While our conference is by invitation, it might well be useful for Mr Snoddy to come along and hear some different views and strategies, because they’re sure as hell not getting into the mainstream media at the moment.