Abstract
This book was sparked by the ongoing debate about the future ownership of Channel 4, which stems back to the 2015 election, and elevated John Whittingdale to the cabinet as culture secretary. It attempts to pose the question: would privatisation be a disaster, an opportunity or a rebirth?
It also doubles up as an attempt to rally or stiffen emotional and intellectual support among the lobbying classes, with facts about the achievements, including news, current affairs and Film 4, while a foreword by Jamie Oliver explains how it has bolstered his healthy food initiatives, including the more overtly political campaign for a sugar tax, something impossible for the BBC to do. A sprinkle of show business never goes amiss.
Only a few dissenting alternative or critical views are in fact ventilated, after obligatory turns by founders Anthony Smith, Jeremy Isaacs and Roger Graef, but they include those of the long-time tormenter David Elstein, who repeats the view that with slashed overheads, achieved most probably by being part of a conglomerate, it could funnel as much as another £200m a year into public service television programmes. He poured a huge amount of energy into his chapter.
For those seeking an inside account of the past year's ownership debate, the best contribution is a scene-setting chapter, Through Political Channels, by veteran media writer Raymond Snoddy. He charts the dodgy manoeuvres of Whittingdale, since removed from his post by the incoming Theresa May, and a failed attempt to bounce a change in Channel 4's status through secondary legislation. It recounts how Claire Enders, founder of the research group Enders Analysis, a self-appointed Channel 4 guardian angel, intervened to undermine a false economic case for it being unsustainable. It also underscores how two new converts to the cause of privatising Channel 4 are grandees Lord Grade and Luke Johnson; both held high office at the broadcaster, know where profitable bits are to be found, but when there fought to preserve its independent status and remit.
The book comes from the same organisers as the 2015 The BBC Today: Future Uncertain, and thanks to a useful index is easy to dip into, loosely organised as it is around four sections: What Future for 4?; The Charlotte Street Years; Where's the Remit Now?; And Imagine, which posits a world without Channel 4. Dependent on unpaid contributions, the format seems to hail back to more leisurely Georgian/Victorian times.
For journalists, the standout achievement is its 7 pm news, there on day one, still there now, a loss-making programme, costs only half covered by advertising revenue. There is a key contribution (Chapter 17, An Endangered Species) from Professor Steven Barnett, of the University of Westminster, who builds on research evidence to state that its editorial agenda and audience has remained remarkably stable.
It remains “an established part of the channel's DNA. Able to maintain both a stable audience and a highly distinctive broadsheet approach”, he concludes. His content analysis of British TV news from 1975 to 2009 confirms that the agenda has barely moved, with around half of the time devoted to “broadsheet domestic news” and 40 per cent to foreign news, with only 10 per cent ceded to lighter, or tabloid stories of the fluffy variety. The evidence stops short of the current regime, but he believes the general anecdotal consensus is correct and the serious questioning tone is maintained. Political news represents about 30 per cent output, on a par with the main BBC News at Ten, while social policy at 20% is the highest of any programme. Barnett says that “these figures tell a clear story of how regulatory structures can protect a commercially funded channel” from pressure, but the degree of subsidy makes it a key bargaining chip in the campaign to prevent a change in its ownership.
An area of less satisfactory debate threaded through the book is whether the channel's distinctive remit to serve minority tastes and interests survives. Farrukh Dhondy, former commissioning editor for multicultural programmes, tasked with assessing its current output concludes: “The remit doesn't exist. I must have missed the act of parliament that changed it.” He asserts it has been replaced by diluted diversity, getting a range of faces on screen.
Another charge is that the commitment to documentary has been engulfed by formatted observation, in which locations are turned into studios with discreet “fixed rig” cameras to capture authentic behaviour. Editor John Mair set distinguished film-makers to watch and assess First Dates, 24 Hours in A&E, The Undateables, and Keeping Up with the Khans. Molly Dineen concluded: “Every single show is the same, these are not documentaries made by people, this is product and what's so sad this as precisely what Channel 4 was supposed not to be.” Channel 4, take note.