Government selects panel to review the future of the BBC

The government has set up an advisory panel to carry out a fundamental review of the BBC. Culture Secretary John Whittingdale has appointed eight people to work on the renewal of the BBC's royal charter - which sets out the corporation's remit.

Dawn Airey, former boss of Channel 5, and Dame Colette Bowe, former chairwoman of Ofcom, are among the advisers.

The current BBC charter is set to expire at the end of 2016.

Full story at :

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-33496925

Related :

New political battle over the BBC's future to begin this week

Concerns timing of appointment of panel to advise on charter review suggests ministers have already decided to mount 'fundamental attack on scope of BBC'

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/jul/12/bbc-charter-review-green-paper-licence-fee-chief-funding

BBC World Service English to end medium wave radio services to Eastern Mediterranean

BBC World Service English to end medium wave radio services to Eastern Mediterranean on 1323kHz in April

The BBC announced that the English language radio service in the Eastern Mediterranean - including Israel, much of Lebanon, Cyprus and southern Turkey - will end on 25 April 2015.

Director of BBC World Service, Fran Unsworth, says: "Our English language service will still be available via satellite and on the internet - which is increasingly how our audiences tune in. However, we cannot identify a financially viable method by which to continue the medium wave radio service. It is for this reason that we have decided to end these transmissions."

Audiences in the region will be able to listen to BBC World Service English 24 hours day through the direct-to-home satellite service on Eutelsat 13 (13o East, 11,117 MHz Vertical) or through the internet at BBCWorldservice.com

(BBC Press Release)

Sixty-five jobs to go in BBC Radio

The BBC is to cut 65 jobs in its radio division, the director of BBC Radio has announced.

 

BBC Radio needs to save £38m by 2016/17 and compulsory redundancies are likely, Helen Boaden told staff meeting at a briefing on Tuesday morning.

 

The move is part of the £800m cost-cutting measures required by the BBC savings programme Delivering Quality First (DQF).

 

About 200 jobs, or 15% of all radio employees, will be lost from 2012-2017

More at :

http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-27776707

Tony Hall's biggest test as BBC director general is to create a digital future

Most of the comment, inevitably perhaps, that has attended new BBC director general Tony Hall's first week in the job has been about the immediate issues that he faces. Rebuilding confidence internally amongst staff, let alone externally amongst the rest of us is no small task in the post-Entwistle, post-Savile crisis world.

 

More at :  http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/media-blog/2013/apr/07/tony-hall-bbc-digital-future

 

BBC World Service introduces new schedule with reduced shortwave transmissions

BBC World Service English global schedule will be simplified with fewer regional variations from Sunday 31 March 2013 and shortwave Arabic broadcasts will cease.

The reductions to shortwave services were announced in October 2012 as part of the UK government's 2010 spending review. BBC World Service on FM and online and on television will not be affected and no language services are closing.

Shortwave and medium wave transmissions in English will be reduced to a minimum of 6 hours in total each day. This will generally be two periods of between 2 and 4 hours each, usually at peak listening times in the morning and evening to help minimise disruption. The changes will have less impact in regions where World Service is increasingly accessed via partner stations or online and in countries where FM is widely available.

Steve Titherington, Senior Commissioning Editor for BBC World Service, said: "We know that increasing numbers of people are accessing World Service on FM, online, and television. For those who can't access these platforms, we've tried to ensure that they will continue to hear to the best the World Service has to offer at times of the day when they are most likely to tune in."

"As part of the new schedule we will endeavour to have a mixture of news, current affairs and a mix of programmes covering the arts, science and human interest stories." says Titherington.

A new programme, The Newsroom, will replace World Briefing. Outlook will be extended to an hour-long format and offer a new approach to covering arts, music and humanities following the closure of The Strand. Every Friday, The 5th Floor will run in the prominent Outlook time slot offering a review of the pick of the BBC's 27 language services programing - in English.

The estimated loss of listeners to Global English on shortwave will be around 1.5m listeners, equivalent to 1.3% of the total Global News English audience on any platform.

BBC Arabic audiences are estimated to reduce by 800,000 as a result of the closure of shortwave broadcasts.

In the Arabic speaking world, the World Service broadcasts on a network of FM relays, a 24-hour television channel and the bbcarabic.com website. Shortwave services to Sudan are not affected as the shortwave service is currently the most viable method of broadcasting to this large region.

(Press Release)

Related :

BBC Shuts Shortwave from Cyprus

http://criticaldistance.blogspot.in/2013/03/bbc-shuts-shortwave-from-cyprus.html#!/2013/03/bbc-shuts-shortwave-from-cyprus.html

BBC Hindi to re-instate morning txn's

BBC Hindi is going to re-instate morning SW txn's at 0100 UTC & 0230 UTC, Program titled "Namaskar Bharat" will start on 27th March 2012. Neil Curry, Head of business development, Asia Pacific region will be in India to see the start of morning txn.

NUJ members to strike at BBC on 15th July

Journalists at the BBC are due to walk out on 15 July in a strike over compulsory redundancies. NUJ members have a long standing commitment to the policy of no compuslory redundancies at the BBC. The NUJ has called on the BBC to enter urgent talks to resolve the threat of compulsory redundancies for the small number of outstanding cases and for the reinstatement of a member dismissed in the BBC World Service. Industrial action will go ahead next week if the BBC fail to address these issues.

More at :http://righttowork.org.uk/2011/07/nuj-members-to-strike-at-bbc-on-15th-july/

Lord Patten vows to protect BBC World Service

Lord Patten has said his love of the BBC World Service made protecting it a "priority" - particularly the "core" Arabic, Somali and Hindi services. The new BBC Trust chairman told the Sunday Telegraph he would fight for it as a 20% budget cut across the corporation takes effect this year. The paper claimed he signalled in the interview that digital TV channels BBC3 or BBC4 may be axed to help secure it.

Full story at : http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-13741210

BBC Turkish radio service to sign off for last time due to cuts

BBC Radio's Turkish Service will end on May 27 after 72 years of continuous programs following a serious of British government cuts to their funding

More at :
http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/n.php?n=bbc-radio-to-end-its-turkish-service-2011-05-23

MPs force rethink on BBC World Service cuts

By Gerri Peev

The BBC World Service's funding will not be cut after ministers gave the corporation a surprise stay of execution. The Foreign Office caved in to pressure from cross-party MPs to announce a
review into its decision to cut its budget.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1388800/MPs-force-rethink-BBC-World-Service-cuts.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

House of Commons Discussion of the World Service
http://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/hi/house_of_commons/newsid_9490000/9490411.stm