[Matrix]

I imagine if accurate these local radio changes may not go down too well with politicians, many of whom I imagine quite enjoy the platform it gives them to speak to their constituents.  Ultimately though the need to save money and make additional cuts comes from the licence fee freeze, which has been made worse with inflation at +10%. 

If there is to be more shared programmes I'd prefer it was combining counties roughly in line with regional news, rather than being across the entire England. (e.g. BBC Radio Cambridgeshire having a shared programme with just Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex and Three Counties.)

I’d agree, for example in Yorkshire, a programme airing across the whole Look North region would still be fairly local, and still have that northern feel. I imagine it’d be the same in other parts of the country

But an England show being like a sub-par version of Radio 2/4/5 wouldn’t serve any purpose, and simulcasting 5 Live would have been a good idea in the days when it was only on MW, but I’d imagine the vast majority of people have DAB now so it’s available in full quality already.

Will they also still be able to resource ‘emergency programmes’ like when there has been floods and bad weather. Not if there is nobody left except a newsreader from 2pm onwards

I'd agree. I suspect the synergy between Local Radio and Regions is quite a tempting one , particularly if you can collapse some into quite big regions ('The North', for example), and still maintain (just) the line that BBC Regions reflect their audiences etc. I'd also agree on the 5 Live point. It seems a bit redundant to simply lean on that, given its availability via DAB etc. It also places quite a large burden on 5 following the News Channel merger content which they're picking up. 

I think the point about Presenter/Producers is also quite important here. I suspect post 2pm bulls will increasingly fall to those who are disjointed from existing schedules but also able to turn their hand to longer-form packages or 'specials', like you say. Either way, I know colleagues are deeply unhappy this morning, which is an achievement given how low things already felt.