[DTV]

Agree with many here on the pacing, but I do wonder whether this is part of the wider cuts in news...and simply having fewer items is a consequence of that? Fewer briefings required etc...

Cuts are certainly a factor - fewer journalists obviously means fewer reports (though there are cheaper ways of producing them, and doing news summaries or in brief segments are fairly cheap) - but there are also editorial reasons that the pace has slowed across BBC News - particularly the greater emphasis on providing 'analysis' across the board, which does tend to drag out every story. Then there's the issue of interviews with external contributors - which plays into both editorial reasons (there clearly being a desire to get somebody's take on every story) and cuts (wanting to get your money out of their appearance fee) - leading to more and longer interviews.

While I'm not particularly a fan of the slowed pace, I can see a justification for it some of the time, but the problem with BBC News output is that it is this lethargic pace nearly all day now - with the network bulletins pretty much the only news programming that doesn't unnecessarily drag. In my view, if you're going to do slow and 'in depth' for the bulk of the schedule, it'd be better to do proper 3-5 minute news summaries at the TOTH and BOTH - so at least you've actually delivered the news before leaping into 'analysing' two or three stories for the rest of the 30 minutes.