[interestednovice]

Interesting that it was indeed the case that Newsnight was nearly cancelled altogether. Instead it will remain but will be a much inferior product consisting of mainly debate panels. Just what we needed, more bickering!

Still, this is directly the result of the government's Licence Fee freeze, so I can hardly blame the BBC for cutting back a programme that has a relatively low viewership.

We’ve had this debate before, but in my opinion the BBC needs to be brave and axe some popular but costly programmes in order to save some more-niche but important programmes.

Those more niche programmes are basically the point of the BBC.

If the BBC ends up as just a duplicate of ITV, then why are we paying a licence fee? I have always thought it was intended to protect funding for the programmes that we may not necessarily want (in a popular sense) to see, but those that we need to or should see - such as David Attenborough documentaries - especially things that the commercial sector can’t or won’t fund.

Yes, the government’s licence fee settlement has resulted in lower funding for the BBC, requiring real-terms cuts, but how the BBC have made those cuts has been up to them. I disagree with many of their decisions.

---

The problem is it isn't the problem of the freeze because they spend money in other areas which are questionable, create new roles which aren't needed rather than focusing on what they already have.

This, absolutely.

They keep schizophrenically jumping on things to create new correspondents or roles for - why the need to waste resources setting up BBC Verify when we had perfectly good BBC Monitoring and BBC Reality Check strands; why correspondents to focus on A.I. when existing technology correspondents are already covering it; why a new nebulous U.K. editor role?

[London Lite]

Just what we want, yet another BBC Two topical show full of the same talking heads as seen on Politics Live.

With Newsnight's remit being changed, it leaves Channel 4 News provided by the commercial sector to provide the analytical news bulletin and long form investigative journalism that Newsnight has a reputation for.

Just as the 1 moved into B, it looks like they want to move it to the Breakfast/Sport set in Salford which while is good for those bulletins, I'm not sure it's great to move it into a lighter set. Yet more commuting between BH and Media City when there's a suitable studio in London that does the job well as it is.

[interestednovice]

I know there has to be cuts, but I do think they are in danger of damaging the BBC News brand. 

Newsnight is going to be a shorter version of “the context” with (one hopes) more focus on UK content but basically another half hour of “experts” and “commentators” giving their opinions and arguing with other which in my mind is not news. I really really do not care what X, Y & Z think because 9/10 they don’t agree, if it’s anything political they blame the other side and it very rarely adds anything to my understanding of a news story. Id have argued a show which is focused on investigative journalism is exactly what the bbc needs at the moment and diverting money to that would be a good idea. They might as well just tag it onto the end of the news at 10 to discuss the stories. 

Extension to the news at one sounds ok in principle but I’d like to see how it’s going to be structured to make it distinct from any other hour on the news channel which I fear it could become. The bulletins at the moment are very structured and focused, I fear the news at one could become a rambling hour, slow paced and no focus. 

I cannot understand why they feel the need to move the news at one to Salford. It is nothing but a box ticking exercise. No one can ever tell you what it adds to the program. It will still be there presented by presenters who were based in London who will either relocate or travel up there, its not as if you’re going to suddenly have someone with northern accent presenting it! It’s presented in a studio, which will be branded to look the same as London so that will be no difference. 

What really annoys me most is they whole purpose of spending £1billion on new broadcasting house was to create a hub so that for the first time all the different teams, uk and world and language services were under one roof. We were told it was about sharing resources and expertise. It would drive costs down etc etc. Now a decade later after spending all that money they’re moving teams and bulletins out. Only last year, it’s been implied millions was spent on upgrading and redesigning studio b that’s now only seems to be used in future for news at six and news at ten and Laura K. Once in a blue moon it’s going to host election coverage but when you compare it to studio e which was in nearly constant use I don’t think it’s good value for money, especially at a time of cuts

My biggest bug bear of all is this talk of a digital BBC. It’s now becoming increasingly clear to me that the current BBC big wigs want to move the BBC to become online only. With trailers often only pointing people to iplayer, even down to the less than impressive ident packages for the uk channels when compared to their foreign counterparts eg BBC Nordic.

 Yes viewing figures are going down for traditional methods however they still make up a large part of how the BBCs audience access their content. As so often seems the case, the BBC have become obsessed about accessing the bbc digitally even if it isolates huge numbers of its current audience. We’ve seen it recently with Radio 2 with changing the line up to attract a younger audience. What ends up happening is the changes annoy large numbers of the BBCs loyal audience who begin to swap their loyaities who are never replaced by enough of the audience the bbc is chasing.

I will say that the live pages are good especially for things like the Covid inquiry however i think there is a place for a news channel which can provide that overview look of how a day is shaping up. 

There’s only one other thing which struck me. I will say this is coming from the “conspiracy theory part of my brain”. The creation of these groups of expertise would make it much easier to sell off departments if the bbc was to ever be privatised. More and more it seems multi-skilled teams are being replaced. 

Like I said I get cuts have to be made, doesn’t mean I have to like seeing the bbc news being weakened in the way it is.

I absolutely agree with all of this whole-heartedly. Especially with Salford totally being a box-ticking exercise, investment in NBH being under-utilised and management obsession with “digital BBC”.

[Rolling News]

Sad news but no surprises. Anyone got any idea when this will happen, and who will present the One?

I guess it'll be two presenters who do 2/3 days a week each and if they're normally based in London will stay in Salford on days they work. I'm sure some of the Breakfast presenters do that (could be wrong)?

[interestednovice]

I guess it'll be two presenters who do 2/3 days a week each and if they're normally based in London will stay in Salford on days they work. I'm sure some of the Breakfast presenters do that (could be wrong)?

So the public will be paying for train tickets and the MediaCity Travelodge, once again.

Meanwhile an almost-new studio in London, where those presenters are normally based, and equipped with advanced robotic cameras at massive cost so it can be staffed with a minimal number of technical people to get on air (and is therefore cheap to run, but required huge up-front investment) sits idle.

The average Joe Public notices no difference in output, but it has cost more to produce. The studio in Salford, while good for Breakfast and Sportday, is also still inferior to NBH B in terms of flexibility and space.

It is madness, and unjustifiable in every way.

What is this “anywhere but NBH” attitude that seems to have recently taken hold at the BBC?

What other organisation would spend over £1 billion pounds on a new global headquarters and then deliberately avoid using it at every turn?

[Stuart]

If the BBC ends up as just a duplicate of ITV, then why are we paying a licence fee? I have always thought it was intended to protect funding for the programmes that we may not necessarily want (in a popular sense) to see, but those that we need to or should see - such as David Attenborough documentaries - especially things that the commercial sector can’t or won’t fund.

The problem has now become that I don't think they're even providing anything 'special' now in return for the TVL. Watering things down to the extent that they become a poor imitation isn't providing anything.

Alternatives to everything they offer are now available on free catch-up services from elsewhere, which don't require a TVL. Their revenue is going to shrink as it is, so this sort of activity will simply speed up that process.

BBC News needs to just be the commercially funded global version, with national bulletins as we had in the past. The other TV channels need to be slashed to just one or two. I know it sounds drastic, but I think this is where we are now.

[Brekkie]

Certain irony that expanding news in daytime is a cost-cutti g measure and then cutting news later at night is a cost cutting measure.

The Newsnight cuts are devastating - really should axe the brand if they're axing the show. Absolutely no PSB value in more debate programming - they've basically joined GB News in the race to the bottom and it leaves C4 News as the only long form investigative programme on TV.

Like BBC Local Radio they're destroying a heritage brand to save £7.5m whilst at the same time investing £5m in "digital content" which will likely offer far less value. An investigation on Newsnight can create far more digital and linear content across the BBC than anything created specifically for digital.

[Kunst]

Stupid move to reduce investigation reports for silly debates.

The former are core journalism

[interestednovice]

The problem has now become that I don't think they're even providing anything 'special' now in return for the TVL. Watering things down to the extent that they become a poor imitation isn't providing anything.

Alternatives to everything they offer are now available on free catch-up services from elsewhere, which don't require a TVL. Their revenue is going to shrink as it is, so this sort of activity will simply speed up that process.

BBC News needs to just be the commercially funded global version, with national bulletins as we had in the past. The other TV channels need to be slashed to just one or two. I know it sounds drastic, but I think this is where we are now.

Yes, I actually agree with you Stuart.

Personally, I am a great supporter of the idea of the BBC and would happily pay the LF to fund it.

But I now feel that we are not getting good value for money back. If the sort of output that we get is quite “commercial” anyway, then we might as well scrap the LF and just have adverts for free.

Even the BBC News (Global Feed) service gets more news than we do. It is as though the BBC take the British LF-payers for fools.

[Humphrey Hacker]

This is both predictable and maddening. Newsnight is or was one of the few mature analytical programmes.