Sir Paul Fox: BBC Charter renewal "could become ugly" without enough sports rights
mlt11
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Per Media Guardian:
"BBC has thrown in the towel over live sport, claims former executive"
"Sir Paul Fox says sport is seen as 'below the salt' as he voices fears 2012 will be the last Olympics the corporation covers"
"He said none of the frontrunners to succeed BBC director general Mark Thompson was a "natural supporter of sport" but said that without sufficient sports rights the debate over the renewal of the BBC's charter and licence fee in 2016 "could become ugly"..........
"Gradually the BBC's will to maintain its sports portfolio is petering out ... All that is left is a pale imitation of what used to be Match of the Day.
"Sport used to be part of the BBC's culture. But in some corners of the corporation, it is now regarded as below the salt, and the big events might just as well be scheduled by the BBC's competitors." .........
"We think sport does have a part in the mix but it will be about the major events and not the others," said Thomson. "We will be ruthlessly prioritising. We have made deeper cuts in sport and less in drama, for instance."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/apr/13/bbc-sport-live
"BBC has thrown in the towel over live sport, claims former executive"
"Sir Paul Fox says sport is seen as 'below the salt' as he voices fears 2012 will be the last Olympics the corporation covers"
"He said none of the frontrunners to succeed BBC director general Mark Thompson was a "natural supporter of sport" but said that without sufficient sports rights the debate over the renewal of the BBC's charter and licence fee in 2016 "could become ugly"..........
"Gradually the BBC's will to maintain its sports portfolio is petering out ... All that is left is a pale imitation of what used to be Match of the Day.
"Sport used to be part of the BBC's culture. But in some corners of the corporation, it is now regarded as below the salt, and the big events might just as well be scheduled by the BBC's competitors." .........
"We think sport does have a part in the mix but it will be about the major events and not the others," said Thomson. "We will be ruthlessly prioritising. We have made deeper cuts in sport and less in drama, for instance."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/apr/13/bbc-sport-live
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I look forward to seeing some figures on Olympic spending by the BBC and reading the expressed doubts the BBC would broadcast the 2016 games, gives me the impression the costs must be huge.
perhaps we'll see more deals with Sky!
And you think that people would not expect the BBC to be providing comprehensive coverage?
As for your claim of OTT coverage, could you give examples of what constitutes this "OTT coverage" in your book?
"The others" he talks of are as PSB as it's possible to be. Minority interest stuff as a rule.
But making the BBC about ratings will not ensure it's survival, just the opposite. Just look at Channel 4. When a supposed PSB goes commercial the talk is of getting rid of it.
As has been seen with a few recent examples, sometimes the commercial broadcasters are offering way in excess of what the BBC was prepared to offer, so at some point the BBC has to walk away. That's just the cold reality.
"Costly" is a relative term. It's meaningless here.
When one considers the BBC has spent around £11m/year on an effing format! (the production costs are on top of that) any cuts to sport are bound to annoy.
I've said it before, I think Mark Thompson had an agenda to destroy the BBC. Pushing it towards a commercial focus and alienating half the population with fem-friendly pap and soaps cannot have been accidental.
"You want sport, go to Sky" he practically says.
And Sir Paul is talking about the very survival of the BBC. How "costly" is dumping sport when considered up against that?
True, but even then the BBC are failing. They've lost the Grand National after this year, their live F1 offering has halved (and expect that to go after a couple of years too), they lost out again to ITV/ESPN on the FA Cup and England games, and only just held on to Wimbledon primarily because the All-England Lawn Tennis Club don't want anything to do with Sky (at the moment.)
And where they do have big events, they're not using them properly. For example, why not broadcast the Scottish Cup Final across the UK, not just in Scotland - there's enough football fans who'll watch any game to merit that, and it would provide Scottish football with a UK-wide outlet it doesn't usually get. They've also got the Scottish Open golf, which AFAIK is only broadcast in Scotland. They could also chip in a wee bit more money and get the Celtic League Rugby Union tournament, instead of having bits on BBC Wales, bits on BBC NI and bits on BBC Alba.
But the BBC has a duty to try to serve all on the budget it has. OK, so "The Voice" could easily have been on ITV. But ITV were only interested in buying the format to stop others using it against the "X Factor". And you have to remember that not everybody likes live sport, so the BBC is right to spend money elsewhere.
They tend to be costly when compared with some other programming genres, and certain sports are certainly costly when compared with other sports. And those costs are being pushed up year-on-year, assisted in part by the deep pockets of some commercial broadcasters, and in part by the perceived attractiveness of particular sports (attractiveness with regard to sponsorship deals, commercial tie-ins etc).
Which commercial operator priced the BBC out of Australia Open coverage? Which commercial operator forced the BBC to drop their 4th snooker event? Were the BBC really priced out of the French Open? Couldn't the BBC budget have been stretched by a couple of million to keep horse racing?
Seems pretty clear the BBC have made a decision to drastically reduce the amount of sports rights they hold, budget cuts or no budget cuts.
The quote was actually from Caroline Thomson (BBC's chief operating officer), not Mark Thompson.
No it's been on network BBC, certainly for the last few years if not longer
Not for too much longer though, as Sky are taking over live coverage of all four days from I think next year
Indeed the BBC has told us in its DQF document that it is:
"Concentrating licence fee spend on the things which the public most expect from us (news; children’s services; original UK drama and comedy; an outstanding contribution to knowledge, learning, music and culture; the events that bring communities and the nation together) while reducing spend on other kinds of output by c30% and reducing distribution costs. This means:
o A 15% reduction in the BBC’s sports right budget (including the decision to share the rights for Formula One with BSkyB, and reductions to some smaller sports events)........."
Link (11/57):
http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/reports/pdf/dqf_detailedproposals.pdf
So the BBC has told us in words of one syllable that sport (other than the few high profile events) is NOT one of the things the public most expect from us.
Sport (except for the few high profile events) is low priority. No secret. No uncertainty. They have told us.
In fact, the BBC should be congratulated on its openness.
Not that I'm saying the BBC's main purpose is to chase viewers, but ultimately you need everyone to tune into BBC at some point in the week or the universal nature of the BBC (and therefore the license fee) falls apart. Which is what I think Sir Paul Fox was referring to.
I don't understand what your point is then, I have given some real world examples, now please provide some counter examples, or I will just assume you are just trolling.
Yes, you can't please everyone. And everyone's viewpoint will, in some part, be influenced by whether they are a sports fan in general, or a fan of one particular sport or another.
As for the oft-mentioned F1, the BBC has stated that " .....the decision to share F1 rights saved more cash than would have been saved by shutting one of its smaller TV channels." (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-15165926) so that does provide a little perspective.
Exactly - nail on head.
The BBC's tactic, in a nutshell, is to prioritise mass audience prime-time programming. The BBC's thinking is that this will maintain maximum public support for the BBC and its funding model.
BUT:
It is Government / Parliament that renews the Charter and sets the Licence Fee (!)
And what do the politicians think is more important for the BBC?
Politicians are much less likely to be interested in mass audience prime-time programming. And much more likely to be shocked when they hear the BBC is no longer showing the Grand National and Royal Ascot.
So the BBC is playing a very dangerous game.
And a certain group of politicians (you know who) is very likely to think that mass audience prime-time programming does not need and should not be funded publicly. So if they win the next GE outright (probably unlikely but certainly possible) then the BBC, as we know it, will have put itself in grave danger.
10-20 years ago that would be a valid point, but nowadays sport is pretty much up there as one of the most watched things on tv (live sport especially). People watch less tv these days, therefore the BBC need to adjust to changing trends. If anything you could argue the BBC should be increasing their sports budget/coverage.
What are they defending, the right for the BBC to be run into the ground by it's management?
Strange but true. BBC support around these parts is actually 'executive support'. Maybe we could have some kind of telethon...
and these changing trends automatically point to sport being the saviour? I a m not so sure, especially as one of the reasons that less TV seems to be consumed is the additional ways that people can use their leisure time (not forgetting that the high TV audiences of days gone by are long since gone due to the proliferation of multi-channel TV, meaning that the viewing market is increasingly fragmented).
And anyway, the BBC should not be making ratings its primary (not that important word) goal. It should be broadening its appeal, by broadening the genres that it covers, and increasing the quality and diversity of its output 9whilst still maintaining a general popularity). An increasingly difficult balancing act, and one where mistakes are being made (and have been made in the past).
That is not to say that sport does not have a place, and that the BBC would be foolish not to be thinking carefully about what is left of its sport portfolio.