4 million people every week still go to church so a programme like Songs of Praise still has a reasonable following. Since ITV has dropped religious programming, only the BBC shows church services now and only the most ratings obsessed atheist would want rid of Songs of Praise.
If the BBC was to be purely based on ratings, then kiss goodbye to Radio 3, Radio 2 at night, Radio 4, BBC Four, BBC Parliament, a large chunk of BBCi, most minority programmes and anything other than soaps, reality shows and the biggest rated dramas. We have seen how an obsession with ratings and cheap, disposable programming has done to ITV and Channel 4 and I don't want this to happen to the BBC.

Sky have axed 'Must Be The Music' following poor ratings for the first series: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage...after-axe.html

ITV reportedly planning to do a Coronation Street-based talent show to cast the role of Rovers Return barmaid Becky McDonald for Corrie: The Musical: http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/soaps/s3...e-musical.html

I actually agree with Robbie on this one. Songs of Praise is a waste of space - BBC1 could have got 7m in that slot for something like Cars or Wall-E.

The BBC shouldn't have to put religious crap on screen for the minority it appeals to in a primetime BBC1 slot - stick it on BBC2.

Another Sky u-turn. I'm sure they said it was coming back at the time.

I assume the nightly three part Upstairs continuation was comissioned with a view to comissioning a few full series if it was a success, otherwise seems rather pointless bringing it back so briefly.

Absolutely, and the fact SoP NEVER airs at 5.15pm any more proves the point. I have no problem with the BBC as a public service broacaster serving up SoP to cater for the minority who are into that sort of thing, but it could have aired at 3-4pm yesterday or on BBC2.

It was truly bizarre scheduling to have aired so late, just as BBC1 was gearing up for its evening assault, and I would be astonished if in recent years when Boxing Day has fallen on a Sunday that SoP has aired in as plum a slot as it did yesterday - indeed, if it has aired at all.

I have always taken the view that to retain the justification for the licence fee, it is imperative that BBC1 remains a popular, flagship channel offering a wide variety of programming that people want to watch.

When people stop watching BBC1, the licence fee will inevitably die - and once that happens, so will advertising revenues for commercial broadcasters who will have to compete with BBC channels for their share of the advertising pot. A BBC funded by advertising would be ITV's worst nightmare right now, mark my words.

We will also kiss goodbye to some of the worthier but less well rated output on BBC2 and BBC4, as well as seeing a whole host of other BBC services come under threat.

Hence it is important that BBC1 maintains its primacy of viewing share and delivers big, popular shows consistently - as well as being able to take risks, and show edgier and less-well rated offerings that ITV simply wouldn't touch.

I think it fulfils that brief pretty well right now.


Actually, that does sound a bit like me.

Lol its probably a good job religious types dont frequent this thread otherwise we would never hear the last regarding that second paragraph.

I think the problem with Boxing Day on BBC1 was that it ran like any other Sunday and as such didnt rank as "special". If they had put SOP on at 5.00 and Indiana Jones later we probably wouldnt be having this discussion. As for Songs of Praise-it was essentially a carol concert with Hayley Westenra and others thrown in so accessible to anyone who liked a sing song really. Just needed to be shown earlier thats all.

Oh I don't know.

There are a quite a few on here who are utterly devoted to worshipping at the Church of Cowell...

Another quality offering from ITV to look forward to then.

Just to add the church is well served by the BBC at Christmas with Carols From Kings (which is brilliantly atmospheric) and live Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve, Morning Worship on Christmas Day, Songs of Praise in advent and (though it did create a bit of a storm) The Nativity in the run up to Christmas.

Absolutely. It didn't need Aled Jones's Big Flop in a plum Boxing Day slot as well.

The 3.6m overnight is a bit inflated anyway because it will include the tail end of the 5.3m-rated news & weather.

But thats with 2/3 showings added
Even EastEnders BBC 3 repeat at the later time of 11:20pm last night pulled in 733k (5.3%).

Lol yes and no-one questions the scheduling of Cowellism

Wasnt there a Dr Who episode where the tv station ran the planet? I think the writer may have had more insight than we imagined.

Doesn't ITV2 repeat the soaps six times during the night and the following morning, not to mention the omnibus editions?

EastEnders dented by TV burp and Top gear then.
I don't know why the BBC put it out in such a stupid slot (and they didn't even advertise the episode)
7:00pm would have been better imo or even 7:15pm
still a good rating though for an out of slot airing and no other soaps to give it a push either

Yes when imo there's no need
1 or 2 showings plus the omnibus is all thats needed
Same with Neighbours that has about 10 showings of the same episode

I think the BBC thought that SoP was the ideal build up for a night of Countryfile, Antiques Roadshow and a 1970's ITV show. Maybe the BBC could revive Highway with Harry Seacombe for next year?

It's cheap probably, but it also smacks of lazy scheduling, same as repeats of Jeremy Kyle. I bet, though, there is a law of diminishing returns as who would really want to sit through the same Corrie repeat all day. At least BBC Three only shows Eastenders the once.

Lol this sounds like a northern Lloyd-Webber. As a secondary search i wonder if they will look for someone who can best cook hotpot!

Lloyd Webber has again said somewhere (I cannot remember where) that his own searches are at an end because of other projects and the lack of suitable searches. The Beebs entertainment rosta looks ever more aneamic.

Good night for BBC1, but utterly stupid for putting BBC1's top show against BBC2's top show, which resulted in EE being severly dented. Strong start for UD and I can see it retaining 7m of those viewers tonight with Marple around 4.5m.

Ok for ITV's film premiere, but nothing special. I understand TV Burp was a clip show repeat, but I still think it deserved a better slot than that. Wouldn't it have been better to start the film half an hour later then air TV Burp on another day? YBF has performed much better than that in the Corrie sandwich on Friday and pre Emmerdale on Christmas Day.

Excellent for Benidorm, but this was the first episode I thought which was really poor. I don't think a Christmas special worked at all for the type of show it is. Obviously there was circumstances beyond the producers control, but the whole premise of the show with different families visiting a rough holiday resort was thrown out of the window. Half the cast were missing and the show suddenly doesn't become funny when there's only a focus on one family. I hope the next series is better and viewers won't desert it after this poor one off.

TOTP and Some Mothers performed well for Ch5 considering how old they are and it's a nice idea once in a while-adds a bit of variety to Ch5's schedule anyway.

Thats all you need really.
The BBC are good like that and don't over show their soaps/soapish dramas

Eastenders gets a 2nd airing on BBC 3 and then omnibus on Sunday

Doctors gets a later showing on the BBC HD Channel

Holby gets a 2:00am showing ad casualty isn't reapted.

IMO thats all you need because these days there is i player and on demand anyway.

The BBC are now showing Adverts for their episode Next Saturday at 8:30pm (New years Day)

Could they not do the SCD final on Christmas Eve?

I agree. I would be sad to see it go. Whilst the church going population are in a minority Christians at large are not. In the last census in 2001 well over 40 million people ticked the Christian box in the religion section or roughly 72% of all British people. http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=954

It will have no doubt declined in the census next year but not to the extent that nominal Christians no longer make up the majority.

ITV2 has never been known for its originality though, they're still churning out repeats of X Factor auditions on a loop- as if anyone is interested now- same as they churn out the same old highlights of I'm A Celeb for three weeks after it's finished. At least Channel 4 never did this with Big Brother.

ITV2 repeats shows because they rate well & because the channel budget for original programming is small.

Believe it or not (and I know this forum is extremely unrepresenative of the general population) most people dont have the time or knowledge to spend hours online watching i-players. Thats for kids and people at desk jobs who dont have enough to do!