Interesting piece of information Gisela Stuart MP referred to In a House Of Commons debate the other day and the fact being that although Birmingham and the surrounding West Midlands area contributes a total of a quarter of the BBC licence fee funding, the BBC only invests back £12.50 per head of population back into the region compared to £755 per head in London.

This is absolutely disgusting treatment by the BBC to our area. and not only are we being short changed investment wise while the bulk of funding goes to London and Manchester, the BBC is disgracefully neglecting our second city which deserves far better and there is absolutely no excuse for the BBC in not allowing a more equal distribution of licence fee money which we West Midlands citizens give them with more than enough funding.

Totally agree. Glad I'm not the only one who has noticed that Birmingham seems to be neglected not just by the BBC but by the whole broadcasting industry. To watch British TV or listen to British radio, you'd think Manchester was our second city...

Not the only one, I agree and I know lots of people who also agree. Lets look at BBC London 94.9. They broadcast 24 hours a day have more staff but if you look at the listening figures than WM has better ones than them!

listened to sunny and shay for the first time today. Jesus it's poor. Sound very amateurish. Glad mollie has been on in the day a bit of late.
I wonder what the listening figures are per show, can you get those?

I'm not a big speedway fan but I do enjoy WM's excellent coverage.Why is it on only DAB and not FM and FM listeners get that dreadful Mark Forrest show that sounds like it should be on mid morning smooth radio ?

No matter how dire they are a Sunny and Shay show is probably WM's cheapest option and all they can afford given how the BBC has totally screwed the West Midlands area up good and proper with lack of investment and given the fact that this region contributes a quarter to the licence fee funding pot !!

Disgraceful is what I calls it !

Surely the cheapest option would be to rejig the schedule and extend other shows or have a solo presenter from 2-4 rather than paying for a double act who I believe normally live outside the area. If that is the case I imagine the fee has to be worth their while.

I think it's out of WM's hands! It is also online and now WM is on Freeview it's on there too.

Fair enough.Thanks for the info.

Out of interest, why would the decision be out of the BBC WM's hands?

I'm guessing there would be a BBC Local Radio-wide directive for stations to carry the Mark Forrest show except when there is major local sport (so live football and in some cases rugby union or league), but why would it be deemed necessary for them to split the platforms when there is coverage of a minority sport like speedway? Also, what happens when WM covers women's football - does that get the same DAB/online-only treatment? I rarely listen via FM these days so haven't been in a position to check in the past.

I'd like to see WM and other BBC Local Radio stations be allowed to opt out of the Forrest show more liberally, for example on busy Tuesday nights of non-league football I'd like to see the return of WM's occasional non-league specials where they'd have reporters at numerous local non-league grounds. Perhaps tonight is not the best example, as I don't think any of the patch's major non-league clubs have been in action, but BBC Coventry & Warwickshire could have offered live coverage tonight as both Nuneaton Town and Leamington were playing.

On a similar subject, what are WM's plans for this Saturday? What with it being an international football weekend (meaning their Championship and Premier League clubs are not in action), I'm guessing they'll do commentary on Chesterfield v Walsall in League One - but will they also have reports on a number of local non-league clubs?

Also, given how they sometimes struggle to get Saddlers-supporting callers on international Saturdays after they have played (and it probably doesn't help that Walsall are away this weekend in this respect), it would be good if they dedicate part of their post-match hour on Saturday to a retrospective of Walsall's Johnstone's Paint Trophy Final. In one of the past couple of seasons, I remember hearing WM taking a look back at Walsall's 2001 Division Two Play-Off winning season using archive audio during the final hour on an international weekend matchday and I thought that was a really good listen, so something similar to look back on Sunday would be very welcome.

When there is Women's Football they also split the platforms. I remember when WM first started would their Speedway coverage on DAB, When there is T20 Cricket on it's on FM as well (apart from last summer on one Friday when Tony Blackbore was on) Richard Wilford said on twitter something along the lines of it's out of our hands. But it's not cutting any costs so I can't think why.

I haven't heard anyone say yet what non league WM will be at. It was said often over the weekend that they will be at some of the games.

WM are NOT covering Cradley v Birmingham tonight and didn't last week!

The decision to opt from Mark Forrest for sport is pretty much up to individual stations.

I should imagine an eyebrow would be raised if a station decided to do so every night, but a wide variety of sports have been covered, and I don't think there's any guidance against, say, non-league football, ice hockey, speedway or anything else.

I guess the decision to leave Mark on FM would be based on the sport on offer being such a minority taste that there's a risk in disrupting the regular listen (even if it's not so local). If you are a speedway fan, you'll make the effort to find it online or DAB.

But I get the counter argument that if you're doing local speech output at an off-peak moment anyway, you might as well have some confidence in it and shout about it on FM.

Horses (and motorbikes) for courses...

blimey! just passed through and tuned into the sunny and shay show. last time i listened was on their first show, definitely both have had elocution lessons

sunny sounds like one of the charactures from a charles dickens novel

Thanks for the information and thoughts on the Mark Forrest/local sport platform splits Connor and Harris Tweed.


These are Saturday's matches from the top three tiers of the non-league involving clubs that are in BBC WM's patch:

Conference North
Chorley v Tamworth
Hednesford Town v Oxford City
Solihull Moors v Gloucester City

Evo-Stik Northern League Premier Division
FC United of Manchester v Stourbridge
Halesowen Town v Stafford
Rushall Olympic v Frickley Athletic

Evo-Stik Southern League Premier Division
Histon v Redditch United

Coverage of most/all of those seven games plus Chesterfield v Walsall would be pretty good in my opinion. Also, feel free to copy and paste the above list if it would be useful for you in your posts detailing the WM Sport coverage details in the Radio Football Commentators and Reporters thread.

I would take a guess and say they will have updates on the home matches and maybe one away team.

Iain Lee said that he only found out today when he was taking to someone in the office that he wasn't on next week and he was going to come in so, why can't WM put him on at 12pm - 2pm?

Normal 'Voice' is off sick, so 'Cousin Voice' or 'Murmur' in some circles is standing in this morning.

Its one year since Debi took over the Hunter role(& Michelle Dawes took over the God slot brekky slot!).

Graham posted on his Facebook page recently that he will soon be reunited with old friends in the East Midlands too!

I wish we could have their programme.

I used to be able to listen to LBC at this time of night but now Ian "tory" Collins has took it over I can no longer listen. So I have nothing to listen to. I might go around the other BBC local radio stations and see what their like.

Didnt know he had any?

I thought he'd only broadcast in the West Mids area.

More cutbacks if he's going out on the East stations too!

Shades of the old Late Show circa 90's to early 2000's then!

If you havent heard this morning, Rebecca Wood is covering the Hunter role for Debi next week.

I shant give the answer for today's show out but nice allude to another former radio station of this parrish!

Anyone note the other subtle cutback this morning?

Wm didnt start until 7am this morning.

On a Bank Holiday, they would have started at 6am!

Yes and also they had a "70s day" Today and on Good Friday it was a "number one day". This meant they didn't need to use many producers. Very lazy.

I know it's a bank holiday but you still hope for news and interviews at Breakfast and a phone Inn (even if it's not like the normal one) and with the Leaders debate on Thursday I was hoping for a phone inn on this. I wander If on the next bank holiday when there's no sport if they will do this again.

I also notice that the morning sports news is now red but Steve Hermon who works for the news team so I guess this is more cost cutting. On a Saturday Jonny Palmer no longer does the sport it a recorded report from the person reading the sports news Friday night with the news reader giving any overnight sports news.

I listen to Danny Kelly one day in the week the first hour was ok but after that just terrible it was a few phone calls about a light heated topic and a consumer half an hour and around that it was just music. Very disappointing.

Rebecca Wood back for an unscheduled second week on Hunted, as Debbie Massey is off ill.

Belated 40th birthday greetings to our Mol for Friday just gone.

(I would've texted in, but I couldn't be a**sed!)

Cazza Martin returned to late night radio last night covering for Torrington. Sadly wasn't a chatshow like The Sanctuary.