Does this match the music policy for Free Radio? Are they sharing same songs yet?

Gem could stay as it is playing 80's, 90's, 00's and now as the area is not served with an AM licence for a Gem 2.

Gem could form the basis of a new portfolio, Bauer City 4. Stations in this portfolio are not served with a Greatest Hits Network on AM in the areas they serve. The playlist for these stations would be 80's, 90's, 00's and now like Heart unlike Bauer City 1 which is like Capital.

The stations would air a weekly 80's show which may also air on The Greatest Network Bauer City 2 and air The Big Top 40 on Sunday Afternoons which also airs on Bauer City 1.

The Bauer City 4 Network would consist of:

GEM in the East Midlands
CFM in Cumbria and South Scotland
Radio Borders in the Scottish Borders
Westsound FM in Dumfries and Galloway

Westsound FM in Dumfries and Galloway is part of Bauer City 2 The Greatest Hits Network, the area is not served with a Bauer City 1 station so airs The Big Top 40 on Sunday which sticks out like a sore thumb compared to the rest of the output. Putting Westsound FM in the Bauer City 4 portfolio will ensure younger audiences and older audiences are served equally in this area playing 80's, 90's, 00's and now.

Each station will have local output as now between 06.00 - 19.00 weekdays. 4 hours on Saturday and 4 hours on Sundays. Outside of these hours programming will come from Gem in the East Midlands.

Every year on Christmas morning since Radio Borders started in 1990 it has aired a show, The Great Battery Giveaway, where people can come down to the studios to pick up those all-important batteries for toys and devices which came without them.

However, looking at the Christmas Day schedules for this year there is no local output at all from Tweedbank on that day, meaning no more The Great Battery Giveaway either.

Sad state of affairs Steven

Don't the usual rules apply even on Christmas Day? There should be at least 4 local hours. Or do Ofcom not even care about that any more?

I checked Radio City and they have a gap between 12 and 4 on their schedule. The rest looks normal with Paddy McGuiness and the Chart show.

Westsound is shared with West FM.

I think Bauer will make 12 - 4 local on the fm stations.

Westsound and west fm are separate stations. Some shows come from West fms Ayr studios with the rest of the local showd coming from Dumfries.

Probably would have been gone a few years ago if they lost the sponsorship for it. This was the year clearly James Stewart and Son didn't want to do it.

I looked on facebook and there was meantion of it up to 2014 but not 2015.

Bauer City 1 Scotland

Christmas Eve

6am Grant Thomson
9am Boogie and Arlene
12pm Weekend Anthems
2pm Local slot
6pm Floorfillers
10pm Floorfillers chilled

Christmas Day

6am Ryan Bothwick
9am Fat Brestovca
12pm Not sure should be local
4pm Big top 40
7pm Darryl Morris

City 1 England

Christmas Eve

6am Simon Morykin
9am Mike and Kelly
12pm Weekend anthems
2pm local
6pm as Scotland

Christmas day

6am Wes Butters
9am Paddy
12pm think its local
4pm as Scotland

Some stations will have regional varations

12pm on Christmas Day is Grant Thomson on all Bauer City 1 Scotland stations.

Oh right I thought that would have just been Clyde

Schedules haven't been fully updated yet, Paddy isn't back on until the New Year and neither is Darryl, probably be updated later in the week.

Presenters on Gem have mentioned a Ricky D being on in the evening on Christmas Eve?

Gem only has a standard schedule on their website

I don't listen to Bauer City 1 (Forth one) much anymore unless someone has the station on.
As for The Greatest Hits Network( Forth 2) I still listen to that but not as much as I used to a few years ago.
Christmas day as well as New Years day schedules on some of the station don't seem as local as they used to be.

Darren

They will be updated in a few days time.

Free radio and gem will have a new website soon.

Will they definitely be getting new websites? Very hard to find anything on Free and Gem's current ones.

Could be someone new covering for Kam Kelly on Gem's Weekend Anthems, he's off at the minute.

I think stations can inform Ofcom they won't be doing local hours on those days - I believe as long as they know in advance and it's occasional. Capital does not seem to be doing local shows on Christmas or Boxing Day from the schedules I've seen.

It's nothing new to Ofcom - I seem to remember GWR running no local programming on some of their stations over a couple of days over the Christmas period 18/19 years ago.

The original service of GWR "The Mix" started on Christmas Eve 1995. It was set up to provide a sustaining service over Christmas for 2CR, DevonAir, GWR Wiltshire and GWR Bristol. (I think that was the first 4)!

There were full programmes on The Mix all day over Christmas as a regular occurrance. Network shows started at 1900 on Christmas Eve, right through to 0600 on 27th. There was also sustained programmes everywhere from 1900 on New Year's Eve to 0600 on 2nd January.

Didn't Late Night Love start in 1995?

The GWR stations in the Midlands all took that from the start.

Going back on topic, as far as OFCOM are concerned, I believe the whole period between Christmas and New Year is treated as a Bank Holiday, so either no or very few local shows are required.

Late Night Love would have been the first programme but only that programme would have been sent originally. The full sustaining service did not start until Christmas 1995.

As for the Christmas period in general I thinky ou may be right - as most people are on holiday there is less local content going out anywhere.

Would Radio 210 / 210FM / 2-Ten FM been part of the original group too?
They had the early merger with 2CR.