Review of services: Nations & Regions 36 Annual Report and Accounts 2002/2003 Annual Report and Accounts 2002/2003 37 Nations & Regions is at the heart of the BBC’s relationship with its audiences, connecting with communities in every part of the UK and celebrating the cultures and diversity of modern Britain.An extra £50million investment in local programmes over the past two years has helped win higher audiences and has led to a rise in approval in every part of the country. Fresh ideas and innovative use of technology enhanced all of our services. It was a year of real progress for Nations & Regions. The 6.30pm BBC regional news remained the most popular news programme on British television. BBC regional television news programmes outperformed the commercial competition in all but three areas of the UK. Local radio across England and the national radio services in Scotland,Wales and Northern Ireland reached their highest aggregate audience ever, with 11.1 million adult listeners. The BBC is determined to get closer to audiences across the country. New local services have been created for listeners in North Yorkshire, Wiltshire and Berkshire and viewers in Oxfordshire, East Yorkshire and Lincolnshire now have a full regional news service. Seven new Where I Live websites brought the total to 42 sites in England with a further seven in Scotland, five in Wales and one in Northern Ireland.Total Nations & Regions online page impressions more than doubled from 25.1 million in March 2002 to 52.9 million in March 2003. Audiences to the new politics and current affairs shows have also more than doubled after their move to BBC One in England. New television drama, entertainment and factual programmes in Scotland,Wales and Northern Ireland added to average network share in all three nations. BBC networks reflected the UK ever more consistently with total television hours from the Nations rising by 15%. Highlights included returning series of Monarch of the Glen, Two Thousand Acres of Sky and Film 2002/2003 from BBC Scotland, Messiah 2, Patrick Kielty Almost Live and Sinners from BBC Northern Ireland and Hidden Gardens, Easy Money and Lesley Garrett:The Singer from BBC Wales. 2002 was also the year that the Connecting Communities strategy began to deepen the BBC’s relationship with its audience. BBC Open Centres at radio stations in Blackburn, Liverpool, Sheffield and Stoke enabled local people to learn about the media, acquire IT skills and become involved in community broadcasting. Partnerships with lifelong learning agencies provided more formal courses and longer-term learning.Ten BBC buses took these facilities on the road, carrying PCs and broadcasting equipment to more remote areas. BBC Nations & Regions is committed to enabling audiences to tell their stories in their own words, with projects like Digital Storytelling in Wales and Video Nation in England.The newest initiative, Voices, is built on months of engagement with under-represented local communities. Powerful, heartfelt stories from these sources have been broadcast on all services. Despite the strong share performance of news between 6pm and 7pm, the overall number of viewers has declined (except in Scotland).To address this an ambitious training scheme aims to energise storytelling, exploiting the emerging new technologies of handheld digital cameras and laptop editing. Two hundred staff are being trained every year in a new centre of excellence in Newcastle. Facing page, clockwise from top: Jim Fitzpatrick presents the Northern Ireland opt-out for the Politics Show. The BBC bus in Sunderland where visitors can get online. Michelle Collins and Paul Kaye in the third series of Two Thousand Acres of Sky. Left: Lesley Garrett:The Singer from BBC Wales. 8 6 4 2 0 3.1 1.7 2002/2003 BBC One lunchtime regional news ITV1 lunchtime regional news BBC One early evening regional news ITV1 early evening regional news BBC One late evening regional news ITV1 late evening regional news 5.7 3.7 5.1 n/a* Millions Source: BARB, TNS/Infosys *These figures are not available due to variable scheduling of this news programme Average audience for regional news bulletins The BBC’s 6.30pm regional news is the most popular news programme on British television. Home services Reviewof services: Nations & Regions English Regions The move of English Regions’ current affairs programmes from BBC Two to BBC One more than doubled the audience to an average of 3.4 million viewers a week.The new programmes, with the generic title Inside Out, became the most popular current affairs programmes on BBC One. In January, with the creation of the new Politics Show, regional political coverage followed suit in moving to BBC One. Average audiences for local politics trebled as a result, from 406,000 last year to 1.5 million. A number of landmark programmes celebrating significant regional events, achievements or history have been transmitted across the UK, most notably the archive-driven North East on Film, broadcast on the BBC Two network in March. Local radio in England faces competitive challenges in the big cities, particularly Birmingham and London, where new strategies are being put in place.Weekly listening to BBC London 94.9, however, rose to a new record of 437,000 adults and to BBC WM to 373,000 – both significant gains over the previous year’s figures. Both performance and approval have improved in the North of England. In particular, the new regional news service Look North, based in Hull and serving East Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, quickly established itself as local viewers’ number one choice. Video Nation has now become an English Regions brand, with 18 schemes across the country producing videos for Where I Live sites and Video Nation’s central online portal. Football First was developed to support local grassroots sport at youth level, involving both children and parents in North East England. This is a caption 38 Annual Report and Accounts 2002/2003 Top left: Inside Out presenter David Whiteley. Left: Moses Brazil, a member of Kent’s Romany Gypsy community in Voices. Above: London 94.9 breakfast presenter, Danny Baker. Right: BBC Garden Design event at The Forum in Norwich. Northern Ireland BBC Radio Ulster’s Sony Station of the Year award (for stations with audiences of over 1 million) crowned a year of high achievement, including a near-record audience share of 23.6% in the first quarter of 2003. BBC Northern Ireland’s biggest ever audience outreach programme included a new sub-opt in Enniskillen and summer outside broadcasts including Proms in the Park, attended by 7,000 people.With its successful news, factual and entertainment programmes, these initiatives helped BBC Northern Ireland achieve its best approval score. Performance in current affairs and factual genres was exceptional; the share for current affairs flagship Spotlight was 32%, 7% above network share for the slot, and up 3 percentage points on last year. It won the RTS Best Regional Current Affairs award for its film on the exploitation of migrant workers in Northern Ireland. Local opt-outs added an average of 5% to network share, and BBC One further increased its overall share in Northern Ireland, though it remains 3.3% below the UK average. South City Beat, a series about the police force’s transition from the RUC into the new Police Service for Northern Ireland (PSNI), achieved a healthy 36% share.The sitcom Give My Head Peace celebrated its 50th episode as Northern Ireland’s favourite local programme. The BBC’s coverage of the All Ireland Gaelic Football Championship delivered a 35% audience share and Ireland’s strong performance in the Six Nations Rugby Championship added 11% to network share in Northern Ireland. A strategic review of language provision in Northern Ireland, completed during the year, will inform further development of indigenous language output. 48 local projects gave a voice to communities across the UK. Voices Annual Report and Accounts 2002/2003 39 Above right: Northern Ireland’s Patrick Kielty returned with his series Almost Live. Right:Thousands packed Belfast City Hall grounds for the BBC Proms in the Park. Above: Give My Head Peace. This is a caption Top left: Cast of the new Scottish soap River City. Left: Celtic vs Rangers. Above left: Holyrood Live presenter Iain MacWhirter. Above: BBC Radio Scotland Voices project in Ayrshire. Scotland As the country’s national broadcaster, BBC Scotland set out to strengthen its programme range and quality with new drama, comedy and entertainment, a successful bid for Scottish football rights, and extended news and current affairs coverage for the 2003 Parliamentary elections. BBC One Scotland had a particularly strong year, increasing average share from 24.5% to 25.1% and outperforming ITV for the first time since current records began. Its place at the heart of the nation was demonstrated when it won a massive 63% audience share for coverage of the Hogmanay celebrations. Six nominations for the 2003 Sony Awards demonstrated the quality of BBC Radio Scotland. News and sport remained the cornerstones of the station, playing a key role in increasing the overall reach and creating audience stability. Sportscene, with 55 live football matches, including coverage of every round of Celtic’s march to the final of the UEFA Cup, the Scottish Premier League, Scottish Cup, European and international games, attracted exceptional audiences from across the country and boosted approval for BBC One in Scotland. Reporting Scotland reached a new high of 31.4% audience share, making it the country’s most popular television news programme. Holyrood Live, Politics Scotland, Newsnight Scotland and BBC Radio Scotland combined to create comprehensive political coverage for the first elections since the Scottish Parliament was established. Perhaps the boldest move has been the launch of a new Scottish soap, River City, a twice-weekly drama series featuring local writers and performing talent that generated intense interest at launch. Against tough competition, it has settled down with a loyal and stable audience share of around 22%. 40 Annual Report and Accounts 2002/2003 Reviewof services: Nations & Regions Wales Television programmes for Welsh audiences enjoyed some notable successes, including The Story of Welsh with Huw Edwards and Love on the Rock, a docusoap set on Bardsey Island.The popularity of live televised sport on BBC Wales was demonstrated when the audience for the live Wales v Italy Euro 2004 qualifying match peaked at over 500,000 viewers – the highest BBC Two Wales audience for any programme for over six years. Snooker, golf, bowls and, in particular, rugby all improved on network audience share. Wales Today performed strongly – nearly 17.4% above ITV’s early evening news in Wales – and the award-winning current affairs series Week In Week Out continued its strong showing. BBC Wales provided ten hours of Welsh language programming per week for S4C, including Pobol Y Cwm. Light entertainment programming was expanded on both BBC One Wales and the new digital channel BBC 2W. Particular successes were Pub Quiz and the new sitcom High Hopes.While Valleys-based drama Belonging continued to attract a loyal following, The Bench and First Degree were not recommissioned. BBC Wales’ English language station BBC Radio Wales achieved its highest audience to date for the first quarter of 2003 with a record 527,000 listeners a week. BBC Radio Cymru,Wales’ only Welsh language service, extended its daily broadcasts by two hours, providing more live contributions from around Wales and new evening programmes for younger listeners. A major Digital Storytelling project has resulted in the creation of 96 digital stories at monthly workshops around Wales. As part of its Digi-nation vision, BBC Wales has also opened two community studios serving North East and South West Wales. Top right: Perplexed quizmaster (John Sparkes) in BBC Wales’ comedy Pub Quiz. Right: BBC National Orchestra of Wales. Left: Huw Edwards told The Story of Welsh. Below:Week In,Week Out presenter Louise Elliott. Annual Report and Accounts 2002/2003 41 Radio services across the nations and regions reached a record 11 million listeners in the first quarter of 2003. Down our way