BBC Scotland. Kasia Raj/Flickr. Some rights reservedIncreased autonomy for BBC Scotland has been on the agenda for many years, and periodically constitutional change in the UK has driven developments in both structure and programming. As long ago as the late 1970s, Alastair Hetherington, then Controller of BBC Scotland, was asking for devolved budgets and operational control for Scotland – for which request he was exiled to run Radio Highland (which he greatly loved, as it happens, being a keen walker). The idea of a special ‘service agreement’ for BBC Scotland, through which it would control its own finances and operations, was mooted by senior corporation figures at a conference on PSB, held at Glasgow University on 13 January.
Broadcasting in Scotland has been looked at through the lens of the constitutional question since 1999, when devolution catalysed the initial debate about news coverage in Scotland – the so-called ‘Scottish Six’ affair, which has not yet been laid to rest. BBC Scotland didn’t get the Six, that is, its own non-network take on Scottish, national and international news. In evidence to the Scottish Parliament’s Education and Culture Committee on 12 January, the BBC’s Director-General, Tony Hall, alluded to the Six and the need to review news and current affairs provision in Scotland and elsewhere in the UK. That’s one to watch.
The current debate in Scotland has been shaped by a report by the Scottish Broadcasting Commission in 2008, set up by Alex Salmond MSP when he was First Minister. This initiative was driven by two forces: political interest and producer interest. The first was about completing the portfolio of Scottish national institutions by setting up a Scottish broadcaster. The latter was about upping the prospects for production and commissioning north of the border. Audience research was conducted for the Scottish Broadcasting Commission (SBC)’s 2008 report, but this rationale has always been the weakest part of the argument for change. It should be revisited now in the context of changing delivery systems and consumption patterns.
