RIG Chair Makes 'Robust' Speech to WMF Conference

Posted on 19th May 2009

THE TIME IS NOW...PARITY WITH TV AND ONLINE FOR RADIO INDIES!

The Westminster Media Forum held their keynote seminar "The Future of Independent Media Production and Investment In Content" on Monday 18th May 2009. The event saw a large audience of independent producers (mostly TV), executives from Ofcom, DCMS and the BBC and a delegation from RIG. The first session was supposed to be chaired by Ed Vaizey MP, Shadow Minister for the Arts, but for reasons unannounced, he failed to attend, which was a real let down for many who had wanted to target their information, issues and questions to a senior MP.

In the first panel, founding RIG member Jez Nelson spoke about the reality of life as a radio indie in the modern world, the near-monopoly of the BBC, and the need for expansion in to other areas of business to survive.

In thesecond panel, RIG Chair Neil Gardner spoke passionately about the failure of the Government and commissioners, particularly the BBC, to egage with the independent radio production sector, the historic marginalisation of the sector, and the current need for parity with TV and online indies. He called on the BBC to open up a 25% WoCC underpinned by a 25% quota for radio indies, and on the Government to put in place a 25% quota of all publicly funded content to be produced by indies, starting with the COI.

RIG's three points of contention were:

[1]        Parity – independent TV producers are given access to 50% of the BBC’s output through a mixture of enforced quota and the Window of Creative Competition.  In radio, we get around 10% of eligible output...eligible being a term even the BBC can’t define accurately...and this is a voluntary amount ‘gifted’ by the BBC and done so with nothing like pleasure on their part. Solution – give radio indies a 25% WoCC underpinned by a 25% quota...give us parity!

[2]        Meritocracy – the public pay their money expecting it to fund the best programmes and the best ways of delivering those programmes.  But without a fair quota in radio, many ideas and proposals from indies are rejected because the commissioning editors are required to ‘protect’ their in house production departments’ guaranteed quotas.  Where’s the meritocracy?  Solution – a 25% WoCC would ensure a meritocratic system of commissioning and allow the public’s money to be spent on the best idea, whether it be indie or in-house.

[3]        Capacity - With in-house units losing producers and staff to regular redundancies, there is capacity problem. BECTU and the NUJ can tell you all about the over-worked underpaid status of our colleagues in-house. But the indie sector is screaming for the work, has the talent and the ideas...our capacity grows with the work we win.  Where do many of the best former BBC producers go when they are made redundant...the indie sector, joining the existing pool of talented producers, writers, directors and sound engineers who have come from many other backgrounds and disciplines! And we use the same pool of freelancers the BBC does.  BBC in-house units have to hire freelance staff to help fulfil their commissions. Something doesn’t quite add up here.  Solution – it’s the same one as before, a 25% WoCC underpinned by a 25% quota will relieve the in house units of their overworked status and allow the producers to focus on one programme at a time.  Removing freelancer costs and allowing indies to take on the work and hire the freelancers retains the access to talent, reduces BBC accounting costs and widens the talent pool.

To read the entire speech CLICK HERE