Sunday, 15 April 2012

Hit The North

I don't know if you've heard, but some parts of the BBC have moved up north.  There hasn't been a great deal of media coverage and the whole thing has passed off without much comment so it's possible the whole thing has passed you by.  Oh no, hang on - that was in a parallel universe where common sense prevails.  Yep, it's not been a good week to be from the north and resident in London.  Tuesday saw BBC Breakfast's first broadcast from their new home at Media City in Salford, marking the end of "phase one" of the migration of staff to the north and arguably the highest profile move yet, certainly in terms of airtime.  And it's driven the media insane. 

There's been an awful lot of very vocal negative chatter about the relocation of the services, including Radio 5 Live, CBBC and BBC Sport as well as the aforementioned morning news programme.  I realised I don't say often enough how much of a wonderful initiative BBC North is - so here goes.  I don't think anyone can really have missed the main argument in favour that has already been much talked about - that the move will put the corporation closer to more of the people that pay for it, better reflect their lives and represent their interests more than is done at present.  Predictably though the controversy has mainly centred around whether Breakfast will be able to attract guests to the sofa in Salford as easily as they did in London.  This in itself is quite a frustrating debate, given that Breakfast is a news programme for over three and a half hours, with just over half an hour at the end devoted to fluffy showbiz stuff (mainly as a spoiler to stop viewers switching over to ITV1's Lorraine and then potentially staying there throughout daytime).  Perhaps the freelance journos doing much of the harping over the move only wake up towards the end of the programme and presume the rest of it pre-8.40 is much the same?

The jury's still out on whether there will be a drop in quality of the guests in this segment (although it perhaps wasn't a wise move to wheel out Shaun Ryder on day two - presumably Peter Kay will follow next week) but it's typical of the tone of the debate that it has been framed by such largely unimportant issues.  Although Breakfast was a late addition to the list of areas moving north, it's arguably the best-placed out of the news output to be broadcast from somewhere else, having as it does a much greater emphasis on domestic human-interest stories.  It'll come as a shock to my neighbours but some of these stories happen outside London and the south east.  For every C-list comedian promoting yet another panel show that can't be bothered to make the trip anymore, the team will be much closer to the heart of so many news stories and their makers that were previously out of reach.

This week also saw a focus on the safety of the area that BBC North is based in, particularly in a Telegraph article that heavily hinted that, basically, Salford is pretty rough, and those relocating from London W12 were in for a bit of a shock.  In fact, those who have spent any time in that delightful area of London will know how dodgy the White City estate that borders much of the BBC's property is.  The idea that "the north" is by definition grim and crime-ridden - presumably in contrast to London - is laughable.  I do love the capital but since moving to London it's never failed to amaze me quite how many shitty areas with not much going for them are crammed into this city, and the punchline is that most of them are ridiculously overpriced too, so it's a little ironic for a city like this to hold this perception.

There's also the story of the staff moving up to Media City.  It's no doubt a very difficult personal situation for those in departments moving north, especially those with partners and children also based in the capital, and I fully understand and sympathise with the decisions of those who have decided not to make the move.  What doesn't get talked about so much in the rush to dramatise the relocation of many staff to the new site is how the project will change the way in which many people end up working in television.  Every year, so many people are required to move to London in order to have any chance of working in their chosen area of the media.  I did it, my fiancée did it, many of my friends from university did it.  Unlike many professions it just isn't possible to remain in your local area to work in TV or radio, unless you're one of the few in the dwindling local TV and radio operations.  The demise of regional ITV companies is a case in point.  Had I been born twenty years earlier I or anyone else would have been able to work in a presentation department in a dozen cities across the UK, rather than the handful that remain now.  So the requirement of staff to move for their job - many of whom were born in London and have always worked in London - doesn't seem too much of a strain to those of us who already have, the family committments excepted (for the record, my job was re-sited in Leeds last year, and had there not been alternative positions offered I would have been tempted to relocate).

Whilst BBC North won't reverse the situation overnight, it will in future mean that those looking to work in TV and radio have the option to look to the north west as well as the south east.  In a small but significant way it will help to counterbalance the unfortunate huge bias towards the capital.  The initial relocations involved may have costs attached, but that's the same for any job that requires you to move location.  And don't listen to those who ask what the point of a new northern operation filled full of southerners is.  Over time, as people move on, the services based in Salford will recruit those from surrounding areas - perhaps even those who would otherwise not have considered relocating to London - and so represent the north of England far better than is done currently.  It will save money in the long term by not having to pay them London-weighted wages, and avoid the relatively huge cost of doing anything in the south east.  And on the subject of the staff moving north, there are bizarre double standards being attached by the press to this process.  Every "total number of staff agreeing to move north" story was accompanied by a chorus of crowing saying that the fact it wasn't 100% meant the strategy was a flop.  The same papers were then incredulous that the new complex didn't employ that many people from the north west - i.e. it had given most roles to their existing staff from London!
The issue of travelling from London brings us back to the thorny issue of getting the guests.  It's actually pretty recent for there not to be a regular networked show airing from outside London.  Through the 70s, 80s and early 90s, Pebble Mill managed to pull in what passed as "showbiz" turns in those days - admittedly Birmingham being not as far from London as Salford is but still, way outside zone 6.  Saturday morning TV on the BBC and ITV has managed to air from Southhampton, Glasgow, Manchester and Newcastle and not end up short of talent.  The oft-quoted example of This Morning moving from Liverpool to London was in fact not entirely driven by the quest for guests.  It was as much a result of Richard and Judy's desire to relocate and the fact that Granada had just acquired LWT and so now had a London riverside studio complex they could use.  Today, there are three trains an hour from London Euston to Manchester Picadilly each taking a little over two hours - a length of time that some (slightly barmy) people take to commute into or across London every day.  Media City is also closer to Manchester Airport than Television Centre is to Heathrow.  If the guests want the publicity, they will come.  If they don't, it's hardly Parkinson.  The programme will not suffer.

What hasn't helped is a number of examples of senior managers not practicing what they preach by relocating from London along with their staff (Peter Salmon, I'm looking at you).  One of Breakfast's anchors hasn't helped the issue by not only remaining in London but announcing that, somewhat bizarrely, they intends to commute every single day, rather than managing to spend a whole three nights a week in the north.  It's hardly helped the cause of the project and gives rise to the impression that the whole thing will be rolled back in a year or two.  It won't - because it's legacy is the key to the success of the project.  In time, the difficulties and controversies will be forgotten and everyone will realise that yes, funnily enough it is possible to run output from outside of London.  Not only that but the output might just get out of the mindset of the London bubble that is happy to mention Oxford Street, Covent Garden and Ealing but largely sticks to generic names such as "North Yorkshire" and "East Lincolnshire" when covering stories from outside the capital. 
I love it here in London - I really do - but I also love the northern cities which I grew up with and they have only improved in the interim.  As the operation beds in over time, and the workforce becomes predominantly local (and Virgin Trains and Manchester landlords stop being the main winners) we'll wonder what all the fuss was about.  Perhaps it should even go further - Radio 1 would be a particularly good fit for moving outside London.  It's not often you look to Nicky Campbell as a beacon of reason and good sense but in an interview with The Guardian three years ago he said  "When people say such and such a programme can't be done in Manchester we just look like's not as if I am going to Helmand province."  There's a risk of us in London looking very silly if we don't stop harping on about it and patronising everyone who lives outside the south east.  When the name "Capital" is seen as a suitable name for a national radio network and the petty squabbling in the London mayoral campaign is reported in the national media you do wonder if the battle has already been lost.  The BBC deserve credit for attempting to do something about this, and I'm happy to give it to them.


peezedtee said...

In the 1970s I ran an outfit called Campaign for the North (based in Hebden Bridge), so you will not be surprised to learn that I warmly endorse every word of the above. Broadcasting was actually one of the subjects we covered and we were pressing for more regional decentralisation by the BBC in particular. (I must say we never imagined that regional ITV was destined to disappear.) Your comments about the London media mentality are exactly the sort of thing we were publishing then!

jonabuft said...

Thank you - yes it is one of those debates that never seems to go away isn't it! I think if anything it's got worse over the years (and I mean the general mindset of the London media rather than closure of facilities outside London).

Shimmin Beg said...

(actually a reply to Richard, but apparently I can't do that using Google ID...)
As I remember reading, Parliament used to go around the country sitting in various posh people's houses, since the toffs had actual estates to run and so on. Always thought it'd be an interesting one to try out again.

Good post, Jonathan, cheers for that.

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