Key quotes from Mark Thompson's speech
- Published
³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Director General Mark Thompson delivered the James MacTaggart Memorial Lecture at the 2010 Edinburgh International Television Festival. Here are some of his key quotes.
ON THE FUTURE OF THE ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ
"In a year or so's time, there will be a debate about the future level of the licence fee. For the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ, I believe this will be a moment for realism and a recognition of the scale of the challenge facing licence payers and the country as a whole."
"Do not believe anyone who claims that cutting the licence fee is a way of growing the creative economy... A pound out of the commissioning budget of the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ is a pound out of UK creative economy. Once gone, it will be gone forever."
"Radical and rapid change inside the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ is... essential."
ON THE ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ'S CRITICS
"Systematic press attacks on broadcasters, and especially on the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ, are nothing new... but the scale and intensity of the current assaults does feel different."
"But - perhaps surprisingly - there's no evidence that any of this is having any effect on public attitudes to the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ at all."
"The same commercial and political forces which are undermining the independence of the public broadcasters in other European countries - Italy and France spring to mind - are at work here as well. In the UK, they know that a frontal assault will fail so they adopt different tactics... Sometimes calls for transparency turn out to be a cloak for something else."
ON THE ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ'S RELATIONSHIP WITH ITS AUDIENCE
"On the Tuesday after the General Election, over 17 million viewers joined us on ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ One during the evening to see events unfold. They came to ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ One because, along with ITV1, it remains one of the nation's front rooms."
"Across the UK population, 71% of people say they're glad the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ exists."
"[Audiences] want the best and they want it all year round, which is why nowadays at the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ we play pieces like Sherlock, The Normans and Rev in high summer."
"The public don't seem to want fewer or thinner services from the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ. Indeed, as we've seen this year with 6 Music, proposals to remove even niche services can be greeted with real dismay. "
ON SKY
"Sky has an annual turnover of £5.9bn, of which £4.8bn is from its core retail subscription business. That revenue line alone is £1.1 billion more than the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's UK public service turnover."
"Sky's marketing budget is larger than the entire programme budget of ITV1. As a proportion of Sky's own turnover and its profits, its investment in original British content is just not enough."
"With Sky News and Sky Arts, the company has... shown a commitment to services which share many values with the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and the other PSBs. Sky is not the enemy of quality British Television - it's an important provider of it.
"But when it comes to investing in original British production, it's a different picture. When ITV was the dominant commercial player in UK television, it poured money into original programming and often in key genres - like drama in the 1980s and 1990s - it did a better job than the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ."
"It's time that Sky pulled its weight by investing much, much more in British talent and British content. "
ON CUTTING COSTS
"We've committed to reduce senior manager numbers by a fifth by the end of next year. That's a minimum. If we can go further, we will."
"We will take the money we save by all these measures and invest it in the central mission of the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ - which is to commission, make and distribute the best and most creative content to the British public."