Britain Television Launches TV Pilot Scheme To Enhance The News Experience

The Tyne Tees and Borders television region has been selected for a pilot scheme to develop new and innovative ways of providing local and regional news, Culture Secretary Ben Bradshaw announced today.

This pilot region, in addition to one in Scotland and one in Wales, will trial Independently Funded News Consortia (IFNCs) which are being created to support sustainable multi-platform regional news.

As well as broadcasting in the regional news slots on channel 3 (ITV and STV), the consortia will be expected to provide increased local news using multi-media technology. IFNCs were a recommendation of the Digital Britain White Paper.

The tender process to run each of the three IFNC pilots was also launched today with an independent panel expected to select the successful consortia in each region by March 2010.

Ben Bradshaw said:

“It is clear that people want high quality local news from more than one source. The huge increase in viewers and readers seeking information about the terrible floods in Cumbria over the last week is a clear demonstration of that.

Its importance to local democracy, coupled with the acute challenge being faced by commercial news companies, means there is a need for Government support. These three pilot programmes are a key step to preserving the long term future of regional news.

“As well as providing a good mix of urban and rural areas, holding a pilot that spans the Tyne Tees and Borders regions will improve the current provision of regional news in the Scottish Borders and English Borders by having a far more localised news service, which the audience wants.

The Scottish borders could get a wholly Scottish regional news service and the English borders area could see a more local and regional news service.

“In return for public investment, the successful bidders for each of the three pilots must demonstrate innovation and commitment to deliver trustworthy news on a variety of different platforms.”

The Digital Britain White Paper set out the Government’s intention to run pilots in Scotland, Wales and one English region.

Tyne Tees and Borders has been selected as the English region because plurality of local news sources there raises particularly significant concerns: changes in the regional news scheduling earlier this year have reduced the offer of broadcast local news whilst the distribution of local newspapers is relatively low compared to the rest of England.

The broad geographical area will benefit from a more localised news service. The area also provides a good test case for an IFNC covering both urban and rural neighbourhoods.

Currently, the Tyne Tees and Borders area incorporates two ITV licence regions.

They form a cross border region serving part of the North West, south and south west Scotland as well as north east England.

Running a pilot in this region alongside a pilot in Scotland could allow those in Scotland to receive Scottish news instead of English news.

Through the IFNC process, the Government expects to create a news service provided by Scotland for Scotland, addressing concerns of many viewers in the region. This would require some technical engineering to existing transmitters to make this happen.

Interested parties for the IFNC pilots have until 11 December to levy expressions of interest and 30 December to submit the final Pre Qualification Questionnaire (PQQ) which will be assessed by published criteria early in the New Year.

All three pilots are expected to be up and running in 2010.

Topics: Governance, government, news, pilot show, regional news, scheme, television, TV

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