Local content to suffer under new moves to network programmes from a central sourceBy Peter John Meiklem, Media Correspondent
Being required to sack your own daughter is as tough as call as it gets in management, but that was the situation Radio Tay managing director Ally Ballingall faced last week as his employer Bauer Radio axed 11 regional radio shows across the country.
Ballingall's daughter and Radio Tay presenter Karen B - who broadcasts to a youth-orientated audience of 26,000 a week across Fife and Tayside between 7pm and 10pm every weekday evening - was one of the high-profile casualties in a move that will see local evening FM shows on Radio Forth, West Sound, Radio Borders, Moray Firth, Radio Clyde, Radio Tay and Aberdeen's Northsound replaced with a Scotland-wide show broadcast from Radio Clyde HQ in Clydebank.
Another high-profile show facing the chop is Mark Martin's programme on Forth One, which has about 91,000 listeners every week.
The move has already been condemned by politicians angry that local youth - most of the local radio audience on weekday evenings - are losing services tailored to their specific interests and communities.
Ballingall, who did not return the Sunday Herald's calls, is understood to be a fierce opponent of the change. This position is not based on family sentiment, a well-placed radio source claimed, but belief that maintaining local content in the evening is the best way to lock in local audiences.
The change comes after broadcasting regulator Ofcom relaxed the rules for local radio stations in February this year - a move made in response to the increasing financial struggles of local operators affected by a downturn in advertising spend. Local radio stations now have to broadcast only 10 hours of local content per weekday, a move designed to make local radio companies more financially viable. Previously, the number of hours varied per licence but was almost always more than 10.
Bauer's announcement follows the decision by Real Radio - Bauer's main competitor across central Scotland - to broadcast its evening shows in Scotland from a studio in Manchester, with the sacking of one presenter. Real's sister station Smooth, targeted at older listeners, shed six Scottish presenters last week as owner GMG Radio looked to cut costs.
Travis Baxter, managing director of Big City Radio - Bauer's network of 35 local stations across the UK - said he was still discussing with staff the exact effect of the changes, but added he expected five to six presenters on freelance contracts to be sacked. He said that the net saving to the company - after the costs for setting up the new Scotland-wide programme were taken in account - would be £50,000.
"To a company of Bauer's size it isn't even a hill of beans, showing that we're not cutting content mainly to save money," Baxter said.
The two new Scotland-wide shows - the 7pm to 10pm slot fronted by Radio Clyde's rising star Romeo, real name David Farrell, and the 10pm to 1am show presented by the same station's Gina McKie - will go live from September 15.
Baxter said evening audiences were less focused on news and local information and had instead a greater hunger for entertainment.
"A Scotland-wide show, broadcast from Radio Clyde where we have our most developed technology, will be better able to attract big name celebrities and that is what we feel the audience want. That is the reason we are doing this," he said.
The new show will launch with live appearances from singer Mariah Carey and Welsh rockers Stereophonics, Baxter added. He said he expected the audience for the earlier programme to remain constant with a "30% uplift" for the Late Night Gina McKie programme.
On internal opposition to the change, Baxter said: "I would be shocked if we hadn't had an honest and lively debate."
Real Radio's managing director Billy Anderson said: "Networking is now part of the landscape of the radio industry but it has to be driven by audience demand."
Jocelyn Hay, founder of audience group Voice Of The Listener And Viewer, said the cutbacks were not confined to Scotland: "This is something we are seeing all over commercial radio and it is very regrettable. A lot of people really rely on these programmes and enjoy parts of the show like the local phone-ins."
Ken Garner, a senior lecturer in media studies at Glasgow Caledonian University, said networking shows overnight was a familiar practice but doing so during the evening was something new.
"If they attempted it during the day people would go bonkers and quite rightly so - it would be commercial suicide," he said. "You can get away with it overnight, but mid-evening? We will have to wait and see how audiences react."
Ted Brocklebank, the 65-year-old Conservative broadcasting spokesman - whose St Andrews home, if not age bracket, puts him in Karen B's broadcasting area - said cutting back on locally produced content was a commercial mistake.
"The trend, especially in television, is to make more local programmes, not less. It seems to me this flies in the face of what is happening elsewhere in the Scottish media," he said.
