I must add my voice to the chorus of anger greeting BBC Scotland's decision to axe the long-running Radio Scotland programmes Newsweek and Scotland at Ten ("Anger as BBC plans to axe Scottish jobs", The Herald, January 18).
As a long-time presenter of the latter, and its predecessor Politics Tonight, I know the disappearance of these programmes will be a loss to the detailed scrutiny of Scottish politics, at a time when constitutional debate has never been higher and threatens to drown out many other political issues. The BBC Trust must act to ease the financial pressure on BBC Scotland which is, apparently, driving decisions like this.
Having worked in London, as well as Glasgow and Edinburgh, I know the BBC's Scottish operation has always been much leaner than that in London, yet the same level of cuts has been demanded and implemented. Once Radio Scotland staff, with a fraction of the resources, proudly strived to match the excellence of Radio 4's news and current affairs coverage for England. Now even that is being denied them.
Kit Fraser (BBC Scotland 1976/2009),
Kilrush,
Belhaven Road,
Dunbar.
Your article did not accurately reflect the BBC's position. One third of Radio Scotland's production staff will not lose their jobs. The 11 post reductions in news are part of a package of cuts required of the BBC as a result of the licence fee settlement, which will require a £16 million reduction in BBC Scotland's annual budget by 2017 and a reduction of between 100 and 120 posts. In news, 30 posts will be lost over the next five years from a workforce in that area of about 240.
You report that the Radio Scotland news programmes Newsweek and Scotland At Ten will go. However, there will be no reduction in news and current affairs output on radio. Nor will there be impact on quality.
The one-hour Newsweek will be replaced by a two-hour news programme. Instead of Scotland at Ten, we will have more regular daily politics slots within our daily radio news output and there will be an extra one-hour news and current affairs programme on Saturdays.
Ian Small,
Head of Public Policy & Corporate Affairs,
BBC Scotland,
40 Pacific Quay,
Glasgow.
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