LOCAL LIBDEMS - BORDER TV MUST BE RETAINED (Jim Hume)

LOCAL LIBDEMS - BORDER TV MUST BE RETAINED

December 19, 2007 12:00 AM

During a Parliamentary debate in the Scottish Parliament, Jim Hume, MSP for the South of Scotland, called on Ofcom not to accept ITV Chief Michael Grade's proposal to merge Border TV with either STV or Tyne Tees.

Jim Hume said:-

"Michael Grade has made public his wish to see Border TV merged with and operated from either Tyne Tees in Gateshead or STV in Glasgow.

"This is quite frankly a retrograde step in public service broadcasting.

"I plea to Ofcom, who has the final say, to reject any formal merger proposals from ITV on Border TV. Let's not forget that we're talking about a public broadcasting service, one which has up until now served its viewers very well and has viewing records to prove it.

"It's not just news and current affairs that will be affected. I have spoken in the past about the people of the Border TV region having distinct identities and I fear that viewers will miss out on coverage of the more localised festivals and cultural traditions that go on each year.

The MSP continued:-

"The Scottish Borders enjoys good coverage of the common ridings festivals for example - Borderers are hugely passionate about the common ridings tradition, going back nearly 500 years. All unique and unequalled in the rest of Scotland.

"And the south west has its immensely popular and successful Wigtown Book Festival. I fear that any coverage of this ten day long event will be totally outsized if the merge with Tyne Tees or STV goes ahead. Its 145 miles from Gateshead to Wigtown and 180 miles from the furthest Border TV area place to Gateshead, a 9 hour round trip. The Border TV region already is vast enough without merging it with Tyne Tees or lumping it into central Scotland coverage.

"The message to Ofcom and Michael Grade is simple - keep Border TV in its current operating form."