The BBC has revealed that it is spending far more per head on people in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland than in England.
The corporation is spending the most per person in Wales, £83.60, followed by Northern Ireland, at £83.40 per person and then Scotland at £72.20. The figure for England is £52.10.
The breakdown of spending was presented by BBC strategy and digital director James Purnell at last week’s Institute of Welsh Affairs conference, which debated an extensive media audit of Wales that warned of a “democratic deficit” due to cuts in spending on Welsh TV.
The per capita figures, which include content and distribution, are highest in Wales, partly because of the expense of providing Welsh language services for the 562,000 Welsh speakers.
The BBC now pays £75.4m a year for Welsh language channel S4C, with the government’s grant to cover the channel’s costs cut back to £6.8m and subject to the comprehensive spending review. The BBC also provides programming and news for S4C, including the soap opera Pobol y Cwm.
However, the corporation is facing demands for a more federal BBC across the UK, with calls for bespoke national news programmes such as the “Scottish Six” news hour to counter the BBC’s perceived London-centred bias.
Blair Jenkins, chief executive of the Yes Scotland 2014 referendum campaign and chair of the independent Scottish Broadcasting Commission (which recommended a Scottish Broadcasting Service), said the figure for spending in Scotland was affected by the referendum and associated debate.
Jenkins said: “All around us, we are moving from centralised power to distributed power. It seems to me a large part of the BBC response so far has been focused on new technology. The BBC has always lagged behind in the constitutional debate and needs to move further and faster, pretty close to a federal model.”
Purnell said that while it was “absolutely right” to put more spending into the nations, for “specific obvious reasons of geography, cultures”, there was no “magic bullet” or extra pot of funds to fix problems, as the BBC sought to make 20% savings.
He added, however, there was now a debate about issuing binding service licences in future for the UK’s nations, so there could be annual and four yearly checks on delivery, as happens with BBC TV, radio and online services.
Elan Closs Stephens, BBC trustee for Wales, said the focus of the Welsh intelligentsia on the plight of S4C had meant a “very serious situation” with regard to English services had occurred. She backed service licences, but added that the potential switch to a unitary BBC board needed to restore proper representation from the nations and regions.
A BBC spokesperson said: “We are committed to improving how we portray and reflect the diversity of the UK – across all its nations and regions – through our programmes and services. From our news and current affairs coverage to dramas like The Fall, Peaky Blinders, Shetland and Poldark, our audiences love the stories that we tell from their local area.
“We are working on a range of proposals that will best meet the aspirations of our audiences, but we need to recognise the licence fee settlement means the BBC faces a tough financial challenge. We have said we will protect funding for the nations and during the next charter period we will remain committed to investing in programming across the UK.”
