In his supportive piece on why the BBC is important to Britain’s culture (The BBC tells the story of Britain in a way Netflix simply cannot. In the year to come, please remember that, 29 December), Tony Hall makes a reference to how important Radio Cumbria is to the people of Cumbria, and tries to suggest the same is true for Radio Scotland and Radio Wales “serving the nations”.
In reality, and unlike in England, BBC Radio no longer serves local communities in Scotland and Wales. For example, Radio Scotland’s morning news programme tends to repeat the same news stories you can hear on Radio 4’s Today programme, except where there are occasional news stories affecting the whole of Scotland.
Radio Cumbria (as with other English local BBC radio stations) will include items about Carlisle, Kendal, Barrow and many other parts of the county and also report decisions and debates in local councils. Radio Scotland – based in Glasgow – provides no local community coverage in Scotland. As a result, residents of Dundee, Aberdeen, Inverness, Fort William and so on have a greater affinity with their more community-based commercial/independent local radio stations than the BBC. The same is probably the case in Wales.
If there is one thing the BBC could do to improve community representation in Scotland and Wales, it should break up these “national” radio stations and emulate what it does in England – a network of genuinely local community-based radio stations. With the ongoing decline in regional newspapers, the need for this is essential to give local communities the strong voice they deserve, but currently do not get.
Stuart Walker
Inverkeilor, Angus
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