BBC Look North and local news cutbacks will hurt Yorkshire: Austin Mitchell

I’M not sure what’s happening to local television and radio but I’m pretty certain I’m not going to like it, Yorkshire’s not going to like it and none of us will benefit from it.
Harry gration and Amy Gracia are the current presenters of Look North - but the BBC only want one person to present the programme in the future.Harry gration and Amy Gracia are the current presenters of Look North - but the BBC only want one person to present the programme in the future.
Harry gration and Amy Gracia are the current presenters of Look North - but the BBC only want one person to present the programme in the future.

All the indications are that a cash-strapped BBC is embarking on yet another round of austerity and ITV, which has regularly tried to slash its regional obligations on which they won their contracts, is at it again.

Like all the other public service cuts of the last 40 years, the consequences will fall on local media, local staffs and local service because, as in government, the centre always finds it easier to cut the provinces rather than itself.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

We’ll all suffer to protect overpaid celebs, TV executives and dumb but expensive programmes.

This is Austin Mitchell in 1971 when he presented Calendar.This is Austin Mitchell in 1971 when he presented Calendar.
This is Austin Mitchell in 1971 when he presented Calendar.

Local electronic media really began in the sixties. Since then we’ve had excellent local radio stations, both BBC and commercial, like Radio Leeds, Aire, Pennine and Hallam.

We’ve had our wonderful TV station Yorkshire with Calendar and strong regional competition from the BBC with Look North, and all the spin-off programmes which came from both.

Yet now the radio stations have become national juke boxes, both Look North and Calendar are shadows of their former selves thanks to underfunding, and now the BBC has ended local political programmes, firing presenters and beginning staff cuts on a sizeable scale.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

This wind down is disastrous. We all live locally, local issues are as important as what’s going on in London and as Tip O’Neill, Speaker of the American House of Representatives, said “all politics is local”. So are we. We all suffer without knowledge of what’s going on in our town and our region.

Harry Gration is the presenter of the Look North.Harry Gration is the presenter of the Look North.
Harry Gration is the presenter of the Look North.

Our politicians and councillors aren’t put to the test and can’t reach the people. Local scandals aren’t exposed because there’s no one to do it or shine the torch of enquiry on them.

J B Priestley said he preferred the news brought to him by local people he could meet and argue with. So do I.

Our local media have lived up to that far better than the remote bureaucracies of the BBC and ITV.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Just look at the achievements of the years since local electronic media arrived. We’ve grown a succession of popular local presenters – Richard Whiteley, Harry Gration, Christa Ackroyd to name but three.

We’ve had a succession of local programmes bringing the broad acres to a broader audience and introducing real Yorkshire folk like Hannah Hauxwell and Gentleman Jack as well as imaginary ones like the inhabitants of Holmfirth, Emmerdale and Heartbeat county to a world that’s better for knowing them.

Our local media have enabled us to talk to each other and
to the world, unearthed local scandals like the Paulson racket, covered local dramas like Flixborough, the Bradford City fire, the Hillsborough tragedy, the miners’ strike or the Revie-Clough debate.

They’ve unearthed local talent from the Yorkshire shepherdess, Bert Gaunt, Jeff Christie (Yellow River) to Arthur Scargill. They’ve put on plays by the local Alans, Bennett, Plater and Ayckbourn, Stan Barstow and Sally Wainwright.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

They’ve established the reputations of local politicians such as Joe Ashton or Marcus Fox as well as drawing on the expertise of our local universities That’s their job.

Yorkshire’s important and certainly as important to us as the petty pre-occupations of the Westminster bubble or the falsities of national celebrity.

In the great days the BBC always had more of a public service role and served an older audience, while ITV and commercial radio were more fun and populist, serving a younger audience.

Yet all sides of this equation were – and are – important. The people should be served, and even if local media are only talking to ourselves, it’s still important that Yorkshire should speak Yorkshire to Yorkshire because we’re a lively region with our own personality and our own issues and too important to be served by drivel doled out of London.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

A proper local service demands proper staffing. That costs money but a television or radio service which doesn’t provide it is not only failing this area, but cutting off its own roots.

It’s time they all realised that Yorkshire matters.

Austin Mitchell is a former Labour MP for Grimsby and retired broadcaster.

Editor’s note: first and foremost - and rarely have I written down these words with more sincerity - I hope this finds you well.

Almost certainly you are here because you value the quality and the integrity of the journalism produced by The Yorkshire Post’s journalists - almost all of which live alongside you in Yorkshire, spending the wages they earn with Yorkshire businesses - who last year took this title to the industry watchdog’s Most Trusted Newspaper in Britain accolade.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

And that is why I must make an urgent request of you: as advertising revenue declines, your support becomes evermore crucial to the maintenance of the journalistic standards expected of The Yorkshire Post. If you can, safely, please buy a paper or take up a subscription. We want to continue to make you proud of Yorkshire’s National Newspaper but we are going to need your help.

Postal subscription copies can be ordered by calling 0330 4030066 or by emailing [email protected]. Vouchers, to be exchanged at retail sales outlets - our newsagents need you, too - can be subscribed to by contacting subscriptions on 0330 1235950 or by visiting www.localsubsplus.co.uk where you should select The Yorkshire Post from the list of titles available.

If you want to help right now, download our tablet app from the App / Play Stores. Every contribution you make helps to provide this county with the best regional journalism in the country.

Sincerely. Thank you.

James Mitchinson

Editor

Related topics:

Comment Guidelines

National World encourages reader discussion on our stories. User feedback, insights and back-and-forth exchanges add a rich layer of context to reporting. Please review our Community Guidelines before commenting.