Regulation news

The first 3 headline stories on the main BBC news at 10pm this evening were all international reports – the Turkish bombing, the Indian bombing and Radovan Karadij. 2 of them not even European.

I watched it and was reminded that we Brits are a nation where international news is consumed at an equal, or perhaps even higher level, than domestic reports. Tales of the Prime Minister’s woes were relegated to much later on in the broadcast.

In part this is due to the success and ratings dominance of the BBC, a well funded state broadcater. However I doubt the commercial ITV/ITN News at 10 would have been much if any different. And that is down to public appetite for international news.

As an industry we have become used to the incredibly detailed, over-regulation by OfCom and it’s predecessors and I often find myself critisising or at least questioning them. However one rule I whole heartedly support is the required absence of direct sponsorship of news programmes.

Overseas broadcaters do not enjoy this particular regulation and as such find their news funding becomes reliant on content that is ‘compatible’ with the sponsor’s brand or image. One only has to look at the ‘Land of the Free’. No bad news and no international news (Well OK, once a week, but that hardly counts).

This is one example where we should infact be grateful for the heavy handed over-regulation we enjoy. Others around then world are not so lucky.

We must not underestimate the value of our Public Service Broadcasters. Please, lets make sure we don’t take them for granted and that we keep them for a long while yet.