It is commercial television that is really in peril

Spectator, The, Aug 2, 2008 by Midgley, Neil

But in signing a co-production deal with the US network Fox, it has at least started to address an overwhelming change in the way television is made and sold worldwide.

As national TV markets shrink and programmes are increasingly distributed over the (borderless) internet rather than the (parochial) airwaves, new shows must have an international appeal to succeed.

The BBC, ironically, is more alert to this new commercial order than most, and has co-produced several big series -- Rome, Five Days -- with US network HBO. Some Channel 4 shows, too, have translated into US hits, not least Supernanny and Wife Swap.

Which makes Channel 4's current argument -- that it must be bailed out by the government to the tune of £150 million a year if it is to continue to show UK-only programmes such as Channel 4 News and Dispatches -- both quaint and alarming.

Channel 4 makes little money from international sales, as all its programmes are made by independent production companies. But those international hits came when Channel 4 was at its most nakedly commercial in the UK -- and, not coincidentally, also at its most creative and innovative.

Now, its editorial priorities defy popularity: hour after hand-wringing hour of free-range chickens, radical Muslims, and Cherie Blair lecturing us about knife crime.

The British public gets greater service from a strong creative economy than it does from documentaries or news programmes which, as the ratings show, few of us want to watch. While there is no particular point in privatising Channel 4 or, indeed, in changing its remit of innovation and experimentation, the government should insist that it at least makes ends meet. As an outward-looking but unsubsidised public service broadcaster, Channel 4 would have a chance of being popular at home and successful abroad -- the only reliable recipe for its long-term survival.

Another welcome side-effect of a less worthy Channel 4 would be to shine a spotlight on the ever-increasing commercialisation of the BBC. The Corporation's incantation that it must chase high ratings to reach every licence-fee payer is no excuse for its paucity of serious current affairs, documentaries and particularly arts programmes. Cookery, lifestyle and daytime are lavishly served by the commercial channels: the BBC should have a greater (though not exclusive) focus on areas where the market simply will not provide.

The BBC will, of course, be this country's principal public service broadcaster for a long time to come. Channel 4, even if it were forced to break even, would still provide publicly owned 'plurality'. ITV, freed from its regulatory straitjacket, could be a strong international player and creator of British jobs. And to engineer this happy scenario, all that Mr Burnham and Mr Richards need to do is to stop reviewing and get out of the way.