Leading Article: Tune in, turn off and dumb down

DO YOU remember Nationwide? It seems that some of the BBC's bosses are getting unhealthily nostalgic about that fixture of Seventies early evening scheduling. For those too young to recall the show's eclectic mix of national news, regional round-ups and stories about Spacehoppers it is perhaps enough to mention some of its abiding legacies to British broadcasting: Sue Lawley, Hugh Scully and Watchdog.

The BBC would like to replace the current, and excellent, Six O'Clock News with something resembling the old Seventies job, a whole hour long, with more emphasis on domestic and regional reporting and even less room for world stories, which will be ghettoised in the Nine O'Clock News.

But what will happen to the existing regional television bulletins? These currently run in the second half of what will end up as the new programme's slot. It is an unfashionable crusade, but the fate of such as East Midlands Today and Newsroom SouthEast does matter. There is much to be said for some of the journalism that appears on these sorts of programmes, which are routinely derided and underestimated.

What the plans also seem to imply is that world affairs can't be tackled by the average couch spud at tea-time. This is baffling, given the drama of, say, the Monica Lewinsky affair, let alone what everybody now accepts: we live in a global village in which we must understand what is going on elsewhere if we are to survive competitively. If world news really is dull, then it is up to the broadcasters to make it appealing. That, after all, is the definition of serious public service broadcasting.

The truth, of course, lies in the move of News at Ten to 6.30pm. Auntie is running scared of ITV and is dumbing down. For Sir John Birt it will be the final betrayal of his "mission to explain", supposed to make TV news grow up and finish off Nationwide-style editorial values. Yet, the BBC is nothing if it is not about quality news. Do we really have to "go nationwide"?