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Greg Dyke on Broadcasting

How the BBC is edging ahead in the 24-hour news battle with Sky

Monday 06 June 2005 00:00 BST
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One of the more interesting battles in British television over the past eight years has been the fight to be Britain's most popular 24-hour news channel. Sky News had the field to itself for almost a decade until BBC News 24 was started in 1997, followed later by the ITV News Channel.

One of the more interesting battles in British television over the past eight years has been the fight to be Britain's most popular 24-hour news channel. Sky News had the field to itself for almost a decade until BBC News 24 was started in 1997, followed later by the ITV News Channel.

The real battle, however, has always been between Sky and News 24, with the ITV channel back in third place, although it has done comparatively well given how much less it costs compared with the other two.

When Rupert Murdoch started the Sky platform back in the late Eighties, Sky News was widely seen as a sop to the politicians to allow him to continue to develop his monopoly in satellite TV. The tactic worked, and in the first few years of Sky News, dozens of politicians who wouldn't normally have got on television found themselves being interviewed. They obviously enjoyed the experience.

But gradually, Sky News established itself and became a fixture in many newsrooms and offices around the country. People who needed to know what was happening on a minute-by-minute basis watched Sky News, which brought a freshness and energy to the coverage of news.

In the mid-Nineties, the BBC recognised that 24-hour news services were an important part of the future of news and began to plan their own. At the BBC, many in the news department were shocked when, after News 24 was launched, it didn't swamp Sky News. They rather arrogantly believed that, given the BBC's reputation in news, people would automatically prefer their channel. It didn't turn out that way, and for several years Sky News was the more popular. But, over the past two years, that has gradually changed.

Interestingly, on the Sky platform Sky News is still the outright winner: in the first five months of this year, Sky News beat News 24 by a margin of four to three. But in Freeview homes, the story is very different.

One of the reasons Sky supported the BBC in launching Freeview - a decision many now believe was a tactical mistake, in that Sky helped to launch a real competitor to its own platform - was to ensure Sky News would be available in all the new digital multi-channel homes that would come if Freeview succeeded.

But what the figures show is that the Sky gamble only partially succeeded. In Freeview homes, News 24 is now beating Sky News by a ratio of close on two to one, and the figures are probably an underestimate. The numbers are deceptive, because the BBC's breakfast show is simulcast on both News 24 and BBC1, and in Freeview homes all the viewing is credited to the main channel. This means that the BBC's Breakfast News scores nul points for News 24 in the 4.8 million Freeview homes.

Overall, when the two platforms are added together and cable homes are included, News 24 is winning with 52 per cent, against 48 per cent for Sky News.

Looking at the figures for this year, two things stand out. First, and not surprisingly, if there is a big story, like the Asian tsunami, viewing increases markedly; January figures were 30 per cent up on the average for the next four months.

And second, owners of Sky boxes seem to watch more 24-hour news than owners of Freeview boxes which, given that they have a far greater selection of channels to choose from, might seem surprising.

But the most interesting question is: why the difference? Why is Sky News still the winner in Sky homes, while the BBC's News 24 is the clear victor in Freeview homes? I suspect that cross-promotion and marketing are partly responsible, but the key factor is likely to be the sort of people who have bought Freeview boxes. They tend to be older, more upmarket and more likely to be people who reject pay television. In other words, they are more likely to be traditional BBC viewers, which would explain why BBC News 24 does so well.

If this trend continues, it seems likely that BBC News 24 will be the long-term winner.

Last year, the numbers buying Freeview boxes outstripped new Sky subscribers by more than three to one, and as more homes are "encouraged" to go digital (quite soon, they will be forced to switch from analogue), the narrow lead BBC News 24 has over Sky News is likely to grow.

Summer fun on the picket line

Strikes in the television industry have always been rather genteel affairs, so the criticism of BBC strikers by the Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson that they were not aggressive enough is a bit unfair. His suggestion was that if you wanted to win a strike, you had to throw rocks and scare people rather than stand on the picket line drinking cappuccinos, hoping that the management would cave in.

But the history of television doesn't necessarily show him to be right. My only experience of going on strike was way back in summer 1979 when I was a producer at London Weekend Television and the whole of ITV was on strike over pay and conditions. On the South Bank, the strike was a jolly affair, with LWT management going out of their way to look after the interests of the pickets.

It was summer, so there was no need for braziers, but at LWT that would have been irrelevant as a paternalistic management took the decision to let us picket inside the building so we wouldn't get wet if it rained.

Their generous gesture didn't help them - we won the strike and came away with an 18 per cent pay increase.

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