'Stupidvision' daytime TV slated

A former senior journalist at the BBC yesterday accused daytime television of being "Stupidvision".

Polly Toynbee, a columnist at the Independent and a former BBC social affairs correspondent, said daytime television looked cheap, was without character and was 20 years out of date.

She launched her attack in the Radio Times and asked readers to send in their suggestions for alternative programmes during the day to replace the "weary grunge of the past".

Ms Toynbee says: "Most of it looks cheap and designed for no one in particular - perhaps some computerised calculation of the lowest common denominator.

"It is tepid, dishwater soup, without character or flavour, inhabiting some cardboard world 20 years out of date, in some imaginary middle suburbia.

"It is Stupidvision - where most of the presenters look like they have to pretend to be stupid because they think their audience is.

"In other words, it patronises. It talks to the vacuum cleaner and the washing machine and the microwave, without much contact with the human brain."

Daytime television was the professional "graveyard", with a lack of new ideas and risky formats.

But the BBC pointed out last night that most of its daytime programmes were popular - and said it had already announced a re-think of morning shows following the scrapping of its programme Good Morning with Anne and Nick.

Ms Toynbee said there were some exceptions: good cookery shows such as Can't Cook, Won't Cook and Ready Steady Cook, and the "magic insanity" of Supermarket Sweep.