The BBC axe list

If only they would let me take control:

Shows I would axe:
Top of the Pops
Changing Rooms
Ground Force
Only Fools and Horses repeats
The Good Life repeats
Fresh Prince of Bel Air
The National Lottery - all shows except Jet Set and Winning Lines


Shows on the critical list - improve or else (emphasis on improving quality rather than ratings)
EastEnders
A Question of Sport (get regular captain)
They Think it's All Over (new comic sidekicks needed!)
Have I Got News For You (new host required!)
Film 2004 (refocus on British movies)


Why on earth have these been commissioned?
New versions of The Generation Game, Come Dancing and Dr Who.


Other changes:
EastEnders: axe Friday show, replace with double episode at 7.30/8.30 on Thursday, with new comedy premiering at 8pm.

New look Friday Nights
7pm Football Focus
8pm Casualty
9pm Jonathan Ross

Saturday: 8.15 Comedy 8.45 News 9.00 Drama 10.30 MOTD

Panorama moves to Monday at 8.30pm.
Regional programmes Mon 7-8pm

And if I had my way:
Newsnight - move to BBC1 10.00-10.50pm Wknights f/b Regional News
BBC2 get their own 30-min bulletin at 8pm, while the BBC4 bulletin follows as a spin-off at 8.30pm, clearing the way for movies, comedy and documentaries from 9pm till close. BBC3 News moves to 11pm with a late 15 minute summary.

Also, how do the BBC justifying airing three bulletins at a time everytime the news is on BBC1. On weekdays at least, BBC1 News programmes would be simulcast on News 24 with signing.

Moving Panorama to 8.30 Monday would be suicide; in a perfect world perhaps it wouldm be good, but the majoirty of people just aren't interested. In my thinking 10.15 on a Sunday is an OK slot. If people want to watch it they will, I don't think many more people would watch it if they put it on in primetime -given the option of that or whatever ITB put on most people would choice ITV.

Pretty much ditto with Newsnight, it get 1m viewers compared with about 5m foir the Ten. Its not designed to be a main channel, its perfect on BBC2.

And what is this obsession with news? BBC2 does not need, nor could anyone really justify a 8pm bulletin and 11pm for BBC Three is just too late (it at least needs to appear to be trying!)

BBC One needs to be competetive otherwise it will just die. There is a fine balance between its need to be doing public service programmes and its need to get ratings. If it fails on the later, then whatever public service stuff it does will just fail too.

Moving Panorama to 8.30 Monday would be suicide; in a perfect world perhaps it wouldm be good, but the majoirty of people just aren't interested. In my thinking 10.15 on a Sunday is an OK slot. If people want to watch it they will, I don't think many more people would watch it if they put it on in primetime -given the option of that or whatever ITB put on most people would choice ITV.

Pretty much ditto with Newsnight, it get 1m viewers compared with about 5m for the Ten. Its not designed to be on a main channel, its perfect on BBC2.

And what is this obsession with news? BBC2 does not need, nor could anyone really justify a 8pm bulletin and 11pm for BBC Three is just too late (it at least needs to appear to be trying!)

BBC One needs to be competetive otherwise it will just die. There is a fine balance between its need to be doing public service programmes and its need to get ratings. If it fails on the later, then whatever public service stuff it does will just fail too.

I think that although some of them are entertaining (I quite like Winning Lines) and some that are truly dire (e.g. Jet Set). However I feel it does not really warrant a good 45 minutes just to select some balls on screen. I would cut it down to 15 minutes at most as it does get really tedious waiting for the numbers to come up.

Although I do agree that these show should be axed...

Changing Rooms
Ground Force
Only Fools and Horses repeats
The Good Life repeats
Fresh Prince of Bel Air

I'm sick to death of seeing OFAH on TV and together with all these home makeover/DIY shows!


That would be a turn off for me and anybody that doesn't like football. If you want to watch lots of football, then get Sky!

Apart from the National Lottery shows, of which I think the draws should be integrated into another live Saturday night programme, all these other shows are quite popular on the channel they are on, and their timeslot, with the notable exception of Top of the Pops (does the Lorraine woman not realise that it might perform that little more better if it wasn't up against Coronation Street?).

As for the OFAH repeats, they are still relatively popular, although they need to be used more sparingly; their should be some sort of quota, where they can be only shown a number of times before they are banned from being used for a month or so. This could also apply to other repeats.



Easy way to get EastEnders back to some sort of decent programme - remove the current Executive Producer, as that seems to have been where the problems began; when Louise Berridge was appointed. The programme was much better when Matthew Robinson and then John Yorke were in this position. A fresh influx of writers might do the trick as well. As for the other programmes, nothing wrong with them, the guest hosts on HIGNFY are doing well IMO (although if they can find the right type of permanent host, then they should go for that).



All the rumours are that the new Dr Who is going to be very different from what it was, so at least wait for it before giving your usual anti-BBC criticism.



That would actually be quite good, although Football Focus should be cut down to 30 minutes, and something else put in at 7.30.



Would not work, both programmes would get hammered by nearly every other terrestial programmes. The BBC might be funded by the licence fee, and not needing total domination of the ratings, but it does actually have to get *some* viewers!



Why? Newsnight works well on BBC2 at 10.30. Their is not a need for more news bulletins on BBC2.



Because News 24 is a rolling news channel, and the BBC1 News programmes are bulletins; a round-up of the day. News 24 would just turn into a clone of ITV NC; not being able to cover breaking news while the BBC1 bulletins were on. Sky News would easily be able to have a monopoly on the 24 hour news market.

In reply to points made here:

Re: Panorama
One main thing I'd do is try to have BBC1 offer a true alternative when the soaps are on ITV1, hence 8.30pm slot opposite Coronation Street. It's new Monday slot would also see some hour-long specials at 9pm. Reducing it to 30 minutes is to make the programme more repeatable for broadcast on BBC4 and BBC News 24.
However, I never explained the main reason - to free up Sunday nights.
When MOTD returns only Sunday would be the viable option for feature length films and drama after the watershed.

Re: Newsnight
Agree it's risky and would probably never get off the ground, due to BBC2 not wanting to lose it and ITV1 not wanting to clash with BBC1's main bulletin. My main justification is I think it's pointless having the Ten o'clock News run into Newsnight. The 8pm BBC2 bulletin is designed as a replacement so BBC2 doesn't lose all news, and also so the BBC offers news in the middle of primetime.

Re: BBC3 News
11pm is not late for the target audience of BBC3. I imagine BBC3 is much more likely to get viewers at 11pm than 7pm for a news bulletin due to C4 & five both offering bulletins at seven. Also, no late-night news summary is offered on British television since the axing of the Nightly News. Terrestrial TV have their last bulletin at 10.30pm, while news channels don't offer a quick Newsbeat style round up within 15 minutes.

Re: Football Focus - Friday 7-8pm
This is scheduling against the soaps on ITV1, so providing for a traditionally different audience. An hour long as BBC will have more rights from next year, and moving from Saturdays so it doesn't clash with people travelling to games / live games on Sky.

Re: News 24 simulcasts
To be honest, at the times of BBC1 bulletins all News 24 does is spread the same news over an hour (allowing for breaking news). I know they currently sign the 1pm bulletin, so I think that should certainly be simulcast. As for missing breaking news, both Sky and ITV News Channel would be providing this service at this time, so again it's complementary scheduling.

However, note I'm complaining about three different BBC News programmes (BBC1/N24/World) being shown at the same time. It's fair to say I'd probably complain that it's a waste if these three channels were showing the same programme at the same time, so it is a catch 22 situation.

PS: After the news that EastEnders has been declared "Best Soap", forget the critical list - I'd axe it straight away!!!

A couple of things:

Newsnight and the Ten are different things, both news, but doing it differentlt for different audiences and they really don't clash, the last few mins of the Ten are misable if you want to watch Newsnight. The Ten is a bulletin, Newsnight is not.

To say that News 24 could miss out on breaking news because Sky News and the ITV NC would be there is just stupid - they are in competition and therefore it is important that News 24 can break news at any time of the day. The differebt BBC channels can complement one another the the BBC doesn't really need or want to complement its services with those offered by its commercial rivals, not in rolling news anyway.

I wouldn't even think of putting Panorama on at that time, up until 1985 it was on at 8.10pm on a Monday and many people turned off, though when Michael Grade took over he moved it to 9.25pm and it was a praised move. I think 10.15pm on a Sunday is a bit stupid IMO, maybe something like 9.30pm on a Wednesday or something would be a good idea.

Some shows need to go, Eastenders needs a good re-think, if not axed as I cannot abide it, when it started it was groundbreaking, but now they treat it like the Kat and Alfie half hour, making it look like the best thing since sliced bread. If not put it back to Tuesday and Thursday ONLY.

I would give Film 2004 a rethink, it is a good show, no-one can deny it, but it needs a better time slot, maybe something like 9.30pm on a weekday night at some point, that would be good. What's the point of having it on at all if it's going to be on at 11.30pm approx on a Tuesday night or whatever day it goes out on.

A Question of Sport needs a rethink, I find it VERY boring, though I cannot argue with the slot as it is treated rather fairly.

I think Points of View needs moving, what was wrong with 8.50pm on a Wednesday? As we knew what time it was on at every week, not like now on a Sunday at 4.00pm something or other.

They need to cut down on the Delboy repeats, theres too many, they also need to cut down on The Good Life as you said. Or as Vivian from The Young Ones said:

'I CANNOT STAND THE BLOODY GOOD LIFE!'

One thing I would sort out is BBC2 daytime, why on earth is it dominated by CBeebies!?!? What was wrong with good old schools programmes? Now they only have about 4 hours a week, on a good week really.

If I had my way, friday nights would look like this:

7pm:TOTP
8pm: My family
8:30: Bargain Hunt (NOT with the awful Dvid Dickinson)
9pm: One Foot In The Grave (hardly ever gets repeated, from the very beginning)
9:30: Liquid News (bring it back!!)

LoveTV

PS: Sorry, obsessed with fantasy schedules at the moment.

It's odd how you're planning to get rid of some very popular shows just because they're aiming for ratings rather than creating stimulating television. Then I spot you're signature flagging up Big Brother. If that isn't populist junk, what is?

The thing with being a Channel Controller is that you have to schedule all sorts of programmes, some of which you probablt won't like, but if they are sucessfuk then they should be re-commissioned. BBC ONE, I'm sure is not just full of programmes LH likes, its a mix of things that, hopefully, the audience will like (but not everyone all the time)

David Dickinson? Awful? He's FAR better than Tim 'Third-rate Dickinson wannabe' Wonnacott!!!!!!!

Wonnacot doesn't have the Duke's flair, wit and overall charm......