Matt Brittin, the Director General of the, declined to rule out closing the Scotland channel when he spoke at the Edinburgh TV Festival. He said he was not aware of the severity of the proposed cuts, while the channel costs £42 million a year and reaches 619,000 people a week.
Edinburgh TV Festival
Brittin said: “It’s not a yes-or-no-answer question for me because I don’t have an answer.” He added: “We’re looking at everything in terms of the audience value it delivers, and I know that there are concerns about the scale of value there.”
The is aiming for £500 million of savings by 2028-29, with between 1,800 and 2,000 jobs due to go. Brittin said: “It’s hard, and I don’t think there are programmes that nobody’s watching or services that nobody enjoys. But let’s be clear: 90% of the will remain, 90% of the people in the will remain, and we need to focus in this moment on serving the audience. That’s what we all do together.”
Pacific Quay in Glasgow
Kirsty Wark described the Scotland headquarters at Pacific Quay in Glasgow as “a call centre where half the staff have been made redundant,” and Brittin replied: “My God, there were ball pits all over the place. But if you walk into Pacific Quay, or PQ, in Glasgow, half of it looks like a call centre where everybody’s been made redundant.”
He also said reports that Newsnight would be axed were nonsense. During the interview, Wark asked: “What about cheap rents for independent production companies?”
Before his appointment was announced in May, Brittin had toured the, including Pacific Quay during the elections and the set of Shetland. He said one possible way forward would be to open up iPlayer and the space to outside creators, adding that people could make content about where they live, the sports teams they follow, and the skills and businesses in the area.
For Scotland viewers and staff, the immediate practical point is that no decision has been announced on the channel itself. Brittin’s remarks place closure, reduction, and restructuring in play at the same time, and the £42 million annual cost makes the channel part of the wider savings work the is already carrying out.
