IT is reassuring that BBC director-general Mark Thompson has seemingly ruled out cutting the corporation’s local TV news service.
The proposal was to end bulletins produced in Oxford and subsume their content into the South Today programme from Southampton.
It is a misnomer to suggest Oxford has a full evening bulletin at 6.30pm as it is, with only half the show being dedicated to the county and surrounding areas, before presenters in Southampton take over for the rest.
But the proposal to shut down the studio in Oxford would have been a retrograde step.
Whatever the beancounters might say, trying to cover Oxfordshire in any meaningful way from Hampshire would have been a sham.
Just consider ITV, which carried out a similar move two years ago and is now more likely to tell you what is going on in Winchester than Witney.
A thriving community needs to be served by local media and – as odd as it may seem from a commercial aspect for us to say this – the loss of local BBC TV news bulletins would damage that.
While Mr Thompson’s letter to Prime Minister and Witney MP David Cameron seems definite, we will still be scrutinising the final proposals he puts forward to the BBC Trust.
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