BBC criticised over 'pitiful' Festival plans

Published on Saturday 1 August 2009 20:01

THE BBC is "short-changing" Edinburgh's festivals after it emerged that it is sending fewer staff to cover the world's largest celebration of the arts than it did to T in the Park.

Around 230 BBC staff have been assigned to the month-long series of festivals – a relatively modest number by the standards of the publicly funded organisation.

In recent weeks the BBC has been criticised for sending 300 staff to cover T in the Park, the three-day pop festival held in Kinross-shire, and more than 400 to Glastonbury, the five-day music festival in Somerset.

William Burdett-Coutts, the artistic director of the Assembly Theatre and a leading light in the Fringe Festival, said: "Glastonbury gets many hours worth of coverage and Edinburgh just gets a couple of hours of television at the end of the day. That's bizarre.

"The BBC should pay far more attention to Edinburgh. It is hugely irritating that they don't. Considering it is the biggest event of its type in the world, I think the coverage it gets is pretty pitiful."

Philip Davis, the Conservative MP and member of the Commons' Culture Committee, said: "Edinburgh should wonder if it is being shortchanged compared with the numbers sent to these other places.

"The reality is, however, that the BBC is a bloated organisation. There is no other media company in western Europe that would be able to send 200 or 300 people to cover any kind of festival.

"If it was ITV, they would be doing it on a shoestring. Sky would be doing it on a shoestring. Every other organisation would be spending less money and as a publicly funded organisation, the BBC must realise this is totally unacceptable in these difficult times."

A spokeswoman for the BBC said the corporation was providing a diverse range of programmes across its television channels, radio stations and online. Among the highlights will be three weeks of The Culture Show on BBC2.

The spokeswoman said: "The thing about Edinburgh is that people are there as required and that varies for each programme. The number of staff at any given time fluctuates.

"Edinburgh is a BBC base, so Edinburgh staff are being used. For example, BBC Radio Scotland's Festival Cafe team are already based there. Given the relative proximity of Glasgow, a number of other staff will be travelling through and BBC Scotland is also providing technical staff for Radio 3's classical music recordings."