Campaign to save Janice Forsyth radio show gather pace

WHEN Billy Connolly was interviewed on the Janice Forsyth Show on Christmas Eve he enjoyed the experience so much he was audibly disappointed when it came to an end. “Are we finished?” the Big Yin asked. “I’ve always wanted to do your programme. We should do it again.”

Little did he know that less than two months later his chances of a return visit would be threatened. Last week, BBC Radio Scotland confirmed it was axing the show, an eclectic mix of music and chat which has been a Saturday morning institution for 18 years. The plan is to extend existing news and sports programmes to plug the two-hour gap.

Now a battle royal is underway to force a U-turn. “Janny on the Tranny” may not be cutting-edge broadcasting, but a combination of Forsyth’s warm and articulate manner and her showcasing of Scottish bands has won her a loyal and disparate fan base prepared to wage war to prevent football from monopolising the airwaves from dawn to dusk.

On social networking sites, outraged listeners have eulogised the host and raised a 1,400-strong petition calling for a rethink. Janny on the Tranny T-shirts have been hastily produced. Celebrities have rallied to the cause. In the past few days, members of Scotland’s music royalty, including Edwyn Collins and Franz Ferdinand singer Alex Kapranos, have posted their dismay.

On Scotland’s east coast, crime writer Ian Rankin penned a piece of doggerel that would give William McGonagall a run for his money. “Saturday mornings without her will leave a hole in her fans’ trannies, So my plea to Radio Scotland is: DON’T DO THIS, YA BUNCH OF FANNIES!” he raved. And on America’s east coast, Alan Cumming fulminated: “Janice Forsyth is a Legend!! Sign the petition, tweeters. This is a national emergency.”

Nor has the anger been confined to those in the arts. The decision has achieved what attempts to solve the country’s problems with alcohol and sectarianism have failed to do – it has united MSPs from across the political spectrum. With one voice, Nicola Sturgeon and Cathy Jamieson have called on the BBC to reconsider.

The campaign – though surprisingly vociferous – is not without precedent. Radio listeners are increasingly harnessing the power of social media to exert their influence on the airwaves. Last year, the radio station 6 Music was saved after 180,000 people waged a campaign which involved more than 25,000 emails, 37,000 online responses and millions of tweets.

6 Music campaigner Paul Lewis says that since their victory many other BBC proposals, including cuts to BBC4 and the World Service, have been either reversed or watered down as a result of online protests. “We proved it was possible to make a difference,” he says.

So far, fans of the Janice Forsyth Show have concentrated on tweeting their disapproval and organising the petition. Their objection to the axing of the show is three-fold: they believe it provides a platform for Scottish music (the indie band The Vaselines, beloved of Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love, tweeted, “She’s one of the few people who play our records on Scottish radio”); they enjoy the big-name interviews, which have included David Bowie and David Byrne; and they argue that the two hours Janice Forsyth is on provides their only respite from Saturday sport on Radio Scotland, what with John Beattie’s Sport Nation from 9.05am to 10am, Tam Cowan and Stuart Cosgrove’s Off The Ball from 12.30pm to 2pm and Sportsound’s live coverage of the day’s matches from 2.30pm to 5pm.

Wilma Duff has been one of the most prolific online campaigners, tweeting and retweeting comments from fans and coming up with the idea for the T-shirts. “In the last six months Janice has had Billy Connolly, Julian Lennon, Chris Rea, Sandie Shaw, Twiggy, The Big Dish, Thomas Dolby, Emeli Sande and Nerina Pallot to name but a few – a diverse range of talent. And it provides up and coming artists with a stage.”

The woman on the receiving end of all this passion comes from Knightswood and attended Glasgow High School for Girls, and so had the kind of middle-class upbringing that chimes with many of her listeners. An English Literature graduate, who once chose Waiting For Godot as the book that changed her life, she combines her passion for culture with a down-to-earth manner and sense of humour, which endears her to both her guests and her audience.

One of the original team behind Glasgow’s Mayfest, she was involved in a range of arts organisations and festivals, including the Glasgow Jazz Festival, before moving into journalism. In the 90s, she presented STV’s arts programmes NB and Don’t Look Down and C4’s Filmnight. A big fan of Columbo, one of her treasured possessions is a copy of Rolling Stone magazine from 1975 which has Peter Falk on the cover. She has two other shows on Radio Scotland – The Movie Cafe and The Comedy Cafe.

Other than thanking fans for their “listener lerve”, Forsyth has otherwise kept a low profile. With the station planning to take the show off air in July to coincide with its Olympic coverage, the campaigners have five months to make their case. So far BBC Scotland’s only response has been a letter in which it insists the decision was taken “in response to audience feedback, which was asking for a simpler schedule on the station, and also in response to the BBC Trust’s review of BBC Radio Scotland, which backed a speech-based station during the day, with music scheduled for evenings, making the station distinctive from commercial radio and other BBC stations.” It says it is working on a new series for Janice next year.

Unlike the proposal to scrap 6 Music, which involved an entire station and was put out to consultation (only to be withdrawn after the BBC Trust said the case for shelving it had not been convincingly made), the decision to scrap the Janice Forsyth Show is being presented not only as a fait accompli, but one which is in harmony with a long-term strategy approved by the trust. Indeed, the trust has already said it is not within its remit to interfere with editorial judgements.

That said, the campaign is not necessarily doomed to failure. Just last week, 6 Music is said to have reversed its plans to scrap the programme Introducing With Tom Robinson, which fans claim has showcased 8,000 new bands in four years, after receiving a petition with just 750 signatures.

If BBC Scotland does change its mind on the Janice Forsyth Show, it may just find campaigners have done it a favour. During the 6 Music protest, listening figures soared from 700,000 to 1.8 million. The same phenomenon already seems to have started with in Scotland.

“I’ve never listened to Janice Forsyth in my life, but following the outcry about her losing her BBC Radio Scotland show I think it’s about time I gave her a go,” one letter-writer said. “What a cheap and effective marketing and research exercise this could end up being for the cash-strapped corporation.” «