h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Dear Points of View [? No email address available for Mark Thompson, unfortunately!],

It was with genuine anger and dismay that I discovered the BBC is to shed a third of jobs in the Natural History Unit in Bristol in order to save £12 million a year. I understand that the Unit will concentrate purely on one 'flagship' programme per year (such as 'The Nature of Britain' and 'Springwatch') rather than two, and that we will lose the excellent lower-budget programmes which usually air on BBC2.

This is, to any viewer, an enormous mistake. The BBC is rightfully considered to be the best maker of wildlife programmes anywhere in the world; no independent broadcaster has the resources to make programmes comparable. Moreover, these are crucial times for the world's wildlife; the need for education has never been greater, and the medium of television is by far the most powerful medium for bringing issues into our front rooms. Without the NHU, there is nowhere for aspiring programme-makers in the genre to 'cut their teeth', and without it the future of wildlife broadcasting will be bleak.

The savings made by cutting the NHU amount to 8% of the £150m budget of BBC3 and BBC4. To the average license payer, these are unwatched, unloved channels, whose few successes would almost certainly have become hits on BBC2 anyway. Greater cuts than this could be made by merging these two channels while leaving the quality of output entirely unaffected.

In short, the NHU is too valuable to be treated in this appallingly shoddy manner. It's the equivalent of selling off the crown jewels to buy a shoddy, unattractive bracelet. I urge the BBC to reconsider.

***

What do you think? Subject for a mass email? Is there any better way of getting a message across?

Thanks to Websailor for bringing this to my attention

"The savings made by cutting the NHU amount to 8% of the £150m budget of BBC3 and BBC4."

I've made this arguement about these 2 channels for some time now. I fail to see the point of them frankly. Its money better spent on BBC 1 and 2 and the online stuff, thats where its needed.

You're right, no-one can make wildlife progs like the beeb,the one that stands out for me was The Blue Planet series.

That's telling them!

That's a great reaction initially

One email doesn't make a difference, though. Is this the sort of thing you'd email to the BBC yourselves, and email on to your friends to email and pass on as well? We'd need thousands to have the slightest chance of making a difference, so it needs to be just right from the start.

Already have done Rich and also posted it as a topic for debate on the BBC's have your say news page.

Email sent to [email protected]

If you do send it, though, take out the second instance of the word 'shoddy'. I was trying to stay up as late as possible to get pages uploaded, and my thinking was a bit woolly

The BBC wildlife programmes are considered to be the very best here in Germany. People love watching them, and it really would be a shame to lose them. Where do I send the email?

[email protected] - you might need to tweak it a bit to make it clear that you're an overseas viewer though, I'm not sure

I'll think of something.

Fiddler has copied me in on an email he sent, and it's a stunner

I've also been over to the S&N website and dropped a line there on the Autumnwatch board. It's being pre-moderated at the moment, but I'll post a link when it's up.

S and N done as well... Skanks and Webby..

Scouting for other areas to post to...

I am seriously on a roiling roll now! How dare they?

It is the only reason I have a television...

This hornet's nest has well and truly been stirred up, and I have a great deal of spleen to vent at present.

Hope Auntie Beeb has the hide of a rhinoceros!!!



MMF

I'm definitely up for this one

And me

My e.mail is sent. Thanks Rich for sending me a copy

I'm a great fan of BBC4. It's my second most watched channel after channel4

What no more budding Attenborough’s A20218628 in the making?!

On BBC3 tonight - The Most Annoying TV Moments We Love To Hate, then Spendaholics, followed by an hour long programme about an Eastenders plot. Then it's a celebrity hairdressing reality show, followed by more Eastenders. Excitingly, the whole lot repeats later on but in a different order, and we get to see an uncut version of the celebrity hairdressers. I don't believe any of that is better than wildlife programmes, unless we're after quantity not quality.

There is good programming on BBC4, but the BBC clearly doesn't have the resources to maintain standards on all four channels. So why slash the budget and output for one of the few areas in which it is the world market leader?

I have also sent my 'polite' e-mail to this address:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/make_complaint_step1.shtml

If I find any other areas to send it to, I will update you!



Fellow naturalists!



MMF

I confess that I don't watch a lot of wildlife telly but it's a damned site more worthwhile than the BBC3 tripe. Don't go messing with BBC4 though for it is the TV holiday home of Charlie Brooker, Marcus Brigstocke, lots of superb music and a fine international news & current affairs programme.

Still, the NHU is one of the things that makes the BBC unique. If I ever meet that bleedin' Michael Lyons make *him* natural history.

Oh yeah, email sent.