The UK’s television industry is being hit by a “perfect storm” that risks leading to British stories disappearing from the small screen, Elisabeth Murdoch has said.
Murdoch, co-founder of the production company Sister, said that a crisis within British television was leading to an exodus of production talent – as well as a danger that British stories were struggling to be told. It follows warnings that cash-strapped British broadcasters are targeting their resources at dramas with international appeal.
She said: “British producers are making excellent content for global platforms, with British talent, set in the UK – but those aren’t the same stories that the BBC or Channel 4 seek out. Those stories, from all corners of the British Isles, are struggling to be made in today’s economic reality. The BBC has projects that they have greenlit and provided foundational financing but the gap to budget remains unattainable.”
Murdoch said that in less than a decade, the UK’s television industry had changed from “a relatively local market” to a global one. While it had created investment, she said it had brought “real threats to creativity, entrepreneurialism and British culture”.
Her comments come amid a lengthy work drought in the UK television industry, in which producers with decades of experience have either fallen out of the sector entirely or turned to entry-level jobs as they await a TV revival. The crisis is partly driven by a concentration on high-end dramas that can be sold overseas. Patrick Spence, executive producer of the huge ITV hit Mr Bates vs the Post Office told the Sunday Times: “If you ask me if we’d make Mr Bates vs The Post Office today, the answer is ‘absolutely not’.”
Murdoch, whose production company is responsible for programmes including Black Doves, This Is Going to Hurt and Chernobyl, said TV was “one of the great drivers of storytelling in our nation. We live in a complex and changing society, which needs to see itself reflected in culture. Content on [public service broadcaster] channels is 80% British; on streamers it is estimated to be 10%.”
She said that the current crisis was partly cyclical. Too much programming was commissioned after the start of the Covid pandemic. She added, however, that a “perfect storm” of factors had hit the industry. Audiences are now watching more on streaming services and digital platforms like YouTube, while the costs of making TV have spiralled. Advertising revenue for public service broadcasters (PSBs) has slumped, while the BBC’s licence fee income has effectively fallen by about 30% since 2010.
Some have suggested that tax breaks could be used to help the industry. Peter Kosminsky, the Bafta-winning television director behind Wolf Hall, has suggested a levy on the streamers to help fund local content. Murdoch believes all options should be carefully considered.
She said: “When you see the stats about the numbers of people out of work or leaving the industry, or the challenges faced by the PSBs and producers to fund budgets for scripted or high-end entertainment, it highlights the scale of the challenge and explains the loss of business confidence. Low confidence means less appetite for risk and we have built the industry on taking creative risks. It has given us Happy Valley, Shameless, Fleabag, Skins, Life on Mars, to name just a few.
“The question is how much will be addressed by allowing market forces to work and where intervention could and should positively intervene to support all that is great and valuable in the UK TV industry.”
The Guardian revealed recently that some established TV figures were now working as high street shelf-stackers, car park attendants and in pubs, with others forced to sell their homes. Meanwhile, some of those remaining in work say they are having to do work that would previously have been carried out by several people.
A BBC spokesperson said: “While the competition of a global market is healthy, the BBC bangs the drum for British creativity and culturally relevant content in a way that the global streamers simply can’t.”
