Media watch: Is the BBC misleading Scotland over its spending?

Scots pay almost £300 million a year to the BBC through the licence fee - that is more than the arts and culture budget of the Scottish government.

The BBC is required to spend at least 8% of its resources in Scotland, nurturing the creative and media industry here. That should be a bare minimum. There is no reason why it should not be more. London does not have to soak up so much of the money and talent - it would not do so if Scotland were independent.

Scotland’s media sector is much smaller than that of a similar-sized independent country. Ireland’s annual media revenue is above 4 billion euros. Scotland’s media sector is worth about a third of that.  Most of the media and culture we receive is owned, controlled and produced in England.  Denmark does even better than Ireland with a 6 billion euro sector. 

The BBC’s obligatory spending is vital to the Scottish creative sector and to the wider economy - it is by far the biggest player that we have, bigger even than the Scottish Government, and it is funded directly by the Scottish people. Yet the BBC appears to wriggle to avoid having to make even its obligatory minimum. 

The amount the BBC receives in licence fees from Scotland - £297 million is almost identical to the amount it says it spends in Scotland - £296 million. But the spending is described as both direct and ‘indirect’ - what does that mean? (see graphic below)

The BBC’s annual report for 2023-24

How much does the BBC actually spend in Scotland employing Scottish-based talent? 

It seems that a great deal of the money listed as Scottish spending is actually paid in salaries to professionals based in London. 

The BBC hit show ‘The Traitors’ is made by Studio Lambert which employs one person in Glasgow. The show is filmed in Alness Castle north of Inverness but almost all of the people involved are not based here and the post-production is done in London - but much of the cost of the show has been counted as Scottish spending. (The BBC just had to correct the record after claiming that 50% of Series 1 spend was Scottish)

Freelance producer based in Scotland Peter Strachan sparked a row when he wrote on LinkedIn recently about Series 3 of ‘Traitors’. Strachan posted:  “The data reveals a truly shocking picture. This is a BBC Network "Scottish" commission awarded to the Scottish Office of a production company HQ-ed in London. Yet only 4.0% of above-the-line roles [permanent staff] are filled by off-screen talent based in Scotland. Removing the Glasgow-based Executive Producer (BBC), the percentage of above-the-line roles would be zero. Only 6.32% of below-the-line roles [cast and crew] are Scotland-based. 

"A total of just 6.05% of the big production team are based in Scotland. 22.22% of the specialist roles and facilities are based in Scotland. 81.40% of the production team are based in London."

Strachan added that “it doesn’t seem credible” that the salaries of all these people based in London plus the post-production costs are outweighed by the costs associated with putting up and feeding them in Inverness-shire during the show. “So, is 70% of the budget really being spent in Scotland or even outside the M25 ”?

“A profound lack of commitment by the BBC” to Scotland

After the story was picked up in The National last week, Strachan wrote an open letter saying that BBC Scotland Director’s claims that BBC Scotland spent £300 million in Scotland do not stack up and that as a result of this unfair treatment,  three-quarters of Scottish directors, heads of departments and crew are currently out of work and our indie production companies are on their knees. Strachan wrote: 

“I am writing to speak up for Scotland’s freelance TV talent base. Many have reached out to me following my recent LinkedIn statement regarding the BBC’s lack of meaningful commitment to Scotland’s off-screen talent and indie sector - a situation starkly highlighted by productions such as The Traitors and Nightsleeper... Although a few specialist facilities in Scotland are receiving work, the majority of post-production is done in London - a fact that represents a significant portion of the overall spend. The BBC has dismissed these facts as “nonsense.”

“At the recent Scottish Affairs Committee, the BBC painted a picture of boom times in Scotland. Hayley Valentine stated: ‘Everyone loves us… We work with over 70 production companies…and have spent over £300 million in the last year in the sector in Scotland’.”

“While such figures suggest that Scotland is an attractive production hub - boasting natural beauty, skilled crews, and world-class facilities - the reality for Scotland’s talent is grim…

“Adding to our concern, Hayley Valentine extolled the merits of the so-called “Scottish drama” produced for the BBC. She cited titles like Shetland (Silverprint Pictures, London-based indie), Nightsleeper (Euston Films, London-based), Granite City (LA Productions in Liverpool), Rebus (Eleventh Hour Films, London-based), and Murder is Easy (Mammoth Screen, London-based) as evidence of a thriving drama sector.”

The dramas Valentine named are produced by companies with only a fragile foothold in Scotland. According to Strachan “they reveal a profound lack of commitment by the BBC to nurture Scotland’s domestic drama indies.”

An independent report found only 5 of 15 “Scottish” producers based in Scotland

A similar controversy was sparked last year when a report from Oliver & Ohlbaum Associates Ltd (O&O), commissioned by Screen Scotland, revealed much of the BBC’s “Scottish” network quota has been commissioned from London and produced by London-headquartered production companies via Scottish branch offices.

O&O reviewed Ofcom data on projects commissioned by the UK’s public service broadcaster network channels that qualified as “Scottish” between 2014 and 2022. It found that only five of the Top 15 “Scottish” producers (by hours commissioned) were headquartered in Scotland over the period.

The remaining 10 were headquartered in London, with their output qualifying as Scottish by relying on the Ofcom criterion of having a "substantive base" (branch office) in Scotland. In fact, 80% of the total episodes made by the Top 15 producers for the BBC were commissioned from London. Scotland’s culture secretary Angus Robertson said he would seek a meeting with Ofcom and the BBC to discuss the situation.

When asked how Scots could trust the BBC if it is manipulating the accounts data like this, the BBC told Believe in Scotland: “There has been no manipulation. We’ve heard from Screen Scotland, and we have written to them to ensure they understand the source of the £296m which Hayley Valentine cited. It’s very clear in the BBC’s Annual Report & Accounts that this figure is the “Direct and indirect spending relating to programmes produced in the nation.” That figure has been in the public domain since last July.”

Why is Scotland’s media sector so much weaker than those of independent countries?  

Scots have a right to know how much of the money we give to the BBC actually goes back into Scotland’s creative industries.  The “indirect’ spending that the BBC lists is a fudge masking the reality that the BBC in London is effectively syphoning money and talent out of Scotland. 

If Scotland were an independent country, Scots could make better use of the money to support a thriving media and culture industry instead of making do with the crumbs from London’s table.

Feeding and nurturing Scotland’s creative ecosystem with public money is the base strategy that has allowed other small independent countries like Denmark and Ireland to build vibrant media sectors. 

There is no shortage of creative talent in Scotland.  Our people are equally talented and hard-working, the thing holding back the success of Scotland's creative industries is simply that we are part of the UK. Scotland's resources - both human and financial - are being redirected to the south of England - that is what we call the ‘Westminster Effect’. 

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