Broadcasting chiefs shift blame over phone-ins scandal

It seems that contractors have become the scapegoats when it comes to the amount of high profile systemic failures occurring in broadcasting – but is it about time TV chiefs looked closer to home?

A few months back the BBC hit the headlines after an inquiry unearthed yet another batch of faked television phone-ins. In response to the furore surrounding the scandal, former BBC chairman and current ITV executive chairman, Michael Grade, blamed the situation on the amount of contractors currently working within the UK broadcasting industry.

He said: "It's partly to do with the casualisation of the industry, people on short-term contracts under tremendous strain, tremendous pressure. Competitive pressure is enormous."

The row was sparked after BBC One's Sports Relief in July 2006, Comic Relief in March 2007, Children in Need on BBC Scotland in November 2005, The Liz Kershaw Show on BBC 6 Music and CBBC programme TMi were all found to have breached editorial standards, including faked callers.

An under-fire Mark Thompson, the BBC’s current Director General, tried to quell the fire by saying: "There is no excuse for deception...it is right that we are open with the public when we have fallen short and that we demonstrate that we take this very seriously indeed. We have made clear that we regard any deception or breach of faith with our audiences as being utterly unacceptable”.

In response, Mr Thompson outlined an action plan that included mandatory training for more than 16,500 staff and called for a workshop involving other broadcasters to discuss issues surrounding editorial standards and training.

However, a report by media regulator Ofcom suggested that it wasn’t necessarily simply a case of having incompetent casual labour that had caused the problems but that broadcasters were "in denial" about their responsibilities to viewers and saw phone-ins as a way to generate revenue.

Xchangeteam CEO Emma Brierley expressed dismay at the notion that casual staff are solely to blame for the drop in standards at the BBC, saying: “All too often, managers fail to plan for the hiring of freelancers, fail to create the ideal framework for the best results and have no accurate method of evaluating performance. Freelancers are often the scapegoat when, in fact they are far less likely to be casual than those in permanent employment – their performance determines their immediate future career prospects”.