COMMERCIAL TELEVISION

From Mr. Emrys Roberts
Sir. - The noise of hostile battle between the barons of the small screen, Lord Derby of T.W.W. and Lord Hill of the I.T.A. is overwhelming.  As the cries of the contestants take on a shriller note, it is difficult to detect the voice of reason.  Let us try to separate the issues.

The first issue is the choice of the programme company.  T.W.W. and its staff had an excellent record.  Yet the I.T.A. had a duty to take the decision which appeared to be the best in all the circumstances.  The competition and case of the Harlech group clearly presented the Authority with a difficult choice.  It cannot really be maintained that the decision, however hard and unexpected, was reasonable.

The new contractor having been selected, the impact of the decision on T.W.W. staff and shareholders must be considered as a separate issue, but one just as important.  Attention should now be concentrated not on attempts to reverse the decision on the franchise but on applying it in such a way as to prevent these hapless people from suffering penalties which are wholly undeserved.  An equitable solution is possible.  The new group does not need to recruit staff anew, to raise fresh capital, to build studios, to win a new viewing public, to attract advertisers to a virgin area.  All the assets are ready for it.  What the Authority can now reasonably do, without reversing its decision, is to review the conditions of the new licence.  The proper course may now well be for it to suggest that the new company should take over the whole of the shares of T.W.W., paying for them by the issuing of shares.  This is what happened under the aegis of the I.T.A. when T.W.W. took over Wales (West and North) Television.  It would be a neater and more just procedure that the conditions about the sale of the studios and the offer of 40 per cent of the shares of the new company.

The directors of T.W.W. have stated their willingness to withdraw from office.  It is possible to achieve a new look for the management of television in Wales and the West, security for staff, and a fair deal for shareholders by the procedure I have suggested.

Provoked by Lord Derby's censures, Lord Hill may be tempted to say: T.W.W. have lost; let them take the consequences.  But the I.T.A. is a public authority with public responsibility towards all who have pioneered and participated in independent television programming.  Its function is not merely to present the prizes every three years.  It has recognised this in other areas.

In Wales and the West, it is clear that there is scope for reconsideration of the conditions, without disturbing the decision in its essence.

Yours truly,
EMRYS ROBERTS
Pennant, Howard Drive, Hale, Cheshire.

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A most reasonable point from Mr. Roberts.  Why should television companies change wholesale in this way?  Surely a better method would be to instruct a newcomer to takeover, lock, stock and barrel the entire operation of the previous company?

In truth, this was the last thing Hill wanted.  It had to be made clear to companies that they were in place under a fixed-term contract.  When that contract came to an end, so did the company.  The contractors themselves had forgotten that, and the death of TWW was no more than a sacrifice to remind them all.

Additionally, as the Authority did at one time care about such things, a change only in ownership would have left the presentation of the company, and the continuity staff, in place.  An indication of great change had to be made, and swapping Lords at the helm would not do this.

Throughout the next eight months, Derby, in increasingly angry exchanges, continued to demand a reversal of the decision, while more conciliatory correspondents advised compromises like this one.

Hill was unmoved.  His biggest talent as a politician had always been his stubbornness.  The personalised insults from his former friend Derby caused him to dig his feet in further.  When Wilson moved Hill to the BBC less than 3 months later, the ITA under Aylestone continued on the same path with the same stubbornness.

Above all, the ITA was the king of independent television, and the contractors were mere courtiers.  They would do well to remember it.