Editorial: ITV squeals

When big, fat Billy Bunter saw his sausage stolen at breakfast time, he set up an almighty squeal.

And that was what we heard from the independent television companies, and from some of the newspapers which have interests in ITV when the Pilkington report came out.

With one difference. The fat schoolboy never tried to convince everybody else that it was in their interests that he should have the sausage, as well as any bacon that was going.

One of the loudest squeals, as we might have guessed, came from the Daily Mirror: “They tell the public, in 160,000 words, to go to hell.” The Mirror has a big holding in Associated Television.

It is not difficult to find the reasons for these squeals. The Pilkington recommendations, if they are ever fully applied, could mean a lot less profit for some of the independent TV companies, which have been doing so well for themselves.

That was why their shares slumped, the day after the report came out.

Pilkington had some fascinating things to say on the scope, philosophy and responsibilities of broadcasting and, reasonably enough, questioned whether the sheep-like acceptance of the drivel which goes under the name of entertainment on television is really enjoyment.

This part of the report was savaged in the press, by papers which themselves are not slow to pontificate on the responsibilities of giving out public information.

But what really caused a flutter was the Pilkington conclusion that ITV had failed to provide good television because it was too bothered about selling advertising time. With something like a scandalised air, the committee uncovered the fact that the profit motive can be responsible for the deliberate production of something which is mean and shoddy.

Now this is interesting. But it is some thing which Socialists would have thought obvious to everybody.