“We are not interested in fiddling with numbers,” BBC director Tim Davie repeated several times to a Scottish parliamentary committee this morning amid the row over… Traitors And local talent.
Davie was pressed over major concerns about the lack of Scottish people working on the hit series, leading to accusations that the BBC is fiddling with the rules governing what counts as a show outside London, which are governed by the regulatory body. Ofcom. Traitors Producer Studio Lambert technically has a ‘substantial base’ in Scotland and is therefore eligible, but this has recently been called into question by figures from the local sector.
Giving evidence to the Scottish Culture Commission, Davie has insisted on numerous occasions that he wants to go beyond Ofcom standards and present more local shows in Scotland.
“Our goal is to have local productions,” Davey said. “This is audited to Ofcom standards. If you have [substantive] Al Qaeda, you are here. From the BBC’s point of view, this is not enough in the long term, and this is not our game in the long term. We are not interested in fiddling with numbers. “I couldn’t care less.”
He added that he was “interested in the facts, the scale of production, the number of jobs, and what is happening in Scotland.”
Davie’s claim of ‘juggling numbers’ may raise eyebrows given Deadline’s exclusive report which found the BBC and Ofcom had to correct the record on the number of Scots who worked on the first season of the series. Traitors. This Ofcom registry was initially listed Traitors The first season met Ofcom’s criteria for at least 50% of the talent below the line to be based in Scotland, but this was found upon investigation to be incorrect, even though the series was eligible to be based out of London.
Davie stressed the need to support local talent, but said he would not “disincentivize” producers from outside Scotland “to bring in teams to film something”, as long as they “want to build a Scottish base” in the future. Since it was filmed in a Scottish castle, he made reference to that Traitors It is a big draw for Scottish tourism and “all of these things should be celebrated”.
Davie, who masterminded a £700 million ($862 million) “UK-wide” plan several years ago to move jobs and shows out of London, said he was “concerned about the depth of the sector across the UK at the moment”. . He revealed that the BBC’s recently launched apprenticeship programme, which seeks to attract 290 apprentices, including about 70 in Scotland, has received 40,000 applicants.
“What worries me is the number of people who will get jobs in this sector,” he said. “We are seeing significant numbers of unemployment outside of London, among the self-employed. So it becomes crucial for the BBC to invest and I will go back to beating the drum for funding the BBC.