News for Cheshire

BBC all ears

2008-11-24T13:11:00.002Z

The BBC Internet Blog has been reviewing coverage of the BBC Trust's decision not to go forward with local video news online. We have a mention, linking to yesterday's post here, which is good. We await responses with interest.

Watch this space, as this issue is unlikely to be tomorrow's chip wrappings just yet...

The end of BBC local news plans?

2008-11-23T12:34:00.004Z

A couple of days ago, the BBC Trust announced that it was vetoing a £68 million plan to provide a network of 65 hyper-local news sites providing video news content. On the face of it, it seems that any possibility of Cheshire's licence-fee payers finally getting some dedicated content have been abandoned. However, closer examination of the Trust's statement reveals that the money must be returned to central funds and may be used only with the Trust's agreement. So, the cash has been ring-fenced - at least temporarily. The statement also makes it clear that the BBC needs to look again at existing regional news provision and find other ways of addressing the gaps, and it has been invited to put forward new proposals to the Trust.

We await new developments with interest, as the Trust's announcement does not mean that there will be no Cheshire news site on BBC.co.uk at all, only that there will be no video news service.

Journalist Dave Lee points out that the real losers are the viewers and listeners, and notes that the regional media needs to up its game.

Regional newspapers are , as expected, heaving a huge sigh of relief. It's understandable as the BBC's video news proposals would undoubtedly have had an impact on local news provision. However, they should not feel threatened by the addition of one single web page to Aunty's sprawler of a site. They now have an opportunity to get their act together. If they are so worried about the BBC muscling to provide local news, then they need to provide it themselves in a more consumable form than they currently do. Robert Andrews has also raised some interesting ideas about how the BBC could offer local content in a manner that would enable the regional media and BBC to work together to offer useful content.

The biggest problem the regional press in Cheshire needs to resolve is frequency of delivery. In a large, mainly rural county most local papers are weekly and those that have websites tend to update them only weekly, instead of when news breaks. Coupled with many local FM radio stations that buy in their news feed from London and thus offer no localised bulletin, it is clear that the media Cheshire has a massive service gap to fill.

If they want to stay ahead of the BBC, those newspaper websites need to be updated daily to offer a genuinely local service to readers. Dave Lee has identified some of the major problems regional news websites need to tackle. Newsquest and Trinity Mirror should, I sincerely hope, being closely examining the issue of differentiation. It's understandable that these huge local media conglomerates want to push a brand identity but it should never be at the expense of their end-users, who want local news round the clock in a useable format.

The regional media and the BBC are probably never going to sit comfortably together, but there is a real opportunity now for both to do what they can to improve localised news provision.

In the meantime, the campaign will be asking the BBC if the axing of the local video proposals affects the proposal to offer Cheshire licence-fee payers equality of service on the website.

O'Brien resigns

2008-09-05T14:28:00.002+01:00

Tamsin O'Brien, head of North-West Regional Programming for the BBC, has announced her resignation from the post.

The news gives no indication if her departure is immediate (but presumably it is), or her reason for standing down. We await news of her successor with interest.

And, of course, the burning question is - what happens now to O'Brien's promise that news and other online services will be provided for Cheshire licence-fee papers at the end of the year? It is to be hoped that the proposals submitted to the BBC Trust will be given the green light, but the arrival of a new broom at BBC Manchester HQ could see a clean sweep.

We will be watching all developments very closely.

BBC online budget scandal - the truth at last

2008-05-30T17:34:00.004+01:00

News broke yesterday of the BBC Trust's review of bbc.co.uk, the corporation's gargantuan website, of which News Online is a major part. The results make interesting reading and have been widely analysed in the media.

First up, even the press release offers some intriguing statistics.

In 2006/7 the BBC spent 3% of the licence fee on bbc.co.uk compared to 70% on television channels and 17% on its radio services, yet it is now the BBC's fourth most widely used service.

Right - so it gets a snippet of the cash available... But wait - there's much more going on. Scroll down the press release and you'll see an appended table detailing the budget, the overspend and misallocation costs, accompanied by a very dry statement.

It fell to the Guardian to get stuck in. Its PDA blog made a scathing analysis of the financial mismanagement afoot.

The world's biggest news and entertainment website breached its 2007/2008 budget by a staggering 48%. About two-thirds of the £35.8m overspend was down to "misallocation of general overheads and costs'' - accountants at the BBC had, apparently, failed to include costs such as the buildings that house its digital teams. Then there was the £3.5m in unauthorised overspend and a further £7.4m in overspending that - bizarrely - is permitted under generous BBC rules that allow for "10% leeway either side of the target,'' as a spokesman put it.
So who gets fired? Well, no one. In part, because no one, it turns out, is in charge of the sprawling BBC.co.uk network.

Shocked? There's more:

How will the Trust rein in the spending? They won't. Instead, the Trust's recommendation is simply to accept the overspend, integrate it into the budget and add an extra £4.4m of additional padding. So the baseline budget for 2007/2008 of £74.2m is bumped up to £114.4m - a healthy 54% increase at a time when the BBC's private sector rivals are feeling the full whiplash of a global credit crunch.

Journalism.co.uk was also scathing of the figures.

From the point of view of media rivals, that sounds threatening. But it's not the place of this blog to detail the long-running war between Aunty and regional news outlets that feel threatened by the BBC's dominance. From the licence-payers' standpoint, it's mixed - bad that things ran over budget but good because it's still committed to investing in what is, after all, a heavily used site.

Sitting here in Cheshire, I can only look at the report from the angle of value for money for us licence-payers in the county. It is quite staggering that the BBC can throw licence-payers' money around like this - losing control of budgets, no one apparently in charge, spending at least £3.5m on "additional content", etc. Yet, the BBC continues to claim that there is no budget as yet to provide dedicated Cheshire content (either news or other regional content) and a million residents in the county are still expected to wait until January 2009 for the BBC Trust to give official approval to provision of equal coverage for Cheshire...

Personally, I'm not massively surprised at the financial waste - stories abound of vast budgets being spent on pilot TV shows that are scrapped before transmission. Neither am I surprised that no one was "in charge" of the whole sorry mess. But let's be frank - if the BBC was a modern plc, it would be a lean, mean, fighting machine accountable to shareholders and expected to rein in costs. Us licence-payers are sort of shareholders but without the control, so this kind of profligate waste continues to abound while the very people that this world-renowned public broadcasting service is to supposed to serve renain unserved.

A scandal? You bet.

Cash for local news at BBC

2008-05-23T18:08:00.003+01:00

The journalism resource site Journalism.co.uk has reported more news on the BBC's plans for local news sites.

That pot of £68 million is a nice little sum. No surprise that regional press editors are unhappy about Aunty's plans as they've long seen this as the BBC muscling in on their patch. It's a shame they don't understand that local papers can and should provide a more detailed service to their community than the BBC will ever be able to achieve.

What we'd like to know is if Cheshire is included among the 60 sites that will be sharing the £68 million. The BBC has yet to specify if the 60 sites are the existing county web pages or if these are to be new ultra-local pages, which has been hinted at previously. Just when are they going to clarify this?

Results not just in but visible

2008-05-02T20:52:00.002+01:00

It took a while, but finally all the votes were counted, the results were declared and the Tories took control of both the new unitary authorities of Cheshire East and Cheshire West and Chester.

In another historic first, BBC News Online reported the election results on all three of the Manchester, Merseyside and Staffordshire pages across which Cheshire news is normally spread (if we actually get any).

After two years of campaigning for one solitary Cheshire news page, perhaps we should now be demanding two - one for each half of the county...

The question is, is Aunty up to the challenge?

Election? What election?

2008-05-01T08:55:00.004+01:00

It's polling day today. Hundreds of councils across England and Wales are up for re-election and, in case you have been living in the Gobi desert for the last six months and hadn't heard, so is the Mayor of London. Ken, Boris, Brian, whoever... even in Wick (that's in the north of Scotland) they are probably aware of who the main mayoral candidates are.

Here in Cheshire, we are about to vote for our two new (and unwanted) unitary councils. Not that you'd know from reading BBC News Online. Aunty has barely reported on the change in the last year, a change that will affect a million people and split the county in two forever.

Today's BBC coverage just ignores Cheshire, as usual. The main story this morning focuses on the general situation, then switches to the fight for London. The electoral news on the Manchester page, where some Cheshire news occasionally gets shunted, ignores the split, as does the report on the Staffordshire page.

Early this morning, there was no news at all on the Merseyside page about the elections. It took until 8.22am for the BBC to acknowledge what's happening. Even then, we are only offered two measly sentences on this momentous change. It would be fair to say that anyone outside Cheshire probably has had no clue of the impending split because it has been so woefully under-reported. Only the county's many local papers have kept Cheshire inhabitants informed, in a fragmented manner. The BBC offers no information today on the number of seats up for election in either authority, which boroughs are disappearing for good alongside the County Council, or what the expected turnout might be.

Eight other unitary authorities will be created today in these elections: Shropshire (minus Telford and Wrekin), Bedford, Cornwall, County Durham, Exeter, Ipswich, Wiltshire and Northumberland. All these areas, however, have their own county news page on News Online, meaning licence-payers in these places have been able to follow the BBC's coverage of the changes.

We shall await tomorrow's results reports with interest - just where on BBC News Online will we be able to hunt down the results of the Cheshire West & Chester and Cheshire East polls?

Wales, Staffordshire - what's the difference?

2008-04-24T17:07:00.005+01:00

A quirky story has appeared on the BBC website today - Audlem in Cheshire (on the border of Staffordshire) wants to become Welsh, even though it is 9 miles from the border with Wales.

Village residents are running a poll to drum up support, although some local inhabitants would prefer to join Shropshire. It's not clear why (apart from free prescriptions) they are so desperate to leave Cheshire, but as usual finding the story meant scouring various regional pages because of the lack of a Cheshire news feed.

Rebranding for BBC News

2008-04-15T10:39:00.003+01:00

The BBC has announced it is to spend yet more money revamping its news service. Following an across-the-board redesign for News Online in March, Aunty is to rebrand all its news channels using various versions of its red globe logo. The exercise will cost £550,000 and see channels such as News 24 renamed and regional news programmes have their own colour schemes.

It all sounds very nice and will undoubtedly look very pretty, while strengthening the BBC's news branding and global image. Here in Cheshire, though, it's hard not to see it as yet another lost opportunity to provide licence payers with equality of news coverage. The truly cynical no doubt wonder how it is that Aunty can afford to spend so much money on looks yet cite an inadequate licence fee settlement (and thus poverty) when it comes to providing a couple of pages of content for the licence-paying residents of Cheshire...

And still more media coverage...

2008-04-11T18:31:00.003+01:00

The media site, Journalism.co.uk, has also picked up on last Friday's Newswatch broadcast and published a story on the campaign. You can read it here.

Too much too zoo...

2008-04-10T19:10:00.004+01:00

Another baby giraffe has been born at Chester Zoo. And BBC News Online has chosen to report the birth. That is the fifth zoo story we've had since the beginning of this year. While it's good to know that these rare Rothschilds are surviving in captivity, it's hardly the most important thing happening in our county.

We have local elections in less than a month and for Cheshire, this will also mean the abolition of a number of district councils, the loss of our county council and the forced imposition of two unitary authorities by the government that will split our historic county in two forever. The BBC has only once reported on this, some months back, despite it having been on the political agenda for well over a year. This massive change is going to affect almost 1 million people. If this was taking place in Liverpool or Manchester, it's fair to assume it would be receiving saturation coverage.

We get bloody giraffes again, instead!

Meet Kate Simms...

2008-04-09T16:14:00.003+01:00

Yesterday I mentioned Kate Simms, the Chester-based correspondent for regional news programme North West Tonight. Shockingly, Kate is the sole correspondent covering Cheshire, a large county that is largely rural and is not easy to get around even by road (unless you're using the M6 - try going east-west and see how long it takes). Should there be a breaking story over in Macclesfield, this might explain why such items rarely get covered - I daresay by the time she's managed to get there the excitement is all over...

Kate Simms is also responsible for online news coverage. Take a look at her page, as she is positively inviting the licence payers of Cheshire to contact her if they have a story they think needs reporting. So, give her a call or send her an email and suggest some news stories for her to cover - we all know there's lots happening across our county, but she may need a helping hand.

Only 5 days late...

2008-04-08T13:37:00.002+01:00

Earlier this year, we reported how the BBC was a whole week late reporting on the "scandal" of the road markings at Chester's newly revamped railway station.

Aunty has done it again, albeit slightly quicker this time. Today's groundbreaking news on the BBC website concerns the collapse of the ancient city Walls. This event happened on the afternoon of Thursday 3 April and was duly reported in the weekly Chester Chronicle the very next day. The council put out its own press release yesterday and today's free edition Midweek Chronicle has a further update on the state of the Walls.

Interestingly, the BBC report acknowledges that the collapse happened last week, so why has it taken 5 days to publish the story?

While in London last week, recording the Newswatch debate with BBC head of local and regional programming, Tamsin O'Brien, I learned (to my complete astonishment) that the BBC does have a Chester correspondent based in the city. Her name is Kate Simms. Which rather begs the question of what exactly she is doing to earn her salary - a salary paid for by Cheshire licence payers. If she was filing news this late on a newspaper, she could expect to be fired. Yet because she reports for the BBC, we continue to get a shoddy service of either late news or no news. Once again, Cheshire licence payers are bottom of the heap when it comes to supplying an up-to-date news service.

More coverage

2008-04-08T09:00:00.002+01:00

Some unexpected coverage of the campaign has popped up on the internet, in an unusual quarter.

Garden design experts Real Oasis, based in Cheshire, appear to have seen the TV debate on News24 last week, and subsequently written about it in their blog. Thanks, guys. Spreading the word is even more important now - it's time to keep the pressure on so that the BBC Trust approves the proposals.

More press coverage

2008-04-07T11:37:00.002+01:00

How Do has today run a fresh story on the campaign, this time reporting on my TV appearance on NewsWatch last Friday. You can read it here.

Feedback on the television debate has so far been very positive, with most people saying they were not convinced by O'Brien's arguments.

If you saw the programme and would like to comment, do please add your views to the blog.

We are still working on getting a clip up on YouTube, after experiencing technical problems. We hope to resolve this as soon as possible.

Transmission truth

2008-04-04T22:02:00.003+01:00

Good evening, viewers.

If you missed Newswatch tonight, don't forget it's still available on the internet until Friday 11 April. We'll be aiming to get the clip on YouTube asap, too.

I think we can all agree that there was the surprise announcement of a Cheshire news page in the offing. They have until January 2009 to make good on the promises.

In the meantime, the campaign is not going away. We'll be keeping up the pressure this year, particularly on the BBC Trust (the governing body) as it's their ultimate decision. So we'll still be blogging and reporting and keeping an eye on the state of play.

But there is indeed light at the end of the tunnel.

Tune in tonight!

2008-04-04T16:17:00.004+01:00

Filming went ahead as planned yesterday at BBC Television Centre.

Newswatch will be broadcast tonight at 8.45pm on News24. There is a repeat tomorrow (Saturday 5 April) on BBC1 on Breakfast. I'm not sure where in the schedule for the programme it will be - probably towards the end of the show, but don't take my word for it.

if you miss that too, you can watch it online for a week on the Newswatch page.

Without giving too much away, there is an interesting revelation made by my debating partner, Tamsin O'Brien, who is head of local and regional programming for the north-west at the BBC.

We might yet see a change before too long. Then again, maybe not.

Tune in to see whether there really is light at the end of the tunnel.

New look, but no change

2008-03-31T21:47:00.002+01:00

As expected, the BBC has begun rolling out its revamped News Online site. It's got a much cleaner look now, and is clearly influenced by the blogosphere in appearance and feel. There are some early teething troubles - many news stories today were published with varying font sizes on the page, which made things difficult to read.

Despite the freshen-up, one thing has not changed. There is still no Cheshire page. It;s business as usual for us licence-payers - if you want to know what's happening in our county then, as before, you will have to scour the news pages for Merseyside, Manchester and Staffordshire. Or choose an alternative news source. What a lost opportunity to add one extra page while redesigning the templates.

Not that you need have bothered - as usual, no Cheshire news was reported at all on News Online today.

BBC news pages to get revamp

2008-03-26T18:43:00.005Z

Journalism.co.uk has just published a news item on the forthcoming revamp of the BBC's news pages on its website. There's lots of talk of exciting new templates and expanded coverage, with embedded video, etc.

We are recording Ray Snoddy's Newswatch next Thursday (3 April) - wouldn't it be a delicious irony if the BBC decided to add our long-demanded Cheshire page as part of the revamp, just as I go on the box to moan about its absence!

Watch this space...

TV date confirmed

2008-03-17T21:30:00.002Z

The TV debate is going ahead. BBC News 24 was in touch again earlier today to confirm filming on 3 April, with broadcasting expected on 4 April.

My opponent on the panel will be Tamsin O'Brien, head of regional and local programming for north-west England.

Stay tuned...

The lord has spoken...

2008-03-05T16:09:00.006Z

The BBC has reported the latest update on the issue of the abolition of Cheshire County Council and its replacement by two unitary authorities.

The report quotes Lord Wade (the House of Lords was trying to force the government to rescind its decision) as saying: "(Cheshire) is a long-term historic county, to which those in it have a great deal of loyalty."

What a lost opportunity for the BBC to recognise this too, and give the residents of a Cheshire a decent online news service.

More zoo news

2008-03-02T11:37:00.003Z

Yet again, the BBC's hottest news story from Cheshire is about Chester Zoo. This week it's all about a pregnant orang-utan that the Zoo didn't know was pregnant. That's 4 zoo stories since the start of 2008 alone, and 15 in the last 12 months.

One might be excused for thinking nothing much happens in Chester apart from zoo births if you only get your news from BBC Online.

Yet the top stories in this week's Chester Chronicle are far more varied. There's the ongoing faked sport stars' autographs trial at Chester Crown court, a major report on the urban impact on the Cheshire countryside, the unearthing of a medieval graveyard on the site of the old Chester police HQ, which is currently being redeveloped, and a visit by Margaret Hodge MP (culture minister) who met with more than 30 leading cultural representatives to discuss the loss of Chester's theatre and cinema in 2007 and related issues. There were also news reports on several serious violent assaults in the area.

Almost all these stories would have appeared on the BBC's news page for Merseyside if they had taken place in Liverpool. Yet they seem considered not worth reporting nationally by the BBC because they took place 25 miles away.

Cheshire split finally reported by Aunty

2008-02-27T20:37:00.003Z

About flaming time.

For the last 9-10 months or so, the 1 million residents of Cheshire have been learning of government plans to abolish Cheshire County Council and six district councils and merge them all, into either one or two unitary authorities.

It goes without saying that the proposals have been splashed all over the various local and regional newspapers in our county. But until today, the issue was virtually ignored by the BBC.

This is a major story that will cost millions of pounds and affect 1 million people yet Aunty considered it not worth covering. Until today.

Note that the BBC's coverage is on the Staffordshire news page. There's clearly no need to remind you that it's there because we do not have a dedicated page for Cheshire news. Oh, the irony of reporting such a massive story on the web page for a neighbouring county...

TV debate stirs regional media interest

2008-02-22T13:27:00.002Z

Following Wednesday's post about the invitation to appear on Newswatch on BBC News 24, the media in the north-west have shown interest.

The regional news hub, How Do, has reported on the forthcoming TV debate. There has also been some interest at the Chester Chronicle, although it's unclear at this stage if they will actually run an article.

The campaign is busy right now doing lots of PR to try and maximise the opportunity offered by Newswatch to widen the discussion.

Stay tuned!

TV boost for campaign

2008-02-20T16:58:00.006Z

The BBC has invited the News for Cheshire campaign to participate in a televised debate about local news coverage. This is a very exciting opportunity to push the campaign forward as I will be able to raise the campaign's pressing issue with a senior figure from the BBC who will be on the panel.

The programme is Newswatch, presented by Ray Snoddy. Filming will take place on Thursday 6 March and be broadcast the following evening.

Watch this space for further developments.

12 day tally

2008-02-11T14:42:00.000Z

A quick count-up of Cheshire stories on BBC News online reveals that just a dozen have been reported since 31 January. One of those was the big story of Garry Newlove, which is still making headlines - his attackers have now been sentenced. The rest were fairly minor - a road crash here, a missing patient there, and a handful of stories on police force and fire brigade cuts.

Where is the real news? Is there really nothing happening out there?

BBC magics money for local news?

2008-01-30T10:35:00.000Z

The front page of the current print edition of the Press Gazette carries the interesting news that the BBC will go ahead with plans for ultra-local news coverage online.

This is not new news - the idea has been mooted for some time and we have already covered this issue here.

PG's detailed report suggests that quite a lot of money is going to get pumped into the BBC's micronews venture, although no figures are mentioned. Unsurprisingly, industry bodies such as the Newspaper Society are gearing up for a fight, citing unfair competition that will duplicate existing local news services provided by the regional press and local radio.

One wonders where the money is going to come from. The licence fee awarded to the BBC in 2007 for the next few years, which was less than the amount asked for, has triggered a lot of cuts. Many BBC news journalists are facing the possible loss of their jobs. A number of planned BBC local radio stations, including one for Cheshire, were axed. And Hugh Berlyn, head of News Online, told me himself that the licence fee cuts meant we cannot expect a solitary dedicated news page on Aunty's website.

This begs the question - if BBC News Online does not have the funds to provide a dedicated news page for Cheshire, which we calculated would cost a fraction of £0.002 a month, how on earth do they propose to pay for a network of 60 ultra-local news websites?

And more intriguingly, if the BBC had already earmarked the budget for this proposal at some earlier date, why cannot it use that £0.002p or less per month to create a Cheshire news page now?

Week-old news is not news!

2008-01-18T14:18:00.000Z

BBC Online - please take note, if a story is more than 24 hours old, it's not news (unless you are running an update to an earlier story.

The news that the road around Chester railway station has no markings is old hat. It was published in the Chester Chronicle on Friday 11 January. That's a full 7 days ago. It's not news.

Bad enough that the BBC publishes so few news stories from Cheshire, but there is really no excuse for running a story that is no longer a story.

Newlove news

2008-01-17T18:11:00.001Z

A small flurry of activity on BBC News Online this past week.

Almost all of the Cheshire news reported recently has been about the Newlove trial. Garry Newlove was kicked to death outside his Warrington home last summer. The trial has been ongoing since November at Chester Crown Court and the jury took almost two weeks to reach a verdict, which was finally announced yesterday. The link above will take you to a number of related pages, plus this one.

A sad tale and one that deserves the heavy coverage it has received, if only to illustrate what now seems to be a fairly typical kind of violence in many of our towns.

2008 - a poor start

2008-01-08T12:21:00.000Z

Since we last blogged, the BBC has reported just 15 Cheshire news stories. Yes, that's 15 in 39 days. Not even 3 stories a week.

Yet things have not exactly been quiet across the county. For one thing, the massive row about the government's decision to split Cheshire into two unitary authorities has only just started to kick off, after simmering a few months. This deeply unpopular decision has been front page news on most local papers around the county. It's a massive change that will cost millions and affect almost a million people. But Aunty doesn't think it's worth reporting.

Looks like there's no policy change at BBC News Online for 2008, then. In other words, no news is, well, no news (for Cheshire, anyway)...

Trust and money

2007-11-30T09:58:00.000Z

Aunty's new governing body, the BBC Trust, has unveiled proposals to give BBC audiences greater involvement in its decision making.

This is welcome news but it remains to be seen whether such measures will have any effect in providing deprived licence-payers with they actually want. Here in Cheshire, we are well used to broken promises - witness the recent abandoning of plans to provide us with a BBC Radio Cheshire...

The BBC Trust will only earn credibility if it can ensure that people are given equality of service. It's all very well promising to listen to people's views. The real test is whether the Corporation is willing to translate that into action.

The financial breakdown of the licence fee makes interesting reading. The cost per household per month for the licence is £10.96. Of this, £0.75p goes to funding 40 local radio stations - Cestrians are paying that for county stations all over the UK except in Cheshire. And the BBC's 240-plus websites cost a mere 49p a month, yet they claim they cannot afford to provide one measly news page for Cheshire because of the recent budget cutbacks. Yet it would cost not even £0.000000001p per month to give us a Cheshire page on BBC News Online.

If you want to let the Trust know how unfairly you think you are being treated as a licence payer, get in touch with them.

This campaign will be making an official representation to the Trust, but the more individuals who make their views known too, the better.

Irresponsible data collection

2007-11-11T11:48:00.000Z

Back in September, we reported that the Chester Chronicle (and other Cheshire local papers owned by the Trinity Mirror group) had revamped its website to provide daily news online, in addition to the Friday print edition. The new site offers readers the opportunity to get involved in commenting on the news - citizen journalism - which is fine until you register and discover that you have to provide not just an email address but also your full name, phone number, fax etc etc, all of which may be published on the website. Somewhat irresponsible in these days of identity theft.

Worse, all comments are withheld from publication until approved by the moderator. What is the point of encouraging people to engage with their local media if their contributions are to be positively vetted?

We had hoped that the "Cheshire Communities" initiative launched by Trinity Mirror would have provided a viable alternative to the lack of news coverage of Cheshire at the BBC, but it appears not be the case.

Back to the drawing board...

Misplaced trust

2007-11-02T06:29:00.000Z

Tell us something we don't already know!

The BBC Trust has acknowledged that Aunty does not do enough for licence-payers outside London. Sadly, we are well aware of this in Cheshire, where our county does not appear on the BBC's website map of England, we have no news page there and we also have no county radio station (plans for BBC Radio Cheshire have now been axed indefinitely).

The campaign will be making official representations to the BBC Trust over these issues. Watch this space...

Axed Cheshire "station" on How-Do

2007-10-22T09:56:00.000+01:00

As we reported a few days ago, the BBC's allegedly advanced plans for a Radio Cheshire have been scrapped for budgetary reasons.

North-west news hub, How-Do, has reported today on the story and this campaign gets a mention!

A bad news day...

2007-10-19T16:38:00.000+01:00

... but not entirely unexpected.

Earlier today, the BBC announced it would not be going ahead with plans to launch 5 new regional radio stations due to ongoing budget problems.

The Dorset page on BBC News Online carried a report on the fact that the proposed BBC Radio Dorset would not get the green light.

Needless to say, there was no trace on the BBC news website at all about the decision to scrap next year's launch of BBC Radio Cheshire. Without a trace of irony, we think it's fair to say that's because there is no Cheshire page on which to announce it!

We are not giving up the fight! We will continue to campaign for a Cheshire news page on the BBC website because we cannot accept that is unaffordable, budget cuts or not, and because 900,000 residents of Cheshire - licence payers all - are entitled to equal treatment.

Many signatories to the petition have made it very clear that they really want a regional radio station and we will continue to press for that too.

Please sign the petition if you have not yet done so - it is more important than ever to make sure your voice is heard!

Zoos aren't news

2007-10-08T14:13:00.000+01:00

Can someone at the BBC please take note - Chester Zoo is NOT news.

Cestrians might be forgiven for thinking that nothing ever happens in Chester except for births at the zoo. Now, Chester Zoo is a fine example as zoos go, don't get us wrong. But there are plenty of more interesting and important things happening in the county capital than the apparent "news" that the zoo is to be on television. For example, the news that the chairman of the Countess of Chester hospital has just been awarded a pay rise of more than £11,000 a year (as reported by the Chester Chronicle).

Priorities, priorities...

Keep 'em coming

2007-10-07T09:16:00.000+01:00

It's been a record week for Aunty - we're starting to lose count of the news from Cheshire that the Beeb is currently publishing.

Cheshire cops are targeting traffickers in the sex industry.

A Runcorn church collapsed after going ablaze.

And a Cheshire man has been charged with drug offences.

Of course, after this unprecedented flurry of reportage, it may well go quiet for another month now. But it would be nice to think the BBC is turning over a new leaf here.

Warrington Watch

2007-10-05T14:04:00.000+01:00

After the latest (yet not unusual) news drought, Warrington has been hitting the BBC's headlines. It's all been happening there in the last two days.

First, a car explosion took place, apparently caused by industrial fireworks rather than act of terrorism. Then a woman had her car stolen by a couple of prospective buyers. Lastly, there was a drugs raid and haul nearby, a big one.

Over in Chester, there's been an E.coli outbreak.

Dear BBC
You see, Cheshire does exist and things do happen here. You managed to report 4 stories in the space of just over 24 hours. It's not that difficult. You can do it, you just proved it. Can we have more, please?
Yours,
O. Twist of Cheshire

Quick!

2007-10-02T18:14:00.000+01:00

... before it vanishes!

There is Cheshire news afoot on the BBC website.

Police "errors" in teenager's death.

Surely more has happened in the last 10 days than that, though?

Radio rumours

2007-10-01T06:09:00.000+01:00

A whisper has reached News for Cheshire that BBC Radio Cheshire may possibly be launching in 2008...

Unfortunately, we didn't hear this from the BBC (now there's a surprise!). The tip came from a local journalist working on one of Cheshire's newspapers.

Searching the net for any info on this proposed venture reveals nothing at all, so I guess we'll just have to sit tight and see if our friendly journo is right - we'd love to see this news come true. On the petition, it's been astonishing the number of signatories who have voiced their fury at the lack of a county radio station even though the campaign started off as a demand for a humble web page on BBC News Online. So - fingers crossed, it may yet happen...

Depressingly, since we last posted on 23 September, the BBC has not published one single item of Cheshire news at all (no change there, then).

Here are last week's stories that Aunty could have reported:

The Tories won a crucial by-election in Gowy for Cheshire county council, strengthening their grip on power. They have also selected Stephen Mosley as Chester's candidate for the general election (which could be sooner than we think). Mosley is currently a county councillor as well as deputy leader of Chester City Council.

An armed gang has been targeting off-licences in the Chester area and members are possibly carrying guns.

A Crewe teacher was convicted of downloading child porn from the internet and is awaiting sentence.

Vale Royal Borough Council won an award - The Times Best Council to Work For, an annual award run by The Times newspaper to recognise the best of public service.

A campaign to revive the fortunes of our county's Cheshire Cheese was launched at Nantwich Food and Drink Festival over the weekend. Just six traditional producers (as opposed to factories) still make Britain's oldest-known cheese.

And - the best news this week - the Glass Slug project is officially dead. Official conformation came on an election leaflet during the Gowy by-election (see above).

All the news that Aunty refuses to tell you....

Tune in next week for more.

Chronicle boost

2007-09-23T14:51:00.000+01:00

Fellow Cheshire blogger, The Wordsmith, has posted about the future of newspapers and some new developments at the Chester Chronicle.

The new Chronicle site is very welcome, given that it will be update daily - for once, the 900,000 residents of Cheshire will have access to frequent local news updates. It's not often that local media steals a march on the mighty Beeb, but we'll be keeping an eye on this.

At a time when newspapers are under huge financial pressure as a result of falling advertising revenues, it's good to see them embracing Web 2.0 and looking forward. All the BBC seems to do is bleat about not getting enough licence fee and failing to provide a full service for many licence-payers.

Cheshire to disappear?

2007-09-19T17:32:00.000+01:00

After the usual complete news blackout on BBC Online, we are astonished to find a sudden flurry of stories.

Mrs Bin Laden of Northwich is divorcing.

There's been a robbery in Culcheth. (If anyone know where this is, do please tell us - it's clearly one of the smaller villages in our vast county!). This was the second in less than a week as robbers attacked a security guard in Culcheth a week ago.

There have also been two sexual assaults on women - one in Widnes and the other in Warrington.

Stories that are definitely not being covered by Aunty include the looming final decision on the unwanted Glass Slug in Chester - a decision is expected imminently as to whether this project will be cancelled as promised by the new Tory administration.

The other hot story that no one seems to be talking about except in the local papers around Cheshire, is the future of our county itself. The government sometime ago demanded council mergers, the result being that Cheshire could end up with either one unitary council covering the entire county, or two - in which case Cheshire would be split into West and East unitary councils.

However, Cheshire County Council, in a recent paper delivered to homes in the county, suggests that the the government really intends to wipe Cheshire off the map for good. In such a scenario, West Cheshire would be absorbed into Merseyside, creating a new county of Merseyshire, and East Cheshire would be absorbed into Greater Manchester, creating the new county of Manshire. You can read about this outrageous proposal here.

We find it astonishing that no one in the media is showing the slightest bit of interest in this story. This would be a major shake-up of local government that would see a historic county vanish forever, and cities like Chester, which culturally is poles apart from Liverpool, sucked into the morass of Merseyside.

Mind you, if it happens, the BBC will be off the hook and no doubt delighted that they won't have to keep fobbing off 900,000 residents of Cheshire with flimsy excuses as to why they won't provide a BBC Radio Cheshire or even a paltry news page on the website...

Yet more zoo stories

2007-09-11T14:36:00.000+01:00

Anyone could be forgiven for thinking that nothing ever happens in Cheshire except for events at Chester Zoo. At least if they are reading BBC News Online. Today's hot story is the birth of a lion cub. Oh, and some of Warrington got left without water for a day.

Elsewhere in the UK, life goes on - shootings, stabbings, robberies, political rows, famous people dying...

Move along, people. There's nothing happening in Cheshire. It's official. Aunty says so.

Summer ends, news coverage resumes?

2007-09-07T11:59:00.000+01:00

Perhaps September will see an improvement in terms of the BBC reporting news from Cheshire.

A major story on Thursday about the chemical spillage at Ellesmere Port on the M53 got coverage, as did news of an impending by-election following the death of a councillor.

I see Aunty is still clogging up the Merseyside page with the ongoing McCann saga, though, despite Kate McCann having only the most tenuous connection with Liverpool these days.

Oh, for a dedicated news page for Cheshire...

No news is not good news

2007-09-01T17:58:00.000+01:00

August was officially a no-news month on the BBC. Trying to find out what, if anything, has been happening in Cheshire over the last 31 days has been impossible. Other news sources have carried Cheshire news, but not Aunty. Whole weeks have passed in Cestrian silence.

So it was with something akin to shock yesterday to discover that the BBC was reporting on the 22nd (Cheshires) Regiment merger with others in the region. The original story was posted at around 6pm yesterday (the page has been updated today), by which time many of the events around the merger had already taken place. Naturally, this gives no one an opportunity to go along and see what's happening, as much of this was in public. It's not the first time the BBC has decided belatedly to report news so late as to deprive the public of participation.

But some news was better than nothing, we suppose.

Let's hope the reporting rate improves this month.

Newlove and Fahy

2007-08-19T14:16:00.000+01:00

Garry Newlove has rightly been headline news on BBC News Online during this last week, after he was killed outside his home for challenging a gang of teenagers. There seems to have been a spate of such awful deaths recently, with a young man from Croydon killed only a day or so later for speaking to some kids who's thrown litter into a car.

So, Mr Newlove's death was not the best reason for Warrington to be in the news, but at least it had the top coverage it deserved.

In the interim, Cheshire's Chief Constable, Peter Fahy, made the headlines himself, firstly for leading the investigation into Garry Newlove's murder. But then he created a stir for saying that the legal drinking age should be raised to 21. Fahy also suggested that parents should be held responsible for their unruly teenagers.

So, Cheshire was heavily featured in this week's news. A pity then, that this profile of Chief Constable Fahy was so hard to find on BBC News Online. A Cheshire news page might have solved that problem...

Back on the map

2007-08-10T17:40:00.000+01:00

After a total news drought lasting more than 8 days, we are pleased to report that Cheshire has been found alive and, well, not really well, but certainly kicking.

It's been all go in Widnes the last few days: first, gunshots were fired at someone's house. Then, a woman was assaulted while asleep.

Elsewhere, Wilmslow (which has been a hotbed of crime since Kerry Katona's burglary) made the headlines again. This time, because a care worker brutalised a patient.

Lastly, someone shot a cat with an airgun in the Chester suburb of Blacon.

Nothing nice to report, but we are relieved that Aunty has temporarily remembered that life does go on in Cheshire...

No news

2007-08-07T07:15:00.000+01:00

There is, officially, nothing to report. The BBC has not published a single Cheshire story anywhere on News Online during the last 7 days. Not one.

We searched high and low but failed to find one anywhere. Perhaps Cheshire really doesn't exist? After all, nothing is happening here, according to Aunty. And Aunty doesn't recognise Cheshire as a county anyway.

We read the news in the Chester Chronicle last Friday. Surely something has happened around here since then?

Why is it so difficult to find out what's going on in Cheshire?

Northgate 1 - Slug 0

2007-07-30T20:53:00.000+01:00

A (very) small cheer for Aunty covering the first demolition in the Northgate redevelopment scheme, which we might add is deeply unpopular with Cestrians.

Nul points for failing to cover the latest on the Glass Slug, an equally unpopular development in Chester. The Glass Slug is a regular front-page story in the Chester Chronicle, as it was yet again on Friday 27 July - this time, the news was that the Tory council administration, which won the local elections in May on a promise of scrapping this deeply unpopular proposed development, might renege on their election manifesto. Front-page news in the Chron, not a whisper on BBC News Online. No change there, then...

One Aunty couldn't avoid

2007-07-25T20:24:00.000+01:00

Cheshire splits in two...

Yes, even the BBC would have had a slight problem not reporting the fact that Cheshire County Council is to go forever and be replaced by two unitary authorities. Although nothing was reported on what the citizens of our county think of such a move (hint: not a popular idea).

No, just the straight facts and nothing more.

We presume that the loss of a single county-wide authority will merely give the Beeb yet another excuse to continue splitting Cheshire news coverage across a number of non-Cheshire pages.

Today's top headlines

2007-07-19T22:28:00.000+01:00

Ok, we were wrong about the Royal visit to Chester - the BBC did indeed cover it.

But where was the report on the latest crime statistics? The Merseyside figures were, predictably, on the Merseyside news page, but not the Cheshire ones. Not even tucked away at the foot of the Merseyside stats. Puzzled, we had a look at the Manchester news page. After all, half of the Cheshire news coverage ends up there if it ever gets posted. Hmm, no sign. But then the Greater Manchester crime stats weren't reported there either. What was going on?

Ah, wait a minute - BBC News Online says Cheshire doesn't exist. Therefore it can't report crime statistics for a non-existent county.

Except that at 6.30pm we were watching the regional news on BBC North West Tonight with Gordon Burn, which managed to report the Cheshire crime stats...

You can wait all year...

2007-07-17T07:39:00.000+01:00

...for a story on Wilmslow. Then, like buses, two come along at once.

Wilmslow, that leafy affluent corner of our fair county, is fast turning into a hotbed of violent crime, it appears.

First, Kerry Katona is held at knifepoint. Then, a golfer is attacked with a hockey stick.

Interestingly, the second story was positioned on both the Manchester and Merseyside news pages on BBC Online, while Katona only made it to the Manchester page, despite being from Warrington in west Cheshire. Wilmslow, of course, is so far east it's practically in Manchester. If Katona wasn't so famous that she was a headline story on the entertainment page too, we might have missed it.

Hijacked headlines

2007-07-16T20:42:00.000+01:00

We swear, in all the months we've been running this campaign, much as we want to see Cheshire news get reported we do not want Z-list celebrities blocking up the cybersphere and preventing real news from being reported.

If you're wondering what we're wittering on about, it's Kerry Katona being held at knife-point. Not that we wish Ms Katona any ill-will, just that we think there are more important things happening in the news.

Zoos again

2007-07-13T17:06:00.000+01:00

According to Aunty, nothing has happened at all in Cheshire over the last 10 days. Monitoring of the Merseyside pages, where news from the west of our county is routinely dumped (if the BBC bothers to report anything at all), shows that only Liverpool stories have been published.

Until today, when we have yet another zoo story...

There's no doubt that Chester Zoo does amazing work, but there's a lot more going on in Cheshire than research into mandrills.

Here's just a few of today's lead stories in the Chester Chronicle:

- Post-box bomber jailed for possessing child porn (child porn stories are normally hot fodder for the Beeb). There are two other major child porn news items in the Chronicle today.

- speculation over the future of Chester City Council's chief executive officer (lots of rumours and whiffs of conflict with the new Tory administration - usually good for BBC coverage).

- announcement of planned visit by Charles and Camilla to Chester, including itinerary (wonder if the BBC will report this after the fact?).

- University of Chester defends its reputation after The Guardian accuses it of being on a secret list of educational establishments at risk of financial failure (Aunty normally loves stories like that).

An experiment

2007-07-03T20:54:00.000+01:00

The BBC in Manchester has started a BBC Manchester Blog. It's an interesting mix of local (ie BBC in Manchester) news and coverage of some of the Manchester-based blogs.

We are running this blog entry to link to it (and we've put a link in the side menu too) to see just how Manchester-centric this BBC blog is. Is it limited strictly to Manchester blogs only? Does it cover blogs from elsewhere in the north-west? (Careful scrutiny shows a Liverpool blog has been reviewed.)

More importantly, by linking to it, will the BBC Manchester blog link back to this one? And if so, will it give some recognition to this campaign?

Watch this space...

No terrorists in Cheshire

2007-07-01T20:31:00.000+01:00

Like 99% of the population, we have been following the news about the failed bombings in London and Glasgow by terrorists.

Interestingly, Cheshire has cropped up as a location in the police reports as they get on the trail. It was announced that two people had been arrested on the M6 in Cheshire. The map further down the page is intriguing, attached as it is to a list of events and locations. Cheshire is mentioned on the list below the map, but is not actually shown on the map. Possibly because the BBC does not know where Cheshire is...

This is a time when having a dedicated news page for our county comes into its own. It may be that the police were not in a position to give out operational details of the M6 arrests but it would have been useful to have a separate report on them on a Cheshire news page.

Going back a couple of days to Thursday and the London bombs, sharp-eyed surfers may have spotted one or both reports on a suspect car in Warrington, tucked away on the Merseyside page. We were rather surprised to see this, given that we'd been watching BBC News 24 on the tv almost all day and no mention had been made in the TV coverage. Again, this was an important Cheshire story. Ok, it turned out to be a false alarm, but at a time of heightened fear across the country some more prominence for this story in general would have been useful, not only as part of the national picture, but also for people around the region of Warrington who could have found broader coverage on this story vital in terms of making travel decisions.

BBC too late again

2007-06-14T13:04:00.000+01:00

The BBC today decided to cover the story of Daniel Larkin's attempt to get a boxing licence. Daniel lives in Chester and, as a diabetic, feels he is being discriminated against. Aunty is a whole week late on this story, which broke in the county-wide Chester Chronicle last Friday. There's no point publishing old news, although hopefully the belated national publicity will help Daniel. Just think, it could have been covered much earlier if the meagre space allotted to Cheshire stories on the Merseyside news page hadn't been littered with the latest McCann reports (we have nothing against the McCanns, we'd like to point out, only the filling of the regional pages with their story, which would be best kept on the UK and international pages).

Elsewhere, we note that the grid-cover thefts in and around Chester have been reported on. No doubt the Chronicle has, for once, been scooped on this, but then the Chronicle is only a weekly...

Bizarre policy

2007-06-10T17:46:00.000+01:00

While we fight for a dedicated news page for Cheshire, let's take a look at what we consider to be a rather bizarre policy of using up limited page space to plug stories that have only the most tenuous link to a county page.

As an example, here's today's report on the McCann family on the Merseyside news page. It's more than a month since Madeleine McCann disappeared in Portugal while on holiday. Since then, every time there has been a news update on her, the story has appeared on the Merseyside page. Why?

In the beginning, the BBC was reporting a lot of background detail on the family and it emerged quickly that Kate McCann, Madeleine's mother, hails originally from Liverpool. Also, at the start of the press coverage, it was clearly important to put the story on as many news pages as possible to draw attention to it.

Look at today's story and you will see no mention of Liverpool at all. Kate McCann's geographical origins are old news and no one probably cares anymore, anyway, as to where she comes from. So why do the news updates on Madeleine McCann continue to be posted on the Merseyside page?

We have no idea. What we do know is that each McCann story on the Merseyside page is depriving coverage of another local news story - possibly one from Cheshire. This policy applies to all stories, not just the McCann tragedy, and all BBC news pages.

We can see a limited case for putting a story from one region on another regional page: where a prisoner has gone on the run and is known to have links with a particular area, when a story first breaks (as with the McCanns), or when a story is about two places in different areas and it makes sense to cross-link it. But otherwise, cross-posting because of a very tenuous and largely irrelevant link deprives other stories of coverage.

If I were Hugh Berlyn (news chief for BBC Online England), I'd be seriously reconsidering this very bizarre policy.

Campaign update

2007-06-08T10:24:00.000+01:00

The campaign has been rather quiet of late. As usual, little Cheshire news gets reported on the BBC website. No change there then... It was gratifying to see this story on Chester's Grosvenor Park get some coverage, but as you might guess it's had considerably more coverage in the local press. If the BBC had a dedicated Cheshire page, many more people from across the county would have been aware of the consultation and taken the opportunity to air their views -it's not just Cestrians who use the park, after all. Still, now that I've aired the report on here, you could always visit the consultation site and have your say.

Are you listening, Hugh Berlyn?

2007-05-10T09:14:00.000+01:00

I have a message for Hugh Berlyn, editor for BBC News Online England - in the last two days, the number of petition signatories has increased five-fold and continues to rise. We have now passed the 200 mark.

Below are the latest comments people have added to their signatures. Note the huge number of demands for a dedicated Radio Cheshire as well as a news page for our county on the BBC website...

“It is simply unfair that Cheshire does not have its own radio station or proper BBC web coverage. We have found it very welcoming since moving here four years ago.”

“No more being a satellite county for other more famous places.”

“I support this petition wholeheartedly. It is most unfair that the fine residents of Cheshire do not have enough media coverage.”

“Cheshire should not only have its own website page, but also its own BBC Radio network. Macclesfield is marginalised on Radio Manchester and I am sure the inhabitants of other towns have the same problem.”

“We are not Scousers, we're from Cheshire instead.”

“Very poor coverage of Cheshire, those of us living away from the area struggle to get good news updates.”

“I think it is right for Cheshire to have its own BBC web page. Do people think that Cheshire is not important? We in the county do!”

“We need a voice in Cheshire.”

“Independence for Cheshire!”

“Come on, BBC, just sack Natasha Kaplinsky and you'll be able to afford it.”

“Cheshire has a wide area and it would be great to have a unified radio station for this great county.”

“Cheshire deserves its own media identity instead of being defined by Manchester and Liverpool.”

“Cheshire is a big county and should have its own station.”

“Please give us our own station, I am sick of listening to Radio Stoke!”

“Please get us off of Radio Stoke, and give us our own radio station.”

“We want good coverage for the Alex rather than listen to BBC Stoke.”

“It only seems appropriate to have some sort of coverage of our county!”

“We need it local.”

“Coverage of current affairs in Cheshire is extremely poor and needs to be rectified. The publication of a BBC Cheshire page would go some way to solving the problem. I pay my licence fee like anyone else and feel that I am entitled to decent coverage on news and sport in my area!”

“A dedicated Cheshire service is well overdue.”

“Amazing that Cheshire has such poor BBC coverage...”

“How Crewe falls under Radio Stoke i will never know – Crewe is Cheshire, Stoke is Staffordshire. You wouldn't expect to hear about Manchester news on Merseyside.”

“No proper coverage given to Crewe by Radio Stoke which is HEAVILY BIASED towards Stoke on Trent. As an example they have broadcast every single football match that Stoke City have played even when the other teams in their supposed area have been playing away from home. If we cannot have our own station for Cheshire please stop this very unfair biased practice, we are all licence payers.”

“Cheshire should have its own radio station. Pull your finger out, BBC.”

“Cheshire is bigger in population than Staffs, Salop and Cumbria, who all have their own BBC radio stations, its about time Cheshire had the same.”

“Please, please can we have a dedicated site for our local county.”

“I am appalled that this large, industrious and varied county has been shuffled into the Stoke and Staffordshire information slot where it is simply sublimed into oblivion. No doubt some controller down in London felt that old Cheshire was either too highbrow or too primitive to warrant its own identity. What a nerve!”

Upsurge

2007-05-08T21:55:00.000+01:00

There has been a massive upsurge in signatories to the petition in the last 24 hours. We are somewhat mystified as to why, because as far as we know there has been no additional media coverage since the How-Do feature last week. However, all the new signatories are genuine and the number has doubled since 4 May. If anyone can enlighten us as to the sudden surge of interest, please add your comments to this entry.

We will publish some of the latest comments shortly.

Unavoidable for Aunty

2007-05-04T06:07:00.000+01:00

The BBC has been busy reporting the various local election results around the UK.

Unsurprisingly, the Tory swing in Chester was reported (as usual) on the Merseyside page.

The overall review of results was reported on the Merseyside page too, as well as on the pages for Manchester and Staffordshire.

Annoyingly, while the Merseyside pages carried news about Warrington in a separate report, you still have to go to the Staffordshire age to get the results for Crewe and Nantwich.

So, Cheshire residents (and licence payers, too, I might point out) still have to visit three separate pages to find an overall picture of the elections results across the county. This is why the BBC's existing policy is so infuriating and why a Cheshire news page is so desperately needed.

We ought to be able to see ALL the election results at a glance, in one place, on BBC Online. But until the BBC sees sense and gives us what we are, after all, paying for, the situation remains unchanged and we are forced to continue scouring various pages for news on Cheshire.

The absurdity of this is blatant at election times...

Online feature published

2007-05-02T08:16:00.000+01:00

How-Do has today published an article on the campaign and the BBC's reluctance to provide a news page for Cheshire.

You can read it here.

Media coverage afoot

2007-05-01T08:20:00.000+01:00

A quick update - the campaign has been approached by How-Do, which plans to offer us space to tell the north-west what we're up to here in Cheshire.

How-Do is the online phoenix that has arisen from the ashes of the late, lamented North West Enquirer - the regional paper/website that lasted just 6 months before backers pulled the plug. We were big fans of the NWE, as it was about the only media outlet in our region that recognised that Cheshire existed and, beyond that, actively sought to include our county in its overall coverage of the north-west as a coherent, recognised region.

Now, How-Do is taking up the reins online to cover media issues around the north-west, so this is a great opportunity to extend awareness of the campaign.

Watch this space!

Crewesing for news

2007-04-29T18:37:00.000+01:00

The BBC's latest idiocy is to post this tragic story on the news page for Staffordshire. The report clearly states that Crewe is the location and that Cheshire Constabulary is the involved police force. I'm left wondering why on earth a Cheshire story has been filed with news for a totally different county. Crewe is only marginally further from Chester, the county capital, than it is from Stoke on Trent, but that hardly justifies filing the story on a page many Cestrians wouldn't bother to look at.

But we already know why - we don't have a Cheshire page for news from across our county. This is yet another classic example of the absurdity of having to search for local news - our news - across the news pages for three different counties.

How much longer is this ridiculous situation going to continue?

BBC scoops Chester Chronicle

2007-04-11T16:22:00.000+01:00

For once, the BBC were actually ahead of local news services when reporting this story from a week and a half ago. Last Saturday, I was anxiously scanning the Chester Chronicle for what I expected to be a quite detailed and lengthy report into the Ermine Road stabbing. I couldn't find it, so I went through the entire paper a second time. Not there. It looks as though the Chronicle failed to report on what has been one of the most violent incidents in a very long while. I was quite astonished that they managed not to cover it, not even in the news-in-brief columns. So, that's a heads up to Aunty on this occasion.

Today, BBC News Online reported another knifing incident in Chester. Wonder if that will get local coverage...

In the meantime, random scanning of the BBC's pages for Manchester and Staffordshire to check for coverage of Cheshire issues in those sections reveals that there is no improvement. So, it's still mostly business as usual. Which means very few Cheshire news stories at all.

A shift in policy?

2007-04-02T15:35:00.000+01:00

Looking at the BBC news website today, there are another two stories on the Merseyside portal that feature Chester news.

The first is another zoo story, of which we seem to get an inordinately high amount. I refuse to believe Chester's sole claim to fame is its zoo. Granted, it's a very nice zoo and doing groundbreaking work in the conservation of rare species, but I remain unconvinced it's worth the high level of coverage every time another creature is born there or gets given a new home.

The other item is about the change in prescription charges for Welsh and English patients. Now this is definitely interesting, as the Welsh border runs through the north-west of Chester and thus the legislative change affects many Cestrians depending on where they live and with which GP they are registered. I would imagine that this change affects quite a few other places on the Welsh-English border - the BBC could have chosen to feature any of them. But it opted for a Cheshire focus instead.

In the three years I have been monitoring news coverage of Cheshire on BBC News Online, I cannot recall ever before seeing 4 stories in the space of 3 days where Chester was the source of the news.

Are we seeing the beginnings of a tentative shift towards more balanced coverage of our county? Could this be a result of my email exchange with Hugh Berlyn? It would be nice to think so, but let's not jump to conclusions just yet. More monitoring is required, including on the news portals for Manchester and Staffordshire to see if there is a shift there too...

Chester hits BBC headlines

2007-03-31T17:47:00.000+01:00

Not one but TWO stories on Chester today, on BBC News Online and, at time of blogging, were the top two news items.

The first story concerns a violent stabbing. Oddly enough, I was aware of this story before it became public news - it happened around the corner from where I live and when I went in search of my missing cat this morning, there was crime-scene tape everywhere and the road was closed. A neighbour had heard the fight and called the police - he filled me in on the news this morning. All very depressing. Chester is not immune to inner-city violence fuelled by alcohol abuse and we've had a few incidents lately, but normally they are only covered in the Chester Chronicle, which is published on Fridays. If the BBC had not featured this, I could have been unaware for a week.

I'm half wondering if the coverage is down to my regular protests to Aunty, which are perhaps bearing fruit at last, or if it's down to increased coverage of violence generally, given the huge number of stabbings around the UK in recent weeks and months.

The second news story concerns the last-ever performance at the Gateway Theatre, which has now closed. There used to be three theatres here, now there's none. Although we are supposed to be getting a new one in 4 years' time... Chester is about to lose its only city-centre cinema shortly as well, which will leave the county capital with no cultural facilities at all. The Chronicle is currently spearheading a campaign to save the cinema, and the city council is now looking seriously at options to buy the cinema off the current owner and retain it as a cinema cum arts centre. Now that's news - but only in Chester. Surely it's worthy of some wider coverage?

The BBC responds...

2007-03-21T12:25:00.000Z

This morning, I emailed the BBC yet again to try to find out why there is a lack of coverage on the BBC News Online website.

This is what I said:
"Dear Northwest Newsonline team
I am writing yet again to the BBC to try to find out why the BBC repeatedly refuses to cover Cheshire news properly online. I am not alone in my frustration at trying to find daily updates on the BBC news website regarding what is happening in my area.

At present (and has been the situation for as long as I can recall), Cheshire is the only English county not represented on the BBC's full website. If I type in my postcode, I am taken to the Merseyside/Liverpool page. News coverage is split between the pages for Merseyside, Greater Manchester and Staffordshire. Sometimes Cheshire news can even be found on the page for north-east Wales! As a licence payer, I find this wholly unacceptable.

I have written on at least 6 previous occasions to the BBC website team to find out why our local news coverage veers between poor and non-existent. Only once have I received a response, in which I was told "we don't know why this is so, we'll look into it". As I expected, I heard nothing further.

As I mentioned, I am not the only person who is fed up: other people in Cheshire with whom I have been in contact have asked the same question and been told "it is not viable" or "read the news pages for surrounding areas".

To this end, I would like to draw your attention to the following websites:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/actionnetwork/G1908 started by myself - I invite you to read the comments.
http://newsforcheshire.blogspot.com/ again started by myself. Please read the comments.
http://www.gopetition.co.uk/online/9179.html more signatures and comments (also on the petition forum).

There may not be that many signatures yet, but the comments are very indicative that Cheshire licence payers feel cut out of the loop when it comes to local news coverage by the BBC. Even the contact page where I found this email address to write to you says : "The team, which provides the latest news in Greater Manchester, Lancashire and Merseyside, and the Isle of Man..." and Cheshire is missing yet again. It's hard to understand why such a large county seems to be routinely ignored. It's as if Cheshire is invisible. We all know the BBC has a tight budget these days but adding an extra webpage and keeping it updated really would not cost very much out of our licence fees. In fact, it's a very cheap option for keeping a county-wide population of almost a million people happy.

I would appreciate a response to this email and some positive action. If I don't hear from you, I will be stepping up action and speaking to my MP to have this issue raised at a higher level because it is simply unfair and unacceptable to deprive such a large part of England equality of coverage."

Incredibly, I received a reply within an hour. And even more unbelievably, the response was from Hugh Berlyn, the Editor for all the England news pages. This is what he had to say:

"I have been passed your email with regard to the provision (or lack of it) of a BBC News Interactive index dedicated to Cheshire news. I have been impressed with your campaign, blog and petition and will follow their progress with great interest.

I am sorry that you feel you have had unsatisfactory responses from the BBC in the past - and I am not confident that this response will offer any immediate satisfaction.

I can promise that the desire for provision of news for Cheshire is very much on the BBC's radar, but you will be aware that the BBC recently received a disappointing licence fee settlement from the Government. As a result of that all BBC priorities are currently under review - including news provision for Cheshire.

"Under review" means just that - no decisions have been made either way - but I can assure you senior managers are looking at what will be possible for the future.

Thanks again for your email."

The blog will be updated again when there is more to report. Watch this space!

More petition comments

2007-03-21T07:40:00.000Z

"People in Cheshire pay the BBC TV Poll Tax like everyone else and should of course have their own website. In case your not aware the BBC has got international clearance for the use of FM channels for BBC Radio Cheshire including 90.2. Still no firm plans yet to use these channels, so community stations in Cheshire are struggling to find space on the dial to represent the county,something the BBC is failing to do on a daily bases."

"It is so frustrating having to go to BBC Merseyside, or BBC Manchester or BBC Staffordshire. Pretty poor show from the BBC for one of the most affluent areas in England."

"Although I live in Shropshire, my work takes me into Cheshire on an almost daily basis. Being in a different TV region, it is difficult to find out about news and events in the area I visit so often."

"It is anomalous that the otherwise excellent BBC website does not offer the appropriate level of service to a county of such commercial and tourist related importance."

"I live on Merseyside but Cheshire is not at all far away! So little coverage about our neighbouring county, and one in which many people originally from Merseyside live."

Bootle more important than Chester

2007-03-20T19:02:00.000Z

Well, it's interesting to see that Aunty has decided to report on the £280 million Northgate redevelopment project in Chester. This has been a front-page discussion in the Cheshire media for several years now. It's a major story that has been dogged by heaps of controversy on an almost-weekly basis. But only now the funding is in place and officially announced has the BBC realised it can't really ignore it any longer...

And even more interestingly, while the report mentions new council offices on Gorse Stacks it doesn't mention the 4-year controversy over the building - known locally as the Glass Slug - which no one in Chester wants, bar the elected councillors who railroaded it through. Even Prince Charles has spoken out against the Slug, but Aunty remains deaf.

We also note that Bootle station, a minor outpost on the MerseyRail network in Liverpool, gets a report on its £4.25 million facelift. Yet Chester Station - the only one we have apart from Bache, which doesn't really count - is about to undergo its own massive refurbishment (more info here).This apparently is not deemed worthy of coverage by the Beeb.

Never mind, at least we have a wiki now - if you really want to know what's cooking in Cheshire, you'd better look there. Because the BBC sure isn't being fair to Cheshire licence payers...

Back in the news!

2007-02-17T17:29:00.000Z

Well, knock us down with a quill - Chester is back in the news on the the BBC website!

In the interim, there have been the occasional stories of car crashes in Widnes, which don't really count, so it was a relief to see this, even if it was about the past.

Meanwhile, plenty of local stories are causing waves in Chester, none of which seem worthy of coverage by Aunty.

The row over the state of our wonderful Walls, which has had plenty of coverage in the local press.

The row over Quinn Glass, rumbling on endlessly, although the latest is that planning permission has been refused.

Just two of the hot topics in the county's capital...

BBC micro news - perhaps it's true?

2006-11-26T13:04:00.000Z

I received an email from a yahoo group I belong to on a totally unrelated topic. There was a link in it so I went for a peep, and was utterly astonished to read this:

"As the BBC moves towards the digital switchover, Mr Thompson said they were also considering delivering even more localised news. In the future, there could be mini news programmes from smaller areas within Wales.
A scheme has already been piloted in the West Midlands.
"There would be 10 minutes of television news from areas like North Wales or Mid Wales, just like you can get on the BBC website," he said."

The link is here.

It does rather look as though the rumour I heard earlier (about the BBC moving towards micro news output) may well be true. But will it happen on the BBC news website?

I await developments with interest....

James Bond and a rumour...

2006-11-16T12:32:00.000Z

The BBC should be careful not to overdo it - they actually published a third Chester story this week!

Fans out for Bond's home premiere

There is a rumour afoot that the BBC intends to improve its micro news coverage. I heard this via a rather roundabout route involving several journalists. Apparently, local newspapers are getting worried that such a move might destroy whatever it is that makes their publications unique. In fact, newspaper editors are apparently so concerned that those who are members of the Newspaper Society are thinking of boycotting the BBC.

The answer to that, of course, is that local papers need to do more to engage their readership - improving their websites and allowing readers to comment directly on stories is one such option, rather than forcing them to write to the letters page, and letting them get directly involved in the reportage by providing eyewitness accounts, photos etc. And stop providing bland front-page splashes of fundraising events and zoo births, instead replacing them with hard news on hot local issues.

Yes, the BBC has far bigger resources (and wouldn't it be great to see some of them put into improving its Cheshire coverage?) but if local papers take up the baton, they have nothing to fear. Boycotting the BBC won't soothe their fears of losing readers to the Corporation. And besides, we are only asking for equality of coverage - ie, Cheshire stories on a BBC webpage for Cheshire. If that ever happens, it will still not compete with the local press, who will always have the space to cover more stories, in greater depth. It's not about being forced to choose between a local paper OR the BBC.

So it's possible that the recent flurry of Chester stories is the first wave of improved Cheshire coverage by the BBC. But it might just be a blip. And we still don't have a web page.

I'm going to try and find out more about this...

Two Chester stories in a week!

2006-11-14T11:24:00.000Z

Prepare to be stunned...

The BBC has reported TWO Chester stories within the space of three days this week.

It started on Saturday by reporting that the roof of a supermarket had blown away in high winds.

Then, on Sunday it covered the arrival of a new elephant calf at Chester Zoo. I actually emailed the BBC to complain about this one, because the original story gave the calf's weight as 7 stone, after listing the kilos. I took the opportunity at the same time to berate them for the lack of Cheshire coverage and point out that on the rare occasions when it does report Chester news, it's invariably zoo stories. The weight of the calf was duly corrected, but I still haven't heard anything back about the general lack of coverage.

I wonder if they will report on the regional premier of the new James Bond film in Chester tomorrow night?

Readers - do please add comments if you have spotted any Cheshire coverage elsewhere on the BBC news website.

Beeb reports on Cheshire

2006-11-06T20:38:00.000Z

Finally a Cheshire story from the Beeb, as they report on the waste incinerator that was proposed for Helsby.

It's unbelievable though - this story has been running for months locally (covered regularly in the Chester Chronicle and receiving front-page coverage from the now sadly defunct North West Enquirer.

It's only now that permission to build has been refused that Aunty is taking notice, even though it's been one of Cheshire top stories for well over a year.

Petition update

2006-10-26T11:07:00.000+01:00

The number of signatures is growing - but very slowly. We need more - many more. So if you're reading this and you're Cheshire-based and you haven't yet signed it, please do so!

Some comments received so far from the signatories:

"Chester has a rich history and is a city and county of great importance. It should be given the same resources as other counties."

"I too have complained to the beeb with no reply."

"Come on the BBC, get your act together and give us BBC Cheshire news pages!"

"Why not? Viablity is clearly not a genuine problem for all of the rest of country."

"I add my name in protest at the way we have been ignored. I have found this disgraceful. License fee paid, only to be ignored and lumped into regions I rarely travel to."

"BBC should recognise a county. Maybe we should ask BLAIR for our very own cheshire regional assembly and pull away from the entire nation..????lol"

"For a major tourist destination its surprising that Cheshire doesn't have a page of its own - and if you want the local weather forecast you have to look at Stoke and guess... Still, we do have the 'Chester At Large' website - are the BBC worried about competition?"

That's a few unhappy licence-payers out there...

Congleton coverage

2006-10-16T18:29:00.000+01:00

The campaign was contacted by a trainee journalist last week, who happens to be based in Cheshire and also thinks the BBC's news coverage of our county is below par. The journalist is writing a feature on the campaign and we should get some column inches in the Congleton Chronicle very soon.

The news interest is very welcome and we look forward to seeing the article in print shortly. If it goes online, we'll post a link to it on this blog.

Aunty still has no Cheshire

2006-09-20T12:09:00.000+01:00

This is the BBC's reporting of the closure of the North West Enquirer.

Note how the BBC states that the NWE covered Cumbria, Lancashire, Merseyside, Isle of Man and Greater Manchester. But not Cheshire. Even though the NWE regularly ran Cheshire stories and even led on the front page with important news stories from our county.

I despair...

One less news source for Cheshire

2006-09-20T07:33:00.000+01:00

I learned very late last night that the North West Enquirer has gone into administration. It won't hit the news stands ever again :( I feel quite sad about that as it was an excellent paper.

I don't know how long the NWE website will remain on the net so if you want the full story, you can find it here.

This means that the urgency of having regional news for our county on the BBC website has increased enormously.

Please - if you are reading this, use the sidebar link to sign the petition.

Northerner gap

2006-09-01T14:21:00.000+01:00

The Guardian's regular Thursday column, The Northerner, also seems to think that Cheshire does not exist. Take a look at their left-hand column listing regional newspapers in the north-west. Can you spot Cheshire? No, I can't either.

Several weeks ago, The Northerner conveniently posted a submission link at the bottom of the column, inviting people to submit questions. So I asked why there was no coverage of Cheshire. The following week's issue of The Northerner contained a rather scathing remark about how it couldn't possibly list or cover everything happening in the region. Well, no, no one expects The Northerner to. But it's not unreasonable to expect them to list the main regional paper covering our county (the Chester Chronicle), if it's listing all the other regional papers of significance.

The Northerner's contact link has not appeared since. What is the Guardian afraid of? Reader feedback? Surely not...

It seems only The North West Enquirer is prepared to cover events in Cheshire from a regional or national perspective...

The NWE's coverage is excellent. The lead story this week is Cheshire-based, and examines the forthcoming enquiry into Cheshire County Council's problem with its rubbish mountain. Well done to the NWE for reporting on news in Cheshire.

Sign up! Please!

2006-08-24T21:28:00.000+01:00

Looking at the stats, this blog is getting a lot of hits, but I'm puzzled as to why so few people have signed the petition. All of the signatories bar two are from Cheshire, which is good. But we need more.

Time has been tight at petition HQ - It's definitely time to do another media blitz to raise awareness again. And I promise that will happen very soon.

In the meantime, if more of you sign up, I can cite the stats to the media to show there is a need...

Self-fulfilling prophecy - you show the demand, the media will take interest, more will sign up...

Ok, enough whingeing! Go sign up!

Thanks.

Media update

2006-08-07T21:02:00.000+01:00

No coverage so far at either the Chester Chronicle or the North West Enquirer.

However, the story has been picked up by Connect Media North West.

As an aside, the BBC is still under the illusion that Cheshire does not exist. They've run a story on some problems at the North West Enquirer, in which they state that the paper's geographical remit covers Cumbria, Lancashire, Merseyside, Isle of Man and Great Manchester. Last time the campaign checked, Cheshire was definitely part of the north-west of England because the NWE definitely runs stories on our county...

Google rankings

2006-08-01T09:00:00.000+01:00

Yesterday evening I decided to google the campaign on Google UK. Typing in "news Cheshire", the campaign page on BBC News Online came up 2nd in the rankings, while the online petition showed up 4th. Today, the rankings are slightly down, at 6th and 7th respectively. But this is very, very good news!

Press release

2006-07-31T09:32:00.000+01:00

A press release has been sent to both the Chester Chronicle, which is distributed across the county, and the North West Enquirer.

Follow-up phone calls will be made today.

More later!

Petition goes live!

2006-07-26T16:24:00.000+01:00

The online petition has now gone live and can be signed here.

Please add your signature and any comments. We need numbers to make our demand a reality.

Contacting the BBC directly

2006-07-26T10:34:00.000+01:00

Some people have already made complaints directly to the BBC.

If you wish to do so, you can contact the powers that be using the contact form on the Feedback page of the BBC website.

The direct url is http://www.bbc.co.uk/feedback/bbci_comment.shtml

Some statistics

2006-07-26T10:17:00.000+01:00

On 17 July, I did some research.

Not terribly scientific - I simply typed in "Chester" on the BBC search engine to see what came up.

The results showed a total of 10 Chester stories since 1 January this year , almost all trivial, such as new arrivals at the zoo. In 2005, the total count was 23 - that's less than two a month. Again, many of these stories were trivial (zoo news, Duke of Westminster's daughter marrying at the cathedral...). Given that we are more than halfway through the year, it's fair to assume our total news count for 2006 will be less than for last year, unless we are unfortunate enough to have a grisly murder here.

The campaign starts here!

2006-07-26T10:04:00.000+01:00

As a regular reader of the BBC News website for about as long as it's been online, I am enormously frustrated by the fact that as far as Aunty is concerned, my county does not exist. If I want to find local news on what is, arguably, the most important and popular news website on the planet, I have to browse either the Merseyside or Manchester news pages.

As Cheshire is sandwiched between Liverpool and Manchester, seeking local news involves trawling the Merseyside or Manchester pages. Alas, on the rare occasions that the BBC covers anything happening in Cheshire, it is invariably a story emanating from Warrington or Runcorn, two towns which just might be considered part of Merseyside because of the industry there. Chester is just 28 miles from Liverpool, but culturally and physically worlds apart, due to the intervening barrier of Liverpool Bay. On the Manchester page, there is even less coverage of Cheshire towns south of Manchester.

I've been e-mailing the beeb on an irregular basis about this. Of all the English counties, Cheshire is the only one not to have its own dedicated page. My first three e-mails clearly fell into a black hole at the BBC News HQ as I received no reply. The last one, sent around 2 months ago, was answered about 3 weeks later. Clearly, my e-mail had been sent around the newsroom as the response I received was at the top of a string of internal e-mails which all said, more or less, "I don't know why this is. Can you pass this on to X?". The response addressed to me said it would be looked into. I guess that means nothing will be done.

I now see this as a personal mission to correct this appalling oversight. I intend to pester Aunty on a regular basis now until the situation has been corrected.

Our local paper, the Chester Chronicle, is fairly good (as I have said before), but it's a weekly. It publishes a free midweek edition, the Midweek Chronicle, which is supposed to be distributed on a Tuesday. Most weeks, I don't receive a copy - I guess they lack distributors. On the rare occasions it falls through my letterbox, it's on a Thursday, the day before the Chronicle itself is published. A fat lot of use that is.

I'm not a fan of local radio, which does cover local news, as I can't stand the ads and cheesy presenters. What I want is to be able to read local news on the internet, on a daily basis - I want somewhere that I can dip into at intervals in my working day to find out what's happening in my area. As a BBC licence payer, I feel deprived. And angry that my corner of the world is routinely ignored. To take a case in point, the BBC weather map for Liverpool places Liverpool itself at the bottom lefthand corner of the map and covers a territory as far north as Glasgow! Chester, just a few miles south, is not marked. Nor does Chester merit a mention on the weather maps for North Wales or Stoke/Staffs... On the BBC homepage, where I have actually managed to set the weather forecast for my local postcode, there is a link offering me the opportunity to find local information. You guessed it - the link is for BBC Liverpool! And if I click on the links below, to find out what music is happening in Cheshire, I get a counties map of England that shows - no Cheshire!

How can it be that a whole city, nay county, does not deserve a mention?

The campaign starts here!