HARDtalk, the long-running world affairs BBC News programme, will be axed in a move criticised by presenter Stephen Sackur as “depressing” for the future of in-depth interviews which hold politicians to account.
Sackur, 60, said he will leave the BBC after bosses confirmed the end of the programme, which first aired in 1997. It featured extended interviews with leading figures on the world stage, ranging from Mikhail Gorbachev to Emmanuel Macron.
HARDtalk is being axed as part of a new round of BBC News cuts involving net job losses of 130 people. The cost reductions will result in “lower-impact” stories being dropped and the merger of separate home and foreign news gathering teams into a single, “story-led” structure.
Sackur, who has presented the BBC News and World Service programme since 2005, criticised the decision, saying: “This is sad news for me personally, but much more important, I think it’s depressing news for the BBC and all who believe in the importance of independent, rigorous deeply-researched journalism.”
THREAD:
1. PERSONAL NEWS:
Today BBC News has announced plans to close @BBCHARDtalk after 3 decades holding the world’s politicians and powerbrokers to account. This is sad news for me personally, but much more important, I think it’s depressing news for the BBC🧵— Stephen Sackur (@stephensackur) October 15, 2024
He added: “At a time when disinformation and media manipulation are poisoning public discourse HARDtalk is unique – a long-form interview show with only one mission: to hold to account those who all too often avoid accountability in their own countries.
This week, the BBC warned that China and Russia are capitalising on cuts to the World Service by spending billions of pounds to build media networks to spread “pure propaganda”.
The BBC’s director-general, Tim Davie, said the hostile states were “filling the gap” left by a reduced World Service, which has lost 40 million people from its global audience after slashing services because of funding constraints.
Sackur wrote: “A brilliant team of producers and researchers is being disbanded just as BBC DG Tim Davie is trying to persuade the British [Government] that the journalism of the BBC World Service is such a vital expression of democratic soft power that the taxpayer must fund it.
“Whatever the outcome of that, it seems it will be too late to save HARDtalk – for so long a pillar of the World Service schedule.”
The BBC said its proposals would deliver a saving of £24m, which amounts to 4 per cent of the current budget.
The broadcaster expects to close 185 roles and open 55 new ones – a net reduction of 130 posts. Its media operations division is also proposing to close the equivalent of 25 posts. Voluntary redundancies will be sought, in the first instance.
As part of a BBC-wide plan to reduce content by 20 per cent, BBC News will be “tougher on deciding what we do not cover and saying no to lower impact content,” BBC News CEO Deborah Turness told staff on Tuesday.
The BBC will find ways to tell stories that “rely less on resource intensive TV packages,” she said.
Confirming the end of HARDtalk, Ms Turness said the BBC needed to focus on “continuous live and breaking output on our News Channel, and do more to use and promote the high impact interviews and important conversations that are happening every day across our platforms.”
A BBC spokesperson said of HARDtalk: “It has done great work across the last 25 years, but we’ve had to make some tough decisions given the level of savings required and changing audience habits.”
“People are coming to our news channel for live and breaking news, while across the whole of BBC News, we have hard-hitting long-form interviews and discussion on more platforms than ever, for instance via our global on-air editors, and our debate and discussion programmes. We can no longer afford to run so many bespoke programme teams.”
The BBC cited Jeremy Bowen’s long-form interviews with leading figures in the Middle East conflict and Mishal Husain’s extended Today programme interview with David Cameron on Tuesday about his period as Foreign Secretary as examples of its commitment to longer cross-examinations.
However one insider said: “Cutting progammes like HARDtalk makes sense financially but putting that money into streaming means taking it away from quality public service journalism.”
Millions of UK radio listeners will get their overnight news from the BBC World Service, including those tuned in to 5 Live, Radio 2 and the BBC’s 39 Local Radio stations, under the plans.
A “follow-the-sun” digital strategy means that to deliver a “better round the clock service we will increase the number of digital roles in time zones outside the UK, closing some roles in London and opening new positions in Sydney to enhance our morning offer,” Ms Turness said.
The merger of Home and Foreign desks into a single “story-led” structure will “empower editors to make earlier decisions so we waste less resource,” Ms Turness said.
An insider told i: “It weakens editors. It will make it difficult to have distinct programming, and will lead to internal strife about who controls the output.”
Michelle Stanistreet, general secretary of the National Union of Journalists, said: “These latest cuts represent a damaging assault on journalism and news at a time when the UK needs greater plurality and diversity of news and trust in journalism is under attack at home and abroad.”
“Some of these decisions represent comparatively modest savings yet will disproportionately undermine the breadth and range of news content the BBC currently provides.”
The latest round of redundancies came as another blow to staff, reeling from the announcement last November that 127 news and current affairs staff were to go, as the BBC shifted resources to online news.
Newsnight lost 34 roles across reporting and production as the flagship current affairs programme was reformatted as a shorter, “interview, debate and discussion show”.
The BBC lost veteran defence editor Mark Urban as a result of the cuts but said new roles across the news division would be added include a royal editor and reporter jobs covering artificial intelligence, financial and political investigations, employment and housing.
Resources were ploughed into the now 60-strong BBC Verify fact-checking and analysis department, which aims to expose disinformation. A new BBC investigations unit is also being staffed up.
The BBC said then that a further 147 digital-focused roles would be created.
In July, it said it was planning to cut a further 500 jobs by March 2026, later opening a round of voluntary redundancies amid “serious pressure” on its finances.
The BBC’s public service headcount, excluding those who working in the commercial Studios side of the corporation, has fallen by almost 10 per cent in the past five years.
The BBC blamed cost inflation and a 30 per cent fall in the value of the licence fee since 2010/11, costing it £1bn a year.
It said it needed to find an additional £200m of savings, taking its target to £700m, as it reinvests licence fee money in new digital services.
