Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Roger Mosey BBC Sports Chief speaks Olympics to Westminster

The BBC's head of Sports Roger Mosey has painted a gloomy picture for the future of journalism at a talk at the University of Westminster.

Addressing some 50 students Mr Mosey spoke about the worrying context of journalism and the lack of plurality in British Journalism.

A strong regional and national journalism network is good for the BBC he said, but he lamented that the situation in British journalism looks to get worse.

Mosey spoke about the idea of working with its competitors fearing that the market could lead to the disappearance of regional journalism.

The BBC's the only game in town he suggested, on the basis that the license fee supports the BBC journalism, but it wasn't a position that brought cheer.

He spoke about the number of newspapers in the US under threat and how disappointing that was.

In more buoyant mood, Mosey talked about the BBC's recent triumphs in negotiating the Masters contract, Football and bringing formulae One back to the BBC.

Making a string case for free to air, Mosey made the point that 42 million people watching the olympics was indicative of how the free- model should not be discarded.