Who's for 202?

THE PRESS

BILL GRUINIDY

'The trouble with X,' the Bishop of Malta once said, in the middle of some extra- ordinarily Byzantine negotiation, 'is that he is an honest man. And, of course, in a matter so complicated, one simply cannot believe him.'

I see what he meant. Being a simpleton myself, the surface is good enough for me. I seldom wonder if there's a dog beneath the skin.

But I should have done. I am not excusing myself. I am admitting that I ought to have got suspicious much earlier on. I can, how- ever, tell you the day it first began to dawn. It was 13 May 1968. On that day the Daily Mail ran as its front-page lead a story by Denis Holmes, once their motoring correspon- dent, now their poor man's Insight. It was headlined: 'Local radio hits cash trouble.' 'It was a well-documented piece of work, or at any rate it looked it to me.

There were five major points: 1, there are financial problems; 2, the sec local stations have only minority audiences because they

work on VHF; 3, they are understaffed and their staffs are overworked; 4, they are often under pressure from local interests; 5, they are under attack as being 'amateur.' Mr Holmes then analysed each of the BBC stations at present in operation, and did it fairly and thoroughly.

It was an interesting story, but the thing that made me wonder was why it was splashed so heavily, and why on that particular day? No other paper I saw touched it, but that could be simply because they had nobody wbo"cl worked on it as much as Mr Holmes had done.

But it made me think. There had been, several earlier references in the Daily Express —at least in the editions I read—to the •Bec's efforts, all linked with an advocacy of local radio on 202 metres, which is a medium wive-, band, But it still didn't add up to anything.

Then, on 24_ May, I had the pleasure of hearing Hugh Green talking about local radii).

I mean Hughie Green, not Sir Hugh Carleton,

and he was talking about commercial radio, not the sec. It was the sort of talk you'd ex- pect from Mr Green, all nods and becks and winks and wreathed smiles, full of 'You good people,' and containing an impassioned plea for .freedom, for our right to have a local radio station which would make money for us, the ratepayers. He didn't say who else it would make money for.

It wasn't a major. speech, and I was there- fore mildly surmised to _ see it reported next morning in the northern edition of both, the Mail and the Express. The Mail even ran' it in its London editions. And on that same Saturday, 25 May, the Express had a lacier- page piece, at least in its northern editions, beaded: 'The Great 202 farce: Final proof!'

It was by the Express's northern iv critic Ron Boyle. Mr Boyle had been driving around the country checking on certain statements made

by the Government—always a healthy thing for a newspaper to do, granted—in its 1966 White Paper. Mr Green had said the night

before that the Government had lied about the possibility of using the 202-metre waveband for local radio. Mr Boyle's findings appeared to corroborate his statement. The 202-metre waveband is the cat's whisker, it seems.

Now Mr Green is himself associated with the lobby for commercial local radio--he ad- %ised the Greater London Council on its application and has been quoted as saying: 'It is true that I myself have an interest in local radio. I belong to a consortium which will apply for a local licence, if and when commercial radio is given the go-ahead.' But it still adds up to nothing.

And then over what Vincent Ivlulchrone once so accurately described as 'a frosted glass of

hock' in El Vino, a disenchanted journalist (not, I hasten to add, Mr Mulchrone) told me the word had gone round that anything on the need for, and possibility of local radio on the medium waveband would certainly get in the paper; anything knocking it wouldn't. Friends on both the Mail and the Express knew nothing of such a hint. The GPO tells me the only application received so far is the Greater London one. Indeed, the Postmaster- General said as much in the Commons the other Thursday and added: 'We are not allow- ing commercial local radio.' The report of this speech in my edition of the Daily Express was headed: 'Hughie hots up radio battle.' It didn't have any quote from Mr Mason but it had plenty from Alderman Robert Rodgers, the Conservative leader of Manchester City Coun- cil. And from Mr Hughie Green. who by this time was saying: 'I am tied in with no organi- sation. My interest is simply the truth and the protection of the ratepayers of this country.' Since then there have been more reports in the Wail and Express. Commenting on Mr Mason's remark -that ten 202-metre stations might be possible, Ron Boyle shouted ecstatically, 'Ten stations! Now we are getting somewhere.' Really? And who might 'we' be? The Express? The Mail? Even after Mr Mason's flat state- ment on Monday that commercial local radio was not on, Mr Boyle still found hope from the reflection that this is Mr Mason's 'present' view; twelve excited front page column inches on Tuesday started the case all over again, with the same emphasis on how the ratepayers might benefit, and the same non-mention of who else might, too.

So what does it all add up to? A lobby, I should have thought. But is it a well-advised one, at least as far as newspapers are con- cerned? It's at least arguable. First, who wants local radio anyway? If the BBC experiment is any guide, not many, VHF or no. Secondly, won't it cut into the amount of advertising available to newspapers? Mr Mason thinks so. He told Labour MP Roy Roebuck : 'the House will realise that if local commercial radio begins on any scale at all it would knock pro- vincial'newspapers sideways.' You may believe Mr Mason or not, but it is a fact that the NW is worried about it. Thirdly, are Associated Newspapers all that reliable when it comes to assessing commercial broadcasting? Did they not pull out of Associated-Rediffusion just before it began to make big money?

Not that it matters to me. If Beaverbrook and Associated Newspapers are thinking of going into commercial radio, good luck to them. I hope they make a lot of money. But if they are running a lobby, I wish they'd let me know and then I could take their news reparts in the spirit in which they are intended.