‘Talent exit’: Grade’s harsh words for our TV industry

In evidence given to the Scottish Broadcasting Commission, which presented its first interim report yesterday, Mr Grade said there was great Scottish talent in the industry, but it was largely based south of the border.

The commission, led by Blair Jenkins, the former head of news at BBC Scotland, has also found that broadcasters including the BBC claim programmes are made in Scotland to fulfil Ofcom regional production quotas, but, in fact, they have minimal Scottish involvement.

The commission has been asked by Alex Salmond, the First Minister, to help plot the way forward for broadcasting in Scotland.

Among those questioned in its first phase are Mr Grade, as well as Mark Thompson, the director-general of the BBC; Sir Michael Lyons, head of the BBC Trust; Andy Duncan, the chief executive of Channel 4; and Stuart Cosgrove, Channel 4's head of nations and regions.

Mr Grade made some of the the frankest comments on the dearth of TV production north of the border, according to transcripts published by the commission yesterday.

He said: "The brutal truth is that the ideas aren't here in Scotland I think you have a talent exit problem, I think people do leave.

"There's no shortage of very successful creative Scottish writers, directors, producers, executives in broadcasting around the rest of the UK.

"Now whether that's the reason, or they're leaving for some other reason, because there's no critical mass here in Scotland, I don't know.

"But there is no shortage of brilliant, brilliant Scottish people making programmes in London."

He added: "I always say there's nothing wrong with any media enterprise that a couple of hits wouldn't cure. If somebody in Scotland could come up with a couple of hits, you watch the money."

Yesterday, Mr Jenkins admitted he had "frank, honest and constructive" talks with a number of "broadcasters, industry leaders and producers" in the first stage of the commission's inquiries, focused on the economics of the broadcasting sector.

Stages two and three will focus on the cultural and democratic aspects of broadcasting before its final report is published later this year.

Mr Thompson said that, before the end of the BBC's new charter, he wanted more than half of the network's commissions to be from outside London, with an average of 9% from Scotland.

He added: "I'm painfully aware we cannot afford not to have a major hit drama series from Scotland. And we're absolutely determined to achieve that."

In the interim report, the BBC - and others - were accused of wrongly labelling some TV programmes as Scottish productions when "there is very little financial or creative connection to Scotland".

Mr Jenkins declined to name individual programmes, but sources later said the BBC TV drama Waterloo Road had been one of the programmes mentioned in evidence.

Waterloo Road is executively produced by Anne Mensah, who is based in Scotland as head of drama, although it is still produced in England by Shed Productions for the BBC.

A BBC statement said: "Waterloo Road is proving to be a vehicle for the development of Scottish scriptwriting, editing talent and production talent.

"These opportunities would not have arisen if there was not a synergy between all of our shows and a major series such as Waterloo Road will continue to provide opportunities for creative talent in Scotland.

"The network success of Waterloo Road has helped pave the way for the recent network drama commissions including Hope Springs, which will be filmed in Scotland, and Phoo Action, which was also produced in Scotland."

In 2006, the total value of production activity in Scotland was over £111m. Half was attributable to commissions from the main UK networks.

Independent producers supply almost 45% by value of these network programmes from Scotland. Network production in Scotland has fallen from 6% of the UK total in 2004 to 3% in 2006.