// BBC ENTERTAINMENT & ARTS — MODA & SOCIETÀ
Katie Razzall: BBC closures make business sense, but far more savings are needed
The BBC's announcement that it will close three of its linear broadcast channels - BBC Three, BBC Scotland and Radio 4 Extra - makes sense financially.
BBC Three's most popular show on Monday night was a repeat of an old episode of Top Gear. Around 77,000 people tuned in.
BBC Scotland's TV channel was watched, according to this year's annual report, by a weekly average of 12% of the Scottish population. Scots simply aren't tuning in in the numbers to make it cost-effective.
(Fascinatingly, BBC Alba, which is aimed at Gaelic speakers and learners, reached 43% of Scots weekly - was it boosted by its rights to broadcast Italian football's Serie A, with the commentary mainly in Gaelic?)
It's hard to argue - although no doubt some will - that there is a business case for keeping BBC Scotland's TV channel open.
The same goes for BBC Three, although the hokey cokey that has gone on with that channel - launched to fanfare in 2003, later made digital-only, then brought back to linear in 2022, now back online only again - has looked indecisive. Bizarre even.
But the bigger picture is that viewers and listeners are already migrating online - increasingly finding the BBC's programmes not via those linear TV and radio channels but on iPlayer, BBC Sounds, and, more recently, YouTube.
So that's the business case - and the BBC needs to save £500m over the next three years. That figure is concentrating minds.
But axing the three linear channels is a drop in the ocean financially. I understand it will save less than £10m in total per year.
BBC Three launched hits including Normal People, starring Paul Mescal and Daisy Edgar-Jones