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If you hadn’t realised this challenging, beautifully crafted, ground-breaking series of 8 documentaries was being shown during November/December 2012, to an audience of 500 million through more than 70 national broadcasters including the BBC – join the club. It seems to be an extremely large one as far as the UK is concerned.

If you hadn’t realised that this was a multi-media, cross-organisational initiative whose aim is to kick-start a global debate on the causes and effects of poverty, the club just got bigger.

On the other hand, if you are puzzled as to how you missed out but, more importantly, angry that those who really need to see these films almost certainly haven’t, won’t or can’t, then you may be part of a very small club indeed. In response to my complaints to the BBC and Radio Times about the poor scheduling, the lack of explanation and totally inadequate promotion, I was told,

“In catering for audiences of many millions, we cannot accommodate every individual preference either in the programmes we produce or their scheduling. Scheduling is a complex process and we understand that some people may be disappointed with the placement  of a programme or series but we do appreciate viewer feedback on such matters.” Jamie Patterson, BBC complaints. (My emphases)

What!? It was just me who couldn’t understand why the series was so hard to notice let alone find?! Just me who complained? It’s not the BBC’s fault that I have the interests of a minority group? Hardly an answer that relates to the seriousness and significance of this event, or that reflects the numbers of people who are poor or about to be made poor – and, anyway, doesn’t the very dynamic of impoverishment diminish us all?

Imagining that Lord Patten, Chair of BBC Trust, would have been a bit sensitive by now to protests about ethical issues, I had started at the top, only to have my complaint passed to the BBC Audience Services as the first stage for attempted fobbing off. Clearly, Lord Patten’s department is still as divided from the real world as is the BBC complaints department. They haven’t succeeded in fobbing me off as I’ve just written back pointing out that my complaint was about what is right; not a matter of personal preference or taste. I stressed that even one person flagging up the significant ethical considerations involved should be enough to warrant a serious rethink.

I don’t think I am overstating my case.

My evidence that the BBC has let the people of this country down is as follows:

-the dance between rich and poor, both here and globally, is one of mutual destruction

-nothing is going to change until there are enough people demanding it or simply getting on with adopting a different code of living because they can see mutual benefit

-people are not going to do so if they don’t face the facts, talk about them and ask why we don’t change them

-not many people want to face the facts for all kinds of reasons.

The programmes in the Why Poverty? series and linked to it were:

– 4 years in the planning and making by an independent international group

– carefully designed to challenge our ideas about poverty through questioning or observational narration rather than ideology

– and are eminently watchable, even beautiful; human without being sentimental; sometimes surprisingly positive

     

 

– they are interesting, full of new ideas, revelatory and backed up by sound research

– they have moments where the human spirit just shines through.

    

 

A truly tremendous effort and fantastic campaigning resource asking why people remain poor in a world of plenty. An effort which the Why Poverty? team is continuing to promote by making these films and 30 shorts freely available on their website and YouTube for at least a year at Why Poverty  They are working to get them into schools and campaigning networks, and will soon be bringing them out on DVD.  BUT how much better it would have been if the BBC had done its job properly in the first place.

This enterprise offered the BBC a unique moment to prove it is on the side of the majority of people whilst even developing some ground-breaking television of its own in support of the project’s aims. To me, it is astonishing that they would miss this vital opportunity to complement such a constructive initiative.

So, why did the BBC bury Why Poverty? on late night BBC1 (once), then various times on BBC4?

Why did they not advertise them frequently on all their radio and TV channels?

Why did they not explain how the programmes were linked and where to find them?

Why did they not fire everything they had to make the series ‘the one to watch’?

Why did they not encourage people to join in the debate and make public debate possible themselves?

Why were the films only available on i-Player for a short time after the series had finished?

And why, oh why, did the BBC give Tony Blair the last word in the inaugurating debate held in Cape Town?

(Yes, Tony Blair, without whose pricey mediation Glencore and Xstrata might not now be in their unholy alliance of exploitation.)

This tightly engineered debate can still be found here.  Various other broadcasts are still available, including Nick Fraser’s Poor Reporting from Radio Four, in which he asks what broadcasters have to do to get the rich world to engage with programmes about poverty.  How ironic!

I fell over the series by accident on a car journey when I tuned into Nick Fraser’s programme. I have yet to find anyone else who has seen or heard these programmes, let alone knew their purpose, even amongst acquaintances who would look for this kind of event. I have since become aware that people don’t even know that BBC4 exists! Also that there is a vast difference in audience numbers between BBC1 and BBC2, let alone BBC3 and BBC4. I was reading only today that Miranda, when shown on BBC2, had ratings of 3 million; a simple move to BBC1 brought her an audience of 7 million.

What do I want to see?

At the very least, I think the BBC should show the films again as soon as possible. If they can’t put them in full view on BBC1, then they should advertise and promote them relentlessly.

Please, if you are reading this and haven’t seen any of these films yet, do watch them and read about them. Then get others to do the same. You may not  agree with everything you see and hear on these films and, in many ways that would be a good thing because that makes for conversation and exploration of the issues. One thing on which we should be able to agree is that it is a conversation that we all need to have.

Pauline Welch

Member of WDM Milton Keynes