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Adrian Chiles: key part of BBC Radio 5 Live's new lineup
Adrian Chiles: key part of BBC Radio 5 Live’s new lineup. Photograph: ITV/Rex Features
Adrian Chiles: key part of BBC Radio 5 Live’s new lineup. Photograph: ITV/Rex Features

BBC Radio 5 Live audience 'below where I’d hoped', admits controller

This article is more than 9 years old

Station’s ratings fell by more then 10% after launch of new daytime lineup criticised for its lack of women

The controller of BBC Radio 5 Live has admitted the station’s audience has not lived up to expectations after it lost nearly 700,000 listeners following the introduction of a new daytime lineup criticised for its lack of women.

Jonathan Wall said the latest audience figures published on Thursday, which showed a 10.7% drop to 5.6 million listeners year on year, were “below where I’d hoped them to be”.

The figures, for the last three months of 2014, coincided with the introduction of 5 Live’s new daytime lineup including Adrian Chiles, Football Focus presenter Dan Walker and former Sunday Sport editor Tony Livesey last October.

It followed the departure last September of three of the station’s most familiar voices, Richard Bacon, Shelagh Fogarty and Victoria Derbyshire.

5 Live’s new lineup was criticised for its lack of women presenters at a time when BBC director general Tony Hall has pledged to put more women on air.

Although 5 Live has several female co-presenters, including Rachel Burden, Anna Foster and Sarah Brett, only one hour in a typical 5 Live day – Burden in the first hour of the breakfast show between 6am and 7am – is presented solely by a woman.

Previously Derbyshire and Fogarty, both with solo shows, presented a four-hour block between 10am and 2pm.

Wall said he knew it would be “challenging” time for the station and said it would “beef up” its plans to attract listeners ahead of a crucial year with the general election, Ashes cricket and more intense competition from its commercial rival, TalkSport.

Wall told 5 Live staff in an email: “The latest audience figures are below where I’d hoped them to be.

“I knew this particular Rajar [radio listening figures] would be a challenging one when you consider the scale of the 10am to 7pm weekday changes and the increasing competition to our sports coverage.

“Even still, our total reach for 5 live of 5.61 million is a little below what I’d expected (650k down on year).”

Wall said it had been a “tough set of numbers” across the industry with Radio 1, Radio 2, Radio 4 and TalkSport all losing listeners.

But he said “on a more positive note” 5 Live was hitting its audience appreciation targets.

He added: “I have no doubt in the ability of our presenters and production teams to drive the station forward.

“I have seen some indicators that show that our January performance (with the Paris story and big sports weekends in particular) is promising.

“However it is certainly no time for complacency as we look to improve our reach and share numbers again.

“I will be meeting our editors, marketing team, [communications]team and station sound team over the next couple of days to beef up our current plans at maintaining and attracting listeners ahead of a busy period of live sport, the election and the Ashes.”

It was never going to be easy replacing presenters of the calibre of Bacon, Fogarty and Derbyshire, who spent nearly 40 years between them on 5 Live.

The current challenge for the station can be traced back to its move out of London to Salford in 2011.

The lineup went largely unchanged in the immediate aftermath of the move but with the majority of its presenters choosing to commute rather than move to the north-west (including Bacon, Derbyshire and Fogarty) subsequent upheaval was inevitable.

It was unfortunate that all three chose to leave at a similar time - Bacon to work in the UK and US, Fogarty to talk station LBC and Derbyshire for a new show on the BBC News channel – but it also gave it an opportunity for a wholesale refresh which will inevitably take time to bed in.

Dan Walker, presenter of Football Focus, was already a familiar voice on the station (albeit not on a news programme) and ex-Sunday Sport editor Tony Livesey has previously presented its weekend breakfast and late night shows.

But the decision to split the morning programme between Adrian Chiles, now departed from ITV, and former drivetime presenter Peter Allen felt like a short-term move rather than a solution.

It is not long ago - four years - that 5 Live was celebrating a record audience of more than 7 million listeners, boosted by the England cricket team’s Ashes victory in Australia.

Insiders say the 6 million listener mark is regarded as psychologically important, with the intention of looking up towards 7 million again. At the moment it is staring in the other direction.

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