Ofcom report reveals drop in spending on British TV comedy
- Ofcom's annual report reveals the main TV channels have cut their spending on comedy by 4%
- £99m was spent on original UK comedy programmes in 2015, the lowest amount for at least a decade
- The drop is despite 72% of viewers saying comedy should be a key part of public service broadcasting
A report from media regulator Ofcom has revealed that the main TV channels are now spending less on the comedy genre.
Ofcom's Public Service Broadcasting annual report - which focuses primarily on the output of the BBC channels, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5, the channels with public service remits - notes that original UK comedy spending by these stations fell by 4% last year, to £99m. This is the lowest figure recorded in the decade the report has been running.
Original UK comedy output has decreased on PSB channels to 193 hours, down by 9% on 2014 and down 18% on the output levels in 2006. Meanwhile, spending on the drama genre increased in 2015, up 12% to £311m.
Ofcom's data reveals that comedy programming accounted for 5.3% of viewing, compared with 14% of output.
Spending on original UK comedy has dropped despite the Ofcom's PSB Audience Opinions research indicating that 72% of viewers think "[showing] high quality comedy made in the UK" is an important purpose of a PSB TV channel - compared to 69% for Drama & Soaps.
Just 59% of respondents to the Ofcom survey said they thought the main channels were meeting their expectations in terms of Comedy output, although this has risen up from the 50% satisfaction level recorded in 2014.
The graph below shows that the BBC remains the main broadcaster of British TV comedy, whilst ITV and Channel 4 both delivered 20 hours each last year.
This latest Ofcom report also reveals a marked shift in how young viewers are now consuming television, with a third of all viewing now on-demand.
The full Ofcom report can be downloaded from Ofcom.org.uk