BBC's great Scottish switch-off: Blow as number of viewers who tune in to digital channel falls by tens of thousands

By GRAHAM GRANT, SCOTTISH HOME AFFAIRS EDITOR Published: 21:09, 15 July 2026 | Updated: 21:13, 15 July 2026 Only one in eight Scots watched the BBC Scotland digital channel each week last year – despite it costing licence payers more than £200million. The channel reached just 12 per cent of the population aged four and over – a decline of 50,000 viewers on the previous year. It comes as BBC bosses consider plans to axe the once-flagship channel in Scotland as part of a major cost-cutting drive. The BBC in Scotland is facing cuts of more than £10million and the loss of up to 60 jobs as part of a bid to slash a total of 550 roles from the organisation’s news, television and radio operations across the UK. It emerged earlier this week that the number of UK households paying the BBC licence fee fell by more than 500,000 last year, leaving the broadcaster facing what its director- general Matt Brittin called a ‘moment of real jeopardy’. Scottish Tory public reform and culture spokesman Murdo Fraser said: ‘These dismal viewing figures will do little to reassure hard-pressed Scots that they are getting value for money from the licence fee they are required to pay. ‘At a time when the BBC is facing difficult financial decisions, it must be ruthless in ensuring every pound is spent on high-quality programmes that audiences actually want to watch. ‘Licence fee payers deserve better than seeing millions of pounds spent on services that fail to attract viewers.’ The figures on the BBC Scotland channel are contained in the BBC’s annual report and measure the average proportion of people watching it for at least 15 consecutive minutes each week. The data includes viewers of primary school age and over, rather than only adults. Presenter Amy Irons works across the BBC, including on the BBC Scotland channel Murdo Fraser insists that the BBC must be ruthless in their decision-making In a break with past practice, the Corporation is refusing to publish the amount spent on the channel or the number of hours of its content watched by viewers – figures which have historically fuelled the row over its high costs. Around 619,000 people watched the digital channel in 2025/26 – down from 670,800 the previous year – a drop of about 51,800. Mr Fraser added: ‘The BBC should not be withholding key figures from the very people who fund it. Licence fee payers deserve full transparency about how their money is being spent and whether it is delivering value for money.’ John Cook, emeritus professor of media at Glasgow Caledonian University, said it was ‘probably time for a rethink’. He said: ‘In the era of YouTube, there are other more exciting ways to showcase Scottish content than via a standalone channel, particularly to engage young audiences. ‘BBC Scotland should be going after that audience via exciting new content designed for YouTube going out to where that audience is.’ The Mail has been told the future of the BBC Scotland channel is in doubt after years of controversy over low viewing figures and repeats. Last year, BBC Scotland’s news show Reporting Scotland: News at Seven was launched on the digital channel, replacing The Nine, which was scrapped after a row over low viewer numbers. At one point it reached just 1,700 people and was ditched along with entertainment news show The Edit and weekly news review Seven Days. News at Seven, which aims to complement Reporting Scotland, the BBC One news programme screened at 6.30pm, is presented by Fiona Stalker and Amy Irons. It emerged last year the cost of the BBC Scotland channel since its launch in 2019 had hit £204million. The figure will be even higher now – but the BBC did not publish its running costs for 2025/26. Former BBC Scotland editor Professor Tim Luckhurst has previously said the channel ‘should close immediately’ as it ‘costs money the BBC can’t afford’. In April, one BBC insider in Scotland said: ‘It’s widely assumed BBC3 and BBC4 will end as linear channels in the next few years. ‘Few think the BBC Scotland channel in its current form has a future. The emphasis would be on Scottish content for BBC1, BBC2 and iPlayer.’ However, any move to target the BBC Scotland channel would risk a political backlash from the SNP. Welcoming its launch in 2017, the then culture secretary Fiona Hyslop said: ‘This is a shift in the right direction from the BBC and responds to calls we’ve made for some time for a new TV channel for Scotland.’ The BBC said that from 2025/26 it is ‘moving away from reporting the service spend on TV, radio and online services, to better reflect how we invest our budget and how audiences consume content’. The corporation has not provided the number of hours of BBC Scotland channel content watched by Scots, because the ‘focus is less on channel performance as the audience can access our content on multiple channels as well as iPlayer’.