The Today programme, increasingly irritating but still necessary listening on Radio 4 mornings six days a week, will be 60 years old in October. And to celebrate, it’s asking its listeners what have been the major changes in the world in that time and over recent years.
As usual, in their pick of issues yesterday morning, wildlife and the environment didn’t get a mention.
There have been good things, these come to mind:
- wildlife legislation – EU Birds Directive 1979, Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, Environmental Protection Act 1990, Badgers Act 1991, EU Habitats and Species Directive 1992, Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000, Climate Change Act 2008, Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009
- recovery of many species after global impacts of toxic chemicals DDT etc
- growth of public support for environmental causes as evidenced by NGO memberships
- more land designated for nature either by the state or by NGO ownership
- recovery of many seabirds and marine mammals
And some bad things, these come to mind:
- loss of abundance – fewer insects splattered on your windscreen, much smaller flocks of wintering finches, declines in bees, former weeds now called rare arable plants, missing the song of the cuckoo
- the state has moved out of nature conservation to a massive extent and axed independent voices which would have held it to account
- a schism in the politics of nature conservation – the right is knowledgeable but uncaring whereas the left is pretty ignorant but well meaning
- house sparrows have disappeared from many of our cities and much of the countryside
- Today used to be quite good on the environment but now it isn’t. It’s light-weight, ill-informed and jokey. But the press coverage of nature issues has also declined dreadfully in the last decade.
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other bad things:
Nitrates out of control across vast areas of the country which is lovely and green but monumentally boring.
I suspect one reason for the decline in quality coverage of environmental issues is an unfortunate and rather perverse result of the increase in audiences for CountryFile, Springwatch, Attenborough et al.
Broadcasters feel wildlife and the countryside box has been ticked, audiences are comforted by programmes featuring lots of cuddly animals and everyone moves on, ignoring the underlying issues.
I would agree with this. There has been a general dumbing down when reporting environmental issues. It also seems to be the case that on television you cant discuss environmental projects without showing school children pond dipping or similar. It reinforces the idea that nature is just for children and not a serious subject. Print media are just as bad. If you cant talk in sound bites then they dont want to know.
Second that – made for the Twitterati. Faked, too – wouldn’t want anything to go wrong on live telly
There might be more watching but certainly less active. Cumbria is a classic. 2015 saw 41.5 million day visits but few if any were involved with wildlife watching. Bassenthwaite Ospreys being the exception. The county boasts the most breeding bird species in England but with no eagles but with the return of Dotterel and still no Avocet! This species shows the lack of imagination with Leighton Moss on its boundary but no wetland or reed bed to compare. Siddick and Bassenthwaite get Bitterns while both Morecombe Bay and the Solway are a wash with waders. The infrastructure for wildlife watching is virtually nil compared to other counties. With such a high visitor figure you would expect some one to grab the nettle!
john – I think it’s an opportunity rather than a nettle!
In the last year I have completely given up listening to the Today programme. I have had too many years of listening to the scientifically illiterate ramblings of John Humphreys, the very embodiment of CP Snow’s Two Cultures problem. Meanwhile their political hacks have lost sight of what unbiased and balanced reporting is, surrounded by like minded people, they don’t realise where their own biases and assumptions show.
There are those who complained against supposed left wing bias in the BBC. These people must be worried that the latest BBC-Tory revolving door now means there Tory party comms is itself headed up by some left wing marxist.
I know you blogged before about the paucity of environmental or nature-related content on Today but I’m unable to find the entry so posting here.
I was wondering whether you’d caught the new “Nature notes” strand Today do on Saturdays? I caught it for the first time yesterday with Tony Whitehead of the RSPB talking about Ravens; a small but welcome addition.
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b099tf4v#play at around the 1h 24m 30s mark)