Save Kids’ TV is a coalition of parents, producers, artists, educators and others passionate about screen-based media for children, and concerned for its future in the face of intense financial pressures. We aim to persuade politicians and the UK Government to acknowledge the cultural and educational value of children’s television, and to protect it from destruction.
Kids need to hear their own voices and see their own stories in home-grown content which attaches them to their roots and gives them the confidence to understand the wider world. It’s one of their basic rights, and it’s our duty to provide them with content which helps them become engaged citizens.
Save Kids’ TV is actively campaigning for a new online and broadcast service for children – with adequate funding to provide high-quality, UK-produced drama, factual and entertainment content missing from broadcast schedules and websites. The service would be a community for UK kids, providing interaction and participation around great content made by professionals and by the kids themsleves. It would be fun, educational and inspirational, inclusive and empowering - just what kids need to face the world today.
Many people think that children are well served by the many channels providing programmes for them, and the websites they access every day. But few realise that most of the programmes are imports or repeats. and many of the websites are starved of adequate funding. Kids still need and deserve a media diet as rich and stimulating as previous generations enjoyed!
Ofcom research has revealed that less than 1% of the programmes shown on children’s channels is newly made in the UK. And this is decreasing, as advertising revenue for children’s programmes on ITV and Channel Five dries up, and the BBC cuts back its budgets. Children’s programme production in the UK, once the envy of the world, has decreased to a depressingly low level.
The Producers’ Association PACT are active in this campaign and are encouraging everyone to send letters to the Ministers concerned - whcih can be easily done at their Wombles website, where the consequences of too much U.S. TV are brought into shrap and funny focus. Watch the Wonbles and send your letter of support.
Save Kids’ TV isn’t against kids watching U.S. TV We welcome programmes from all over the world. But we also believe that it is vital for their future, and the cohesion of UK culture and society that they hear their own voices on TV as much as American ones.
The disappearance of children’s programmes from mainstream channels like ITV is a symptom of the wider failure of Public Service Television in the UK which the Government is examining right now. Save Kids’ TV was set up to ensure that any solution to ensure the future quality of television includes our kids – not as an afterthought - but at the forefront of their thinking.
“Kids’ TV has been in the vanguard of the collapse of public service broadcasting in the UK. Now it needs to be in the vanguard of the solution…” Anna Home (Chair, Save Kids’ TV)
You can read more about the background to the campaign on our info pages.
We need your support to pursue this goal. So please sign up for the SKTV newsletter to register your interest and encourage others to do the same.
Philip Pullman, patron of Save Kids’ TV
“Children need the best of everything, and that includes the best of television – not the cheapest. Save Kids’ TV is working to make sure they get it.”
