Our Beliefs
- television and other screen media play a key role in children’s lives, and content designed specifically for them not only entertains, but also educates and informs
- well-produced and appropriate content helps children make sense of the complex and often confusing world they inhabit, and shows how they can make creative and positive contributions to it
- as a society we should ensure that our children have access to high quality, original, home-grown content which reflects their concerns and their culture
- the intellectual, creative and cultural diet we provide for our children is as important as the food we give them
- issues like these, which affect the quality of our children’s lives cannot be left to commercial forces and the market alone
- revenue generated by advertising forms an essential component of the children’s media economy - since these revenues are restricted, new ways of funding quality children’s media and encouraging pluarality of supply need to be found
Kids TV in the UK …
- Is a safe haven for our children – one of the few
- It helps them make sense of the world, through stories – both fictional and factual
- It feeds their imaginations
- It encourages a whole range of activities in art, craft, hobbies and sport, and interactive enegagement online with popular and powerful TV brands
- It teaches them about their own culture and the cultures of others
- It can help explain difficult things
- It entertains them with appropriate humour
- It validates their lives and empowers them as young individuals and members of our society
- It prepares them to enter the adult world with a rounded view of life
With less good children’s TV, what else will they watch…?
- Children will continue to watch television, whether it be on the family TV, in their bedrooms, or even on computers.
- It’s our duty to ensure that no matter what the commercial realities, the best TV is delivered to them every day.
- Cutting the available funds for children’s programming will not reduce the amount they watch – it will simply diminish the variety and quality of their media diet.
- In some disadvantaged households television is a kid’s lifeline to culture, imagination, empowerment and engagement. It is often their only connection to the issues and values which hold us together as a society. To deprive them of that connection would be damaging.
