'Reality TV has brought the issue to the boil'
Independent producers respond to MediaGuardian's report on the exploitation of young people working in the television industry.
Over the past two weeks, MediaGuardian has been detailing the complaints of hopeful young entrants into the TV industry who found their dreams shattered by low pay, long hours and poor prospects. We found anecdotal evidence that employers pay below the minimum wage, exceed the EU working time directive, and sometimes pay nothing at all for months, under the guise of "work experience".
The producers' alliance, Pact, complains there is no hard evidence to support the claims, so TV Wrap, the freelancers' collective that started the campaign, is compiling some. Meanwhile Pact has responded by sending a memo to its members reminding them of their responsibilities. John McVay, Pact chief executive, says it will discuss the issue at the next council meeting. He argues that the problem is not a simple one: "The bigger point is that if broadcasters can reduce the price [of programmes] well below the right level, that is not in the interests of anyone. We will end up with a spiral of decline." He urges freelancers to contact him directly, in confidence, but pleads that not all producers be "tarred with the same brush".
After giving prominence to the concerns of low-paid workers, this week MediaGuardian asked leading producers for their views. There is a growing consensus, it appears, that the issue needs to be addressed.
Nikki Cheetham
Managing director, Endemol UK Productions
Company credits: Big Brother, Fame Academy
I am sure the complaints are not being invented. Television is a very hard place to work. People are passionate about what they do - it attracts very different people from those making baked beans. As an independent producer grows bigger, you have to put processes in. You can't know everyone.
On Big Brother we have a horrible shift, the day producer shift, 24 hours long. The person is in the gallery during the day watching everything then edits overnight and presents to senior editors in the morning. The reason everyone wants to do it is because they have editorial control, it is the equivalent of making your own documentary.
The important thing is you then get days off afterwards. In a way, one-off documentaries can be worse, or live shows where items go down and you have to recover. With reality shows like Big Brother it is a military operation, very organised. The point is not to take advantage of people.
Keeping great people, fantastically talented young people, and treating them well, is important from a humane and commercial point of view. Work experience people are here a maximum of four weeks and they are in addition to budgeted posts. Producers will know them, they are monitored, and they are only doing it because they are hoping it will lead to paid work. Loads of people have got jobs as runners for £240 a week that way, though some are doing it then going back to university.
I really think that putting this issue under the spotlight is a good thing. We have got to run ourselves well. I think broadcasters have to look at their budgets. But it is a cop-out for indies to blame low budgets for not looking after people. These [budgets] are negotiated and agreed with broadcasters.
Andrew Zein
Managing director, Tiger Aspect Productions, chairman of Pact
Company credits: Vicar of Dibley, Fat Friends
At Tiger we endeavour to behave in line with best practice and then beyond it. We make sure we are a place people want to work - we are a people business. In terms of training, pay and conditions, we try to match the BBC. Our runners are paid £250 a week for an eight-hour day, on six-month contracts, and they are allocated to line managers and departments. About 60% find positions and stay with us.
On work experience, we have a policy of a maximum of two weeks and we do not take on people in television jobs. It tends to be people in their last year at school, not graduates. But the broader issue is freelancers. We have 70 staff, 180 people in the building, full time, but we have used 3,500 people this year crewing up different projects. I can say no complaints have arrived on my desk but I am sure there are times people work longer than they might have chosen.
This debate is about television production, about working practices and financing. On production you work a six-day week. The pressure is to reduce the number of "shooting days". Over the past 20 years the pressure to get the maximum amount of material shot per day has risen. There is a real need for the industry to debate what is happening, and expectations.
It is always assumed television production involves long hours, hard work. We had this debate last year at the Pact council [chaired by Zein] about the European working time directive, whether the UK's opt-out should become sector specific. Our initial reaction was: "That's the way television works." Then we stopped the debate and asked: "Would television cope? If the media is out of kilter [with the rest of British industry] is that a real problem?
Reality television, with constant streaming, as in Hell's Kitchen, has exacerbated and brought the issue to the boil, in public. Bullying, long hours, bad conditions - the conditions for it always existed because creative people, directors, producers have ambitions which know no boundaries. But we have to get a handle on the situation.
Jane Hewland
Chairman, Hewland International
Company credits: Dream Team, Mile High
We are in a production market that is being severely squeezed. Independent producers are being squeezed massively by the broadcasters. There are a lot of indies competing for crumbs. The real problems are in low budget reality programming: there is a lot of marginal programming on marginal channels. I have no idea how they get made, even on minimal wages.
Indies pay what they can afford. It depends on how you define exploitation. Work experience for a fixed period is not exploitation, if set out fairly. I know of a kid who did two weeks' work experience for London Tonight. When the work ran out he kept going in for three weeks, for nothing. Then they said: "Would you like a job?" Is it exploitation if an industry is hugely over-subscribed, with lots of people trying to get in but they need experience?
Obviously runners are on basic wages, but we try to fulfil our side of the bargain: if people are good we fast-track them. People with zero experience are not what we want.
Employers have to honour their side of the bargain, but people like me are always looking for talented, reliable people. Genuine talent is very hard to find.
Andrew Critchley
Managing director, Red Production Company
Company credits: Clocking Off, ***** as Folk
We do not take on unpaid or work experience people. It is not something we do here, as far as I can remember over the last seven years or so. We have run a scheme with North West Media where, for instance, we took on five or six entry-level kids, and we topped up an allowance and paid them separately, not a bad rate, around £300 a week I think.
We are contacted frequently for work experience but we are a very small company, except when in production, and there are insurance issues too. When we are in production every position is in the programme budget.
mediaguardian
