Broadcasting cuts and insecure work demand a clearer picture of success and a radical plan for what comes next.
Wales needs an independent audit of its creative industries. We keep celebrating international productions and announcing investment, while programmes disappear and experienced people struggle to earn a living. Before declaring the sector a success story, we should establish whose success we are measuring.
Having worked across Welsh television, digital media, publishing and games, I know the talent we possess. My concern is whether we are building an economy that allows that talent to stay, develop and tell our own stories.
The BBC cuts announced on 24 September bring that question into sharp focus. Radio Cymru will lose Dros Ginio and the Saturday edition of Dros Frecwast, alongside football discussion programme Ar y Marc. BBC Wales subsequently clarified that 58 individual roles, equivalent to 45 full-time posts, would go, including 20 newsroom jobs. AOL
Ending established current affairs programmes removes space for explanation, challenge and public participation in Welsh. For a language with limited media provision, each loss matters disproportionately. A listener cannot simply switch to another Welsh-language station offering equivalent journalism.
Ofcom identified Radio 2 as Wales’s most-listened-to station in its 2024 findings. That raises an uncomfortable question about what our national services should provide. I worry that Radio Wales and Radio Cymru increasingly risk becoming English- and Welsh-language versions of Radio 2 for Wales. Music and companionship have real value, but public service radio also needs sustained scrutiny of the country we live in. ofcom.org.uk
Wales needs greater plurality: independent news radio, stronger community stations and producers with distinct editorial voices. Funding should support reporters and original programmes. Adding another music stream does little to fill a gap in democratic information.
S4C faces a related challenge. Ofcom’s 2026 report shows that linear viewing among Welsh 16–24-year-olds fell 45% during 2025, to 17 minutes a day. YouTube reached 67% of Welsh 16–34-year-olds weekly at home. Television still matters, particularly to older audiences, but the audience S4C must cultivate is increasingly elsewhere. ofcom.org.uk
S4C is responding through digital commissioning and its iPlayer partnership. On 9 September, chief executive Geraint Evans told MPs that investment in YouTube, TikTok and digital journalism has to come from the programme budget. Serving new audiences while maintaining existing provision creates a financial squeeze. 09 Sep 2026
Is the current model sustainable? Repeated cuts suggest its funding and obligations are becoming harder to reconcile. Public service media needs a durable funding settlement, alongside a commissioning system organised around how people actually watch and listen.
A radical approach would make YouTube a central distribution platform for Welsh content, with substantial funding for work conceived for it. That means regular creator-led programmes, explainers, comedy, interviews and entertainment, supported by professional production skills. Publishing a television trailer and hoping viewers find the channel is an inadequate response.
We should fund Welsh-language creators to build returning audiences, experiment with formats and develop viable businesses. Commissioning should account for discovery, subtitles, audience relationships and the rights needed to keep programmes available. Success should include whether people return and spend more of their everyday media lives in Welsh.
YouTube advertising alone cannot be expected to sustain minority-language journalism. Public investment remains essential, as do editorial independence, fair pay and publicly controlled archives. Distribution through a commercial platform needs safeguards against dependence on its changing rules. This transition deserves its own investment, rather than being financed through the steady erosion of journalism.
The wider creative economy requires equally honest examination. House of the Dragon, Sex Education and Young Sherlock have used Welsh locations, bringing international visibility and production work. These are achievements worth celebrating. GOV.WALES
There is evidence of economic benefit. A Welsh Government evaluation covering 45 supported screen and digital projects estimated £263.9 million in Welsh production expenditure associated with £23.7 million of funding between 2020/21 and 2024/25. It also cautioned that the activity could not all be attributed to that funding, and identified gaps in freelancer and geographical data. gov.wales
Production spending cannot tell us how consistently someone works, who owns the resulting intellectual property, or whether Welsh-language companies can afford experienced crews. Those are essential measures of a sustainable industry.
An S4C-commissioned study in 2021 already documented increased competition for cast and crew from network and international productions, pushing up costs for domestic producers. Better earnings for workers are welcome. The difficulty comes when local commissioning budgets cannot keep pace with the rates available elsewhere. A production boom can therefore coexist with pressure on the companies serving Welsh audiences. s4c.cymru
For Welsh-speaking communities, this also affects where people can build their lives. S4C-supported production sustains work in rural north and west Wales. Its economic value includes helping people remain in communities where they can use Welsh every day. s4c.cymru
BBC business correspondent Huw Thomas has highlighted the human consequences on LinkedIn, discussing insufficient freelance work and asking to hear from people who had changed careers. That warning predates this latest round of cuts. Creative Wales’s own 2025 survey, published this July, found that 25% of responding businesses reported falling turnover and 78% had undertaken no recruitment during the previous year. This is a sample, but it hardly describes universal prosperity. Huw Thomas
Journalism shows how damaging prolonged contraction can be. In 2020, the NUJ reported more than 90 Reach journalism jobs in Wales at risk, 25 Newsquest jobs cut in Newport and north Wales, and plans for 60 BBC Wales posts to go in 2021/22. The latest BBC reductions add to that history. nuj.org.uk
The same NUJ briefing documented Reach’s Welsh operations being placed under publishers based in Birmingham and north-west England. Editorial management moving away is not the same as every reporter leaving, but it creates distance between decisions and communities. Generic copy cannot replace the accumulated knowledge of a journalist who understands a town and keeps questioning its institutions. nuj.org.uk
Research published this July, tracking 27 Reach newspapers across 2019, 2022 and 2025, found declining local coverage of essential civic information alongside growing use of shared content. The consequences extend well beyond the newsroom payroll. journals.sagepub.com
Games deserve particular attention. Wales Interactive’s Sker titles demonstrate what Welsh companies can achieve internationally, including through Welsh culture. Yet TIGA’s 2025 regional figures, reported this March, put Wales at just 0.6% of UK games development employment, compared with Scotland’s 9.6% and the North-West’s 13.3%. Welsh development employment fell 10.9% between May 2024 and September 2025. research.senedd.wales
Why have we failed to build comparable scale? University of South Wales research identifies the need for stronger business support, mentoring and routes from education into employment. These findings suggest that developing talent without enough companies able to retain and employ it leaves a major gap. Across the UK, TIGA reports the first fall in development employment since 2011. Wales must address its longstanding weaknesses during a much tougher international market. University of South Wales
An independent audit should build on existing research and examine the whole sector, including people who have left. It should establish employment and earnings trends, distinguish permanent jobs from temporary production work, and track ownership, public funding and the value retained in Wales. Welsh-language provision and differences between communities must be central to it.
Publish the findings, compare Wales with successful regions and attach funded actions to the gaps. That would give us a basis for deciding how to sustain journalism, support domestic production and grow games and digital creation. Wales has the talent. We owe the people doing the work a strategy grounded in their reality.