Evening star., 1960-09-25
A COMMUTE LIMIT
How British Handle PoIiticsonTV

garding prices, employment, agri-
culture, and roads. This was fol-
lowed by Mr.. Macmillan inter-
viewing Selwyn Lloyd, then For
eign Minister, on the Geneva Con-
ference and the recent diSarma-
ment proposals made in New York.
The final and most successful
Conservative telecast was a
straight talk by Mr.. Macmillan on
domestic and world affairs. Al
though it was a recorded broad
cast in order to present as
smooth a delivery as possible, the
public was given the impression
that it was being presented 'live."
In addition to these official par
ty programs, both networks car
ried (at no charge to the parties)
special TV election programs in
addition to their regular news
coverage of the campaign.
In contrast to plans in our
current campaign, no press con-
ference programs we're presented.
AS result neither Mr.. Macmillan
nor Mr.. Gaitskell submitted to
any direct questioning.
The chief opportunity for the
voters to confront the candidate
occurred on special BIC ques-
tion-and-anSwer program called
the Hastings" which helped to
bring the campaign down to the
local level. Two 40-minute pro-
grams were presented a week
before the election in the seven
BIC regional areas. A neutral
chairman presided over a spirited
discussion between candidates Sc
lected by the chief parties contest
ing the area. The audience was
made up of supporters of. each
party in equal proportions plus
some uncommitted voters. In spite
of the fact that the questions
largely came from the parties,
some such as What was your
party's worst mistake in the last
10 yearS?" provoked interesting
comments and considerable enter
tainment for the audience.
One Minute Speeches
Another of the most original
TV programs, Marathon" put on
by one of the leading commercial
companies, enabled all candidates
from constituency to speak for a
minute each with a minutes re-
buttal. No candidate could appear
unless all the others in his con-
stituency also agreed to do so.
The result was that OF. 348 poten-
tial candidates, 26T appeared
either in the mid-afternoon or
late at night on time donated by
the TV stations, Despite the off,
peak viewing hours, the audience
exceeded expectations.
More than 20 million people, or
81 per cent of the total electorate.
is believed to have seen at least
one party broadcast. Twenty-one
per cent of the T'V public watched
the IL party broadcasts, about
equally distributed between the
two networks.
Quite naturally the Prime Min
lister attracted the largest pro-
portion of viewers-27.5 per cent
with his election telecast. No
labor program reached more than
23.5 per cent of the viewers. In
general, audience research showed
that public interest in the politi-
cal campaign as presented on the
special election telecast was. in
the case of BIC viewers, slightly
less, and in the case of the COM
mercial networks viewers sub
Stantially lower than the normal
program which would have been
broadcast Despite the fact that
the number of TV sets had risen
SO per cent in Britain since the
1855 election, the TV audience for
political programs last year was
proportionately fewer.
Specialists in TV audience re-
search were unable to conclude,
even after exhaustive studies,
which kind of political TV pro-
gram was most effective.