Keep Longwave

The BBC has announced plans to relegate its longest-running programme, Daily Service, to digital platforms only from the start of April 2024. Axing analogue transmissions could see the demise of the programme after nearly 90 years of broadcasts.

First broadcast in 1928, Daily Service was one of the first programmes to air on longwave from the Droitwich transmitter when it was built in 1934.The programme was removed from FM in 1991, but has continued to be a stalwart feature of Radio 4 longwave, on air between 9.45 and 10.00am on Mondays to Fridays.

Since the advent of DAB digital radio, Daily Service has also been available as a digital pop-up channel bearing the same name. However, the BBC now plans to remove that pop-up channel, moving the programme instead to digital-only station BBC Radio 4 Extra.

Whilst this change may not present many problems for users of digital radio, it is likely to have a heavy impact on longwave listeners, who will now be forced to give up using their often long-serving radio sets and buy new digital equipment if they wish to continue to listen. An announcement has been read at the end of Daily Service since Monday 4th December, in which listeners on longwave are directed to ‘electrical and online retailers’ to purchase digital radios. The move comes ahead of the BBC’s planned retirement of the longwave platform, which has met stiff resistance from listeners, with nearly 2,000 people having signed a petition to keep longwave.

What’s worse, the proposed new home of Daily Service, Radio 4 Extra, is also facing the axe: the BBC announced in May 2022 that Radio 4 Extra, along with television channels CBBC and BBC4, would be closed in the near future to save money, albeit with no definite date given. This would leave Daily Service as an online-only programme, available on-demand from BBC Sounds but no longer broadcast to the nation.

Dr Tobias Thornes, who set up a petition to keep BBC Radio 4 Longwave in August 2023, said: ‘Whilst some may prefer to listen to programmes online at their own leisure rather than according to a radio schedule, this way of listening is not particularly suited to a religious service. It is preferable to listen to a service – where possible – at the same time as others, in order to have a sense of togetherness in prayer. ‘Daily Service’ should therefore remain on scheduled, regular radio, accessible to all, and not become buried in a back corner of BBC Sounds where it would be difficult to find and all sense of listening together would be lost. Surely a 95-year-old programme deserves better than this.’

There are concerns that any move to online-only would be the death of Daily Service, especially as many of its current listeners use older, longwave radio sets and may simply cease to listen or not know where to look, were the programme to leave linear radio.

The BBC has not yet responded to a request for comment.