Keep Longwave

On 25th December at 3pm, His Majesty the King’s fourth Christmas Speech will be broadcast to the world. It’s another opportunity to enjoy a time-honoured tradition on your favourite Longwave Radio.

The Monarch’s Speech on Christmas Day was an idea first mooted in the 1920s, but which became a reality only in 1932 with the inaugural broadcast at 3pm by King George V (pictured above). Since that time, the broadcast has been made almost every year, especially since the Second World War when its power to bring the nation together during times of crisis became evident. The strength of this power was shown again as recently as the Covid-19 pandemic when, at Christmas 2020, Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth delivered one of her most impactful speeches.

Whilst most of the speeches since 1957 have been available on television, only radio has carried them all. Moreover, radio retains its peculiar power to speak intimately to the listener, and is arguably the best means of tuning in to hear the King. Nowadays, the speech can be heard on Radio 4 FM, digital radio and online (since 1997). But the greatest reach – and arguably the best, most authentic quality – remains with one of its original means of transmission, longwave radio.

At its inception in the 1930s, the King’s Christmas Speech was broadcast simultaneously on the Home Service, presumably originally including the Daventry longwave transmitter, and on the BBC Empire Service on its shortwave frequencies. These services have since become BBC Radio 4, broadcasting on 198 kHz Longwave from the Droitwich, Westerglen and Burghead transmitters; and the BBC World Service, which still uses shortwave to reach particular parts of the world at restricted times of day (you can see the current shortwave frequencies and times at the BBC website via this link). Therefore, longwave and shortwave have been carrying the monarch’s words over the air at this special time of year for nearly a century.

Originally the broadcast was live, timed to be at 3pm GMT so as to reach as much of the Empire as possible during waking hours, but nowadays it is recorded and disseminated separately around the commonwealth. It is still embargoed in the UK until it goes out on radio and television simultaneously at 3pm on Christmas Day, bringing the nation together at the same moment as it has done from the start.

Radio 4 Longwave remains an efficient and reliable means of communicating the monarch’s message to the nation to this day, with its unique ability to penetrate into almost every corner of the British Isles and beyond. In fact, through the power of longwave, listeners from Scandinavia to the Mediterranean, Ireland to Ukraine will be able to pick up the King’s words this Christmas with a simple, low-power longwave radio (albeit requiring an appropriately placed aerial when listening at the fringes of the broadcast’s range).

Unlike all other current signals, longwave can ever be received for many miles offshore from the British Isles, and all across rural parts of the nation, ensuring that nobody is left out. It’s also much more reliable than other broadcasts during power cuts – so at least you can rely on hearing the King on longwave when all other means fail, if you’re unlucky enough to suffer a power outage on Christmas Day.

And there really is nothing like the warm, soft tones of a longwave radio to bring a much-loved national and international figure into one’s own living room. The Campaign to Keep Longwave exists to ensure that there will still be a longwave signal to tune into at Christmas 2026, and beyond.

Wherever you’ll be this coming Christmas, we wish you an enjoyable and happy festive season, and many hours of pleasurable listening to a longwave radio.

Let us hope that the King’s Christmas message continues to be a source of unity and joy to the nation and to our fractured world – and that, just like the single longwave signal that touches nearly a whole continent, it will be a single voice that brings many hearts together amidst troubled times.

Long live longwave, and long live the King!

(If you haven’t done so already, please sign and share our petition to keep Radio 4 Longwave using this link)