Stacey Dooley: I am totally gutted about BBC3 moving online only
The Beaten by My Boyfriend TV presenter has said that the closure of BBC3 as a broadcast channel will see the loss of great documentaries for a younger audience
Stacey Dooley, the 28 year-old TV presenter who has made her name making BBC3 documentaries, has said that she's "totally gutted" about the proposed move of the channel online.
“I think it’s a massive shame that it won't represent the younger crowd and it will be missed in terms of making decent, accurate documentaries."
Dooley's latest project, Beaten by my Boyfriend is an investigation into the younger face of domestic violence, and an example of the type of absorbing yet educational programme that BBC3 supporters are concerned will suffer when BBC3 goes online-only.
Although Save BBC3 protestors last month marched to the BBC Trust to deliver 270,000-signature petition, the wheels for its move online are still in motion.
The BBC executive responded to the protest with the following statement: “With the licence fee frozen we’ve had to make some difficult choices in order to save £800m a year, including moving BBC Three online. There is no easy solution and we have chosen to make a bold move to reinvent the service rather than simply having to take money out of all our programmes across the board.”
And some have said that shows like award-winning drama Murdered by my Boyfriend and investigative programmes like Dooley's will still be watched by a younger audience on catch-up service BBC iPlayer anyway, so that there is no need for a linear BBC3 channel.
However, Dooley said that while she understands that a 16 to 24-year olds are the easiest audience to move online, BBC3 deserves a place on ordinary TV as well as online.
"I think it’s a shame not to have that quality on television also. I just think BBC2 and BBC4 are very similar, and BBC4 could have migrated to BBC2 instead."
