Table of Contents

Preface and Acknowledgements Abbreviations PART I: BREAKING THE MONOPOLY Beveridge Beyond Beveridge White Paper, 1952 Interlude: 1952/3 White Paper, 1953 Field Days in Parliament: 1953 The Television Bill Passage of the Bill: 1954 PART II: THE BEGINNING: 1954/5 The First Authority Competition The Network Companies Birth of Independent Television News The Programme Contracts The Transmitter Crisis Television Hours The Statutory Committees 'Proper Proportions' of British Material Labour Relations The Authority and the Programmes Getting Ready Publications Curtain Up PART III: IN AND OUT OF THE RED The London Audience Problems of Balance Crisis at ITN Financial Affairs £750,000: the Gift Horse that Bolted Men and Money Scotland, Wales and the South Two Obstacles Removed Programme Developments PART IV: THE NEW MONOPOLY Unacceptable Profitability The Network Carve-Up PART V: PEOPLE'S TELEVISION The First Six Years Perspectives on Programmes PART VI: ALARUMS AND EXCURSIONS Committee of Enquiry: 1960 The Prevailing Climate Notes and References Appendix 1: The Nature of the System: Extract from the ITA Annual Report, 1961/2 Appendix 2: Some Company Publications Index

About the Author

BERNARD SENDALL went to an elementary school, of which his father was headmaster, and subsequently, on scholarship, to the Royal Grammar School, Worcester. At the age of 16 he won an Open Demyship in modern history at Magdalen College, Oxford. He graduated at 20 with a first in modern history and then went on to read modern greats. In 1934-5 he was a Henry Fund Fellow in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Harvard University. Entering the Home Civil Service in 1935, he became private secretary to the wartime Minister of Information, Brendan Bracken, 1941-4. He helped to establish the postwar Central Office of Information, where he was Controller (Home), 1946-9. From 1949 to 1951 he was Controller, Festival of Britain, for services to which he was made CBE in 1952. After further service in the Admiralty, he moved into television in 1955 as Deputy Director General of the ITA (later IBA), in which post he remained until 1977. On leaving he received the gold medal of the Royal Television Society for outstanding service to television.