Sunday 15 February 2009

Revive our Heartbeat says village hit by ITV cost-cutting



A plea for cash from the BBC to save Heartbeat.
The decision by ITV to axe Sunday night drama Heartbeat after nearly two decades has left me very angry.
Yet another cut in this dammed recession. I have already signed a petition drawn up by the residents of Goathland, which doubles up as fictional Aidensfield on the show, is fighting back to rescue the series on which its economy depends.
In only a couple of weeks the villagers have already gathered almost 10,000 signatures for a petition calling on ITV to reconsider this move.

I think that the government should step in and take some money out of the BBC's pot and support programmes like this. The BBC have too many channnels for the minority; either, viewing or listening, who actually supports all these BBC channels each day anyway?
Since the nostalgic police drama first went on air in 1992 it has attracted a huge number of tourists to Goathland and surrounding area.
Many stores sell souvenirs linked to the show, a Heartbeat tour bus brings visitors in from Whitby nine miles away and the cast and crew bring in money in the winter months.
It is claimed that there must be thousands indirectly employed as a result of the drama's success.

It is the amount of publicity Heartbeat gives the whole area worldwide for tourism. Once it goes there will be a slow decline. Tourism is jobs, people coming back to the area and money coming into the local economy.

The series, which stars Joe McFadden as PC Joe Mason, has been a staple of Sunday night viewing for nearly two decades and used to regularly pull in ten million viewers.
Save our heartbeat and support the petition at:

2 comments:

  1. Please join us here, Oliver.

    http://saveheartbeat.proboards.com

    ReplyDelete