The BBC needs to spend as much on television content in Rutland as it does elsewhere, say protestors.
They claim the corporation spends almost nothing producing content in Rutland. Even the TV series Rutland Weekend TV had been filmed in London. Adding the detective series Shetland could just as easily have been filmed locally and called Rutland instead. Licence fee payers in Rutland ‘deserve better,’ they said.
‘We’re calling for a year-on-year increase in locally produced content until we are getting our fair share of BBC spending. We are fed up being the butt of the joke,’ said parish councillor Colin Dull, citing the band called the Rutles and their album ‘A Hard Day’s Rut’, and the cartoon series Beavis and Rutt-Head.
'The BBC should play a greater role in Rutland - portraying and shaping the Rutland identity,' he added.
A BBC spokesperson said: 'The BBC is committed to audiences in Rutland and indeed everywhere in Great Britain, and to all of the media and creative businesses based in Rutland, if indeed there are any.' He went on to say that Rutland had benefited economically because two episodes of "tweet of the day" on Radio 4 were recorded nearby, and a part-time BBC researcher had lived in Oakham until 2012.