it's begun, the uk's first contestent forjunior eurovision since 2005 is about to take to the stage in the next hour. now on bbc news, the media show. hello and welcome. my guest this week is kevin lygo, the managing director for itv of media and entertainment. as such, he's responsible for all of the programming for itv on its tv networks, and on its new streaming service, itvx. he began his media career working on the two ronnies as a trainee at the bbc. he's also been a dealer in islamic art in paris for a while.

and this year, he released a book called the emperors of byzantium. kevin lygo, welcome to the media show. you're a busy man! yes. we'll talk about itvx, the future of linear tv, the culture secretary on the bbc, love island, maybe even if you'll make a programme about byzantium emperors for itv. not a chance. we'll get into all of that. i've got to ask you about matt hancock, though. in the last few hours, he says he's going to be stepping down as an mp when the next election happens. of course, it's just a few days after he was on one of your shows, i'm a celebrity. did you did you have any inkling that might follow? no, but i suspect he did. but i don't know. no, that's his choice. and i thank him very much for coming onto the show. it was a great success. were you involved in the decision for him to take part? yes. were there pros and cons, or simply something that you said, my goodness,

we need to make this happen if we can? there were. it was late in the day. so so most people were cast when he was put forward, i can't remember how, actually. i thought most of us thought, that is a fascinating idea! does he really want to go in? so, we decided after some debate, but not enormous soul—searching, yeah, we think he would be a great addition to the programme. with someone like matt hancock, or indeed any other contestant, when they say they want to take part, do they sometimes bring conditions and say they will take part, but "i don't want to do this challenge, i don't want to be involved in this situation"? no. you have to go in in full metaljacket! no, we can't allow people not to do things. do you think he may be interested in his own show? sounds liek he's interested in a career beyond politics? he might.

i think the bbc is the place for matt hancock. we will see. at itv, you are a broadcaster and a producer, selling programmes around the world. i'm interested to know how your role straddles those purposes for itv. when ijoined itv, for about five years or more, i ran the studios, the production side of the business, and we all identified that it needed bolstering and it needed to grow, and owning your own programmes was a good thing to do. so we have spent many years investing in it, growing it, to now, it is maybe the biggest producer in europe sort of thing. it is a very important side and i don't manage that but obviously, now commissioning, i don't know, over half of the programmes we have at itv, on all the channels, are made by our studios.

although there's no quota or something, i think there's an understanding in the business that the perfect, the perfect show is one that is made by studios, that you own, that you can control, and if it has any potential outside for earning of the uk, it is great that we keep it. because by being on itv, you have a good chance of it being successful. given those multiple considerations, what is an average day in an average week looking like? how was your time divided up between these responsibilities? it is a bit of a doctor's surgery, truth be known. i have meeting after meeting after meeting, where people are either pitching shows, internal meetings with editors, heads of department, and remember it is from news to entertainment, to drama. do you have time to watch tv, given you have so many meetings about it? yes, i always managed to watch a great deal of television, so i do watch...

in the evening, or do you block out time in the day and say, it is tv time? mainly in the evening. my poor, long—suffering wife will attest to this, i have a way of watching which can be infuriating of fast—forwarding quite often. but you have to keep abreast of, you obviously have to be on top of everything that you're making and is going out on your own stations. but you have to keep abreast of other things, and then there is what you watch for pure enjoyment that might be on a streaming service or something like that. yeah, i watch a lot of television. you mentioned streaming. itv has a two—pronged strategy announced in the last 12 months, one is to double the amount of scripted tv, dramas mainly, and the second part is to launch a new streaming platform, itvx, and that has been released into the wild in the last few weeks. help me understand the decision to make itvx. was it partly driven by the fact that itv hub�*s reputation was not

quite what itv hoped for? how very dare you?! no, it was... do you know, the way that people watch television has changed and is changing all the time. all of us, if you think how you watch television at home, the streamers have influenced beyond anything else the way we now watch television programmes. that much, but the idea that the type of programme may not have shifted that much, but the idea that i want to watch what i want when i want and how i want is a big shift. i think streaming has done that. but that was true 12 months ago. what will i get from itvx that i will not get from the hub? the hub was designed to be a catch—up service.

so in the days it was designed, it was about you put your programmes out on the channels on them for 30 days, you could catch up if you missed it. that was the thinking behind it. now, the iplayer has changed all of this, and now what itvx is is a way... think of it more as a destination that you would go to to watch and itv programme and when you are there, it is so user—friendly and look so good and the rest of it that you will find a plethora of other programmes, things you missed orl things you did not even know were there. it is a whole world where you can spend time watching shows. you're optimistic about it. i wonder why you think the itv share price fell nearly 20% when the plans were announced, and has not recovered. why do you think investors are nervous about it? i think investors can be funny about investment! what itvx is for itv is a serious investment. we're spending £160 million on new programming and it's additional,

on top of the dayjob that we are doing all the time anyway. with the main channels. i think it was just that. and it was a perfect storm of the war in ukraine and all sorts of things happening at the same time. so i think people are coming round now to understanding it is a good idea, and of course, they will wait and see how it works, but i have no doubt it is the right decision to move into this area. i'm interested in hearing that you don't have doubts because it looks like streaming is a high—stakes game at the moment. disney's streaming services on tuesday reported an operating loss of nearly $1.5 billion. we know there's extreme pressure on the budgets of all the big streaming competitors. would it be reasonable to have some doubts this won't work out? yeah, it sounds quite big, but we have been in this game a long time. this is a totally free service.

remember that. most people understandably equate streaming with paying for it. you don't have to do that for itvx. it is free, but it carries ads. we are an ad—funded business and a leader in the market, and we know what we are doing, and so we have not done this sort of in the dark, in conversation with advertisers and the rest of it. everyone is welcoming this new engine to the market. help me understand what itv becomes in the form of itvx. everyone listening would have close associations with itv and how it fits into the fabric of british culture and society. if you become a successful streaming platform, but another one with a variety of programmes, what is itv and what do you stand for? the same things. remember with itvx, everything currently available on itv and its channels is within itvx

as well and you can watch it live, if ou like coronation street, you can watch it through itvx. so it is that. what we can do is offer a greater range than we have done of programming. there is enormous pressure on commercial stations to get 4, 5 million viewers every night at nine o'clock sort of thing, and certain genres and types of programming, that's a real stretch for. comedy is an example. sitcoms in the last period of time — a decade, almost, with notable exceptions — struggle to get people in big audiences now. itv has not been making comedy. but with itvx, you can let things grow and develop, and we are commercially interested in maybe smaller audiences that are, that are people who don't watch a lot on itv that would be looking for comedy, and we can make

comedies and hopefully attract an audience that perhaps would not first off go to itv. i'm reading a quote on itvx saying it will tackle subjects that they would normally be nervous about on the main channels. what would you put on itvx that you would normally not put on itv? certain genres in drama, you may have darker stories, i don't know, horror, sci—fi. itv doesn't do these. it is a mainstream broadcaster based on advertising revenue, and you need volume, and you need massive reach. and you want to reach as many people as you possibly can all the time, and that limits to a certain degree what you can do. there are wonderful programmes that are very niche and would never get 5 million viewers let alone ten. one thing that itvx can do is contribute to a widening

of our audience that perhaps like things a bit more quirky or so. as i'm listening to you, i'm wondering, all of these goals you have for itv, are they supported by being a public service broadcaster? would achieving those goals be simpler as a company if you were freed from some of the constraints and obligations that come with being a public service broadcaster? public service ethos, if you like, is in the dna of itv. it has always been there. we do an enormous amount of news, that's probably the most obvious public service we do, regional news. this year, we extended the early evening news by half—an—hour, so we do 1.5 hours of news every night plus another half—hour at ten o'clock. so this is not hindering us in any way. i think audiences respond to this. it gives you a slightly unique selling point that the bbc and itv are the only people who can do this

sort of thing and are trusted. i think it's terribly important we continue to do it, so we will. let me ask you about that decision, you extended the news 6:30 to 7:30, and coronation street moved to episodes monday and friday, emmerdale up against eastenders, big decisions for you and itv to take. how do you take them? are you doing that on guts, or after months and months of data analysis? the data analysis follows the gut decision. does it? a bit. i just thought there was a lot of programming in—between soaps that was good, some of it good, some of it not as good, but it tended to disappear after a while. the budgets were getting squeezed and ijust thought, i think it would be cleaner if the news ran longer. and the big decision,

in some ways, was — can people take that much news, can we move emmerdale after its successful place of seven o'clock to 7:30pm? and research and data tells you that 80% of the people who watch emmerdale watch coronation street. so that audience, for example, is used to watching a soap at 7:30pm. so there was no shift in the emmerdale audience and, similarly, coronation street, moving to an hour on friday, and what we found now is that when traditionally with episodes split with something in the middle, that the second episode would always lose some viewers from the first because there was a temptation to go find something else or something else you wanted to watch, whereas you put it for one hour and you stick for the hour. again, it has worked

effectively for us. that, i'm happy to say, was a good decision. what is it like in the itv office, if you take a decision like that, getting in in the morning, waiting for the evening before�*s viewing figures? is it nerve—wracking, do you feel like yourjob is on the line? i think if it had been a howling error, i wouldn't be talking to you now! so, yes, some of it is risky and big. but i've been doing it a long time, i'm surrounded by some very clever, talented people, that you can estimate how healthy these things are, and we can surreptitiously try a lot of things out without people particularly noticing, to see if it is working or not. you mention you've been doing this a long time, i was saying in the introduction, you started off as a trainee with the bbc in the two ronnies, and you have done an awful lot between now and then. are there things that you learnt in the early days in television that are relevant now, or is the industry, in the way that viewers and producers have changed so much, that, to some extent, it is just a different thing entirely? no, i think what you learnt, and god bless the bbc for giving me a traineeship... you just didn't stay very long! i did a few years.

so the techniques of storytelling, of making programmes, are much the same. you know, they move on a bit. but that's a constant, i would say. i think the... i still love the range of output that a mainstream broadcaster can do — from high to low culture, from silly game shows to serious dramas or whatever — and that hasn't changed. so the real change in the landscape is there is so much choice now. when i went to television, there were four channels, and you had a trapped audience, and so people were more forgiving and less critical than perhaps now. if you just think of the way you watch yourself of an evening, you give something a couple of minutes, and if you don't like it, you put something else on. everything ever made is available to watch tonight, as well as loads of new shows

dropped every week, mainly from america, but also from the bbc and itv. so the choice is extraordinary, and this certainly is sharpening the wits of producers and writers and creators to meet that challenge. so help me understand what it is that makes one programme cut through all of that. let's focus on love island, one of your biggest hits. why do you think that format has generated so much interest, in a way that lots of other formats don't? yeah, i wish i really knew the answer to that one. i think what's extraordinary about love island is... i'm so glad for everyone in television it came along when it did, because the accepted wisdom was, oh, young people don't watch terrestrial television anymore, they don't look at the schedule,

they never know, they won't consume these things. and so, we bring along love island, which is on every single night at 9pm to 6pm, eight weeks, on itv2, it's not even on the main channel, and the young audience finds it immediately and is absolutely addicted, watches it every night, and it bucked all the trends. and it showed that, actually, if you bring the right thing at the right time in the right way, young people will come. but it is just harder than it ever used to be. but what is the right thing? you were saying the fundamentals of making programmes haven't changed since you started on the rwo ronnies but, surely, love island is a format that, surely, 20 years ago, would not have worked? this is a tv format that has synced with a generation that lives digital lives as if it's their normal lives, there's no distinction between digital life and their normal lives. that's not in isolation, is it? that's connected to love island's success. yes, i think love island probably couldn't have happened without big brother happening, and big brother was a show that

revolutionised television — the way it's watched, to what's possible, the way you tell stories, the way you deal with real people. so i think it's big brother that was the enormous shift that really had an impact on everybody who works in television, and those that watch it. so, love island is a narrower version of that, a more obviously... it's a dating show that happens to be stripped in this way. and when you look at it, you were at channel 4 when big brother was commissioned, so you know that programme intimately, you were also there when ali g was commissioned, men behaving badly and others. do you think there are some types of programmes, some formats you commissioned years ago that, now, would be harder to commission? is it harder to commission edgier or difficult programming? it shouldn't be, because there are more outlets for everything. but it is always hard, and i think you want the confidence, as a broadcaster, or as a channel

or whatever, to think — we can try these things and, if it fails, it doesn't matter, because we can try something else next week. so i don't think it's less risky, certainly not at itv. it's probably more risky than it was, as people's tastes change a bit and adapt. so, yeah, i think we can relax in the thinking that shows of the past that seemed very edgy at the time would still happen. yeah, i can't think of one. if ali g suddenly arrived on your desk now, i'm sure you would probably still do it, so... and we talked about formats, i would like to talk about some of the people within the formats. the talent, as they are referred to in the industry. we have mentioned i'm a celebrity, because of matt hancock being in the news today, and ant and dec front that,

they front saturday night takeaway that's been going for a long time, they now have ant and dec�*s limitless win. when you have such successful presenters on your books, help us understand the calculations you make about how much to use them, because most things they attach to are successes, but presumably, there is a law of diminishing returns at some point? yeah, i think, if you like, talent management is terribly important, particularly in the entertainment business, and you will find that it's no piece of luck the longevity of people like ant and dec, they are very good pickers of shows themselves. they're quite cautious, they don't quit hits. some presenters think after a couple of series, oh, i'm bored, i want to do something else, and maybe never reach those heights again. but i think with ant and dec, they're such professionals, they're such a delight to work with that we use them very sparingly. we would never force them to do anything.

if they have an idea, and they've had a few ideas that we have discussed at length and in the end thought, let's not do it, that works both ways. and what's the relationship between itv and them? would this be something that you might whatsapp them on the way out of the bbc about something, are you to—and—froing with them all the time, or does it all formally go through producers and agents and everyone else? no, i think one of the glories of working at itv is you are very close to them, so i will actually text them during i'm a celebrity. will you? saying, "a bit more of this, a bit less of that"? saying, "that's really funny, and what's going on with that?", and they will respond in the commercial break. and what are these ideas that so far, they are opting not to do? i couldn't possibly talk about those. go on, kevin, there's no—one else listening! the odd quiz or game or something that we all think, oh, maybe, and we work it through, sometimes we do pilots and we don't carry on. so, visions of you sitting

on the sofa with your wife, watching tv of an evening, just messaging different itv presenters on air. is there anyone else you're messaging? robert peston, while he's doing his show? i have texted robert. but, yeah, no, there is a close relationship, but also, there is a commissioning team, there are the producers, everyone is kind of united in getting the best out of whatever the show is at the time. we have inevitably, and rightly, talked about itv a lot. i want to ask you quickly about the place where you started your media career, the bbc, because in the last few days, 0fcom have said some audiences are persistently underserved by the bbc, and it's particularly the case for those in lower socioeconomic groups, who are less likely than other audience groups to use bbc services. you will be aware itv does a very good job of being popular among those people, those groups described by 0fcom. what advice would you offer the bbc to reach everyone better,

as 0fcom is suggesting it should? well, they could give us some of the licence fee... would you like that? oh, well, i don't know. it's very difficult to please everyone all the time. but i'm interested, that was a throwaway remark, but it seems to me it wasn't entirely injest, because i'm sure you know the culture secretary this week said that the licence fee is not a long—term, sustainable model, so is itv interested in a different type of licence fee, which is notjust given to the bbc? honestly, that's a job for the bbc to worry about. what is without doubt is that the bbc is incredibly important, vital to the broadcasting ecology, and a strong bbc is good for the country and good for other broadcasters. you know, healthy competition between us is a good thing, and i want the bbc to thrive, just as itv does. you want it to thrive, but do you think it can and it should thrive with its current funding model? i don't know. i'm sure there are legions of people in this building thinking about that

at this very moment, and i'm sure they will come up with a great idea. just before we finish, kevin lygo from itv, we've talked a lot about how itv is evolving its business, its products. you have got itvx landing. i just wonder if you're nervous about the world cup? itv hub famously struggled a bit during one big game in the euros, when england were in the semifinals a while back. it's going to get a huge amount of tension and pressure, itvx, with the world cup games coming up. are you ready? yes, we're ready. remember, we had the england—senegal game, when millions of people were watching through the itv hub, and we are confident it will be all right, but it will be massive traffic. nobody except the bbc, actually, bbc one and us, gets this sort of volume. whether it's tiktok or netflix, nobody deals with 10 million people at the same moment, all clicking in. but so far, everything has worked very well, so let's just hope that continues. and lots of people have been paying attention to roy keane,

as part of itv�*s coverage. some suggesting perhaps he needs to break out from just being a football pundit and perhaps... dance instructor? well, i don't know, you're the expert! i just wonder if sometimes, you look at on—air talent and think, goodness, if we could just take them out of where... you have to be careful, he is brilliant, roy. i mean, you're mesmerised by whatever he says, and he has such respect from pundits and other footballers and everything. so i think he's great where he is, and i'm sure he doesn't want to do much more. have you asked him? have i asked him to do more? no. and finally, in the last 30 seconds we have, you obviously watch a lot of tv, do you watch lots of video? do you watch twitter, youtube, tiktok? not as much. i watch... whole programmes, ifind, are more satisfying than bits and pieces. thank you very much forjoining us for the whole edition of this programme. we very much appreciate your time.

my pleasure. thank you very much. kevin lygo, thank you very much forjoining us. thanks to all of you for watching. we will be back at the usual time next week. hello there, it has been a very cold day today. in cambridgeshire today, it stayed foggy and temperatures remained below freezing all day. we have winter hazards continuing into the new week, staying very cold, widespread sharp frosts, more snow and ice risk and for a while, freezing fog. this evening, many places turning dry, clear skies, tumbling temperatures. 0urfocus tumbling temperatures. our focus shifts tumbling temperatures. 0urfocus shifts towards the south east weather cloud is thickening, bringing sleet and snow into the night. across the south east of england, east anglia, two to five centimetres by the end of the night, possible travel disruption by

tomorrow morning. areas of freezing fog in southern england, the midlands and lincolnshire as well. it will be cold everywhere, widespread frost, typically down to -5. it widespread frost, typically down to —5. it could be as low as —13 in the north east of scotland, that will be the coldest we have seen all year. but it should be a dry and sunny day for much of scotland on monday. and across northern ireland. we will have sunshine across england and wales, but the south east and midlands in particular are likely to stay grey, misty, foggy, and there could be flurries of snow so these areas particularly cold. in eastern scotland after that very cold start, temperatures may remain below freezing. thejet temperatures may remain below freezing. the jet stream temperatures may remain below freezing. thejet stream is temperatures may remain below freezing. the jet stream is to the south of the uk, that's why we are in colder air and thatjet stream is doing areas of low pressure and into southern europe once again. we have an area of low pressure approaching the north east of the uk from the north sea and that is going to bring snow showers across northern and eastern parts of scotland. it could be grey and foggy through wales and parts of northern england and there will be a bit more cloud here across

the south of england as well. it is going to be another cold day, temperatures struggling to get much above freezing. and then we shift more towards the north through tuesday, wednesday and into thursday because this is where we find most of the snow falling and there could be quite a lot over the hills in northern scotland, perhaps as much as 20 centimetres here. and the focus is shifting more towards the north because the wind is picking up and it is going to be that arctic northerly wind that can sweeping down across the country. again, northern scotland in the firing line, a lot of snow showers here, some eastern parts of scotland and also the north east of england. elsewhere, dry with sunshine. a cold crisp winter's day and temperatures as high as 4 or even 5 degrees.

this is bbc news. the headlines at 4:00pm: a libyan man suspected of making the bomb that destroyed pan am flight 103 over the town of lockerbie in 1988, is in us custody. a nursing union leader says a planned strike by nurses could be called off, if the health secretary negotiates "seriously" over pay. the one day of action that nurses are going to take on thursday hasn't created the 7.2 million people sitting on our waiting lists. the job of union leaders is to negotiate on behalf of their members, they do an incredibly important job, but they negotiate with their employers. in this instance, the employer is the nhs. a teenage girl with seemingly incurable leukaemia — is now cancer—free thanks to a revolutionary therapy.

authorities in jersey say they are no longer looking