Press Releases Peter Salmon has been appointed Director, BBC North

Category: BBC
Date: 09.12.2008
Printable version

Peter Salmon has been appointed Director, BBC North. He is currently BBC Vision's Chief Creative Officer, responsible for the Corporation's new in-house multimedia broadcasting and production centre in the division, and takes up his new position in mid-2009.

He will join the BBC's Executive Board in 2010 as the BBC's new home in Salford Quays nears completion.

Peter, who will be based in Salford Quays, will lead the development of the world's most advanced broadcasting centre.

This will involve the largest move of staff and departments out of London in the BBC's history. On completion the centre will house 2,500 staff, with approximately 1,500 jobs moving there from London.

In his new role he will be directly responsible for BBC Sport, and all its activities; the radio networks BBC Radio 5 Live and 5 Live Sports Extra; and BBC Children's, including programme-making, commissioning and broadcasting of its CBBC and CBeebies channels.

The Director, BBC North, will hold and be accountable for the service licences, granted by the BBC Trust, for BBC Radio 5 Live, 5 Live Sports Extra, and the CBBC and CBeebies channels.

The Controller, BBC Radio 5 Live and the Controller, BBC Children's will retain a close working relationship with the Directors of BBC Audio & Music and BBC Vision respectively and will continue to be members of their senior management teams.

Peter will have managerial oversight of BBC Learning and the significant number of Future Media & Technology staff who will move to the new centre from London, along with a strong regional broadcasting operation and the network production departments from the BBC's current Manchester base (factual, religion, entertainment, drama, comedy, current affairs and music, including the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra).

However, final budgetary and editorial control of these areas will rest with existing BBC Groups as now.

The BBC's operations are currently based in Oxford Road, Manchester, but they will move a few miles to the new Salford Quays base as part of a major development called MediaCityUK from 2011.

Peter will continue in his current role in charge of in-house programme-making until mid-2009, though he will begin to take up some of his new responsibilities from January 2009, initially working to Caroline Thomson, the BBC's Chief Operating Officer, who is currently the executive sponsor of the Salford Quays project.

In 2010 Salmon will join the BBC's Executive Board and report directly to the Director-General, Mark Thompson.

Announcing the appointment, Mark Thompson said: "The appointment of a Director to lead the move to Salford and its subsequent development is a huge step along the path to realising the BBC's ambition to produce half of its output outside of London by 2016.

"I cannot think of anyone better qualified than Peter to lead this bold venture which I believe will have significant impact across the BBC as new ways of working and using technology are developed in practice.

"He has been an outstanding programme-maker and editorial leader and his experience stretches across most of the BBC's output, including Sport, BBC One and now BBC Vision Productions.

"Peter has a long and continuing connection with the North of England and is well known for his work at Granada.

"He rightly commands huge respect across the BBC and the wider media industry and I am very pleased he has decided to accept this exciting new role."

Peter Salmon said: "This is the first big broadcasting venture of a new decade and can define the way the BBC works for a generation.

"I want to help build a world-class, creative powerhouse for the BBC based in the North of England but networked into the whole UK.

"I think this significant cluster of programme-making and broadcasting can be a magnet for other like-minded organisations too, from independent producers to facilities and technology companies, educational bodies to training groups for established and new media.

"Though I will be sad to move on next year from leading the BBC's in-house teams at Vision Productions – the biggest and best group of content-makers in the world – I am really happy that I will still be working with many of them in Salford Quays."

Caroline Thomson, Chief Operating Officer, BBC, said: "Peter is one of the outstanding editorial and creative leaders of his generation. He has presided over a period of tremendous success for BBC Vision Productions.

"His passion for programme-making combined with his long-standing connection and commitment to the North of England means he is ideally placed to lead such a challenging and ground-breaking project."

Peter Salmon became Chief Creative Officer of BBC Vision Productions in October 2006.

He currently oversees the work of about 3,000 people for BBC in-house production, making programmes throughout the country.

BBC in-house production is the largest content creator in the world, responsible for the likes of Strictly Come Dancing, Doctor Who, Top Gear, Antiques Roadshow, Dragons' Den, Top Gear, Watchdog, EastEnders, Survivors, The One Show and many more programmes from bases all over the UK.

Peter started at the BBC as a General Trainee in 1981 and, as a programme-maker, he eventually became BBC Bristol's Head of Factual, in charge of shows like The Antiques Roadshow, CIA, 999 and Small Objects Of Desire.

Along the way he directed the first-ever film shown on Crimewatch UK before going on to produce the series; he was responsible for more than 40 environmental programmes for Bristol's Natural History Unit; he was co-creator of Sport Relief, BBC One's companion piece to Comic Relief, which has so far raised £75m; he signed Wallace and Gromit creator Nick Park to the BBC, where he then executive-produced Aardman Animation's Oscar-winning film The Wrong Trousers; he was producer on David Dimbleby's BBC One history series Across The Great Divide; and he edited a major season of documentaries on BBC Two, War And Peace, marking 50 years since the Second World War.

He also worked on Blue Peter, Newsnight and BBC Radio 1's Newsbeat and Manchester's File On Four current affairs series.

Peter left the BBC in the early Nineties and during his time in the commercial sector he oversaw some notable programmes.

As Director of Programmes at Granada in Manchester, his output ranged from World In Action to Reckless, Hillsborough to the first episode of Cold Feet, Coronation Street to The Royle Family.

As Controller of Factual Programmes for Channel 4, his teams won a record number of Baftas, RTS Awards and International Emmy awards as well as two consecutive Prix Italias.

From 1997 to 2000 Peter was Controller of BBC One, where he commissioned new projects as diverse as Clocking Off, Waking The Dead, Holby City, Dinnerladies, My Family, Warriors, Wives And Daughters, MacIntyre Undercover and Walking With Beasts.

Then, from 2000 to 2005, as Director of Sport and a member of the BBC's Executive Board, his teams produced The Athens Olympics, plus successive World Cup and European football campaigns.

Peter pioneered sport interactive television at Wimbledon and the much-acclaimed Manchester 2002 Commonwealth Games, as well as the development of BBC Sport online.

He also regained a number of key contracts for the Corporation, notably The Derby and Match Of The Day.

He left the BBC in 2005 to become Chief Executive at independent production company The Television Corporation, but quit following a takeover in summer 2006.

Peter Salmon was born and brought up in Burnley, Lancashire.

Notes to Editors

1. The appointment of Peter Salmon as Director, BBC North, was made by the BBC Executive Board. The BBC Trust has approved the position to join the membership of the BBC Executive Board.

2. The post of Chief Creative Officer, BBC Vision Productions will be advertised in due course.

3. Five BBC London-based departments, including two TV channels and two radio stations, will move to MediaCityUK in Salford Quays in 2011. They are BBC Children's (including CBBC and CBeebies); BBC Formal Learning; parts of BBC Future Media & Technology; BBC Radio 5 Live (including 5 Live Sports Extra); and BBC Sport.

4. The BBC has already announced that it intends to base commissioning executives for daytime, comedy and learning programmes at Salford Quays, reporting directly to BBC Vision. Commissioning executives for Children's will move with the two channels, reporting (through the channel controller) to Director, BBC North.

5. The BBC will be based in three new buildings at MediaCityUK, a 200-acre brownfield development and the UK's first media city. A separate studio block also forms part of the development, although this is not solely for the use of the BBC. [The BBC does not own the buildings nor is it responsible for their construction or the site's development; these are all the responsibility of Peel Holdings.]

The mediacityUK consortium developing the site comprises Peel Holdings Ltd, the Northwest Regional Development Agency (NWDA), Central Salford Urban Regeneration Company and Salford City Council. [The BBC is not a member of the consortium, nor is it a partner in the development, but as the anchor tenant does have a place on the Steering Group.]

Final approval for the BBC initiative was given by the BBC Trust and agreement reached with the developer Peel Holdings on 31 May 2007. Preparatory work started on site in June 2007.

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