Talksport today launches a sister 24-hour radio station today at the Cheltenham Festival of horse racing.

The launch of Talksport 2 is accompanied by news that the station has live rights to broadcast ICC World Twenty20 cricket matches in India and the ATP World Tour of tennis.

After the station's launch at 10am today it will carry live coverage of the opening Super 10 cricket match between India and New Zealand in Nagpur.

Mike Bovill, managing editor of Talksport 2, said: “There is a huge appetite for sport in this country, and the array of live rights that we’ve secured for Talksport 2 is a great prospect for listeners, who just have to retune their digital radios to pick up the new station.

"To have the biggest cricket event of the year as well as unprecedented access to names such as Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer and of course Andy Murray through the ATP World Tour is incredibly exciting.”

Talksport 2 is available across the UK on digital radio as well as online. It will focus on live coverage of sporting events.

In the last quarter of 2015 Talksport grew its weekly reach by 1.9 per cent year on year to 3,061,000 according to Rajar.

Picture: Shutterstock

Journalists working for the BBC’s Chinese Service fear that its ability to report freelly will be undermined by moving most key editorial staff to Hong Kong.

Some 16 editorial position in London will close as a result of the move with ten new jobs opening in Hong Kong.

The service has been based in London for 75 years and has been online-only since 2004. It attracts some 1.5m unique browsers per month to its Chinese language website.

Howard Zhang, who heads up the service’s National Union of Journalists chapel, said: “It is a politically-motivated decision, rather one that is made in consideration of the national interest or the BBC’s long-term interest.

“It is a result of turf-fighting and middle-managers keen to please their bosses. Every department has been asked for savings, the Chinese Service is vulnerable because the head of Chinese Service is currently a vacant position.”

NUJ members at the China service have highlighted the fact that last week the editor-in-chief of Hong Kong newspaper Min Pao was sacked after Beijing was critical of its coverage of the Panama Papers.

They said that Government-backed companies have bought nearly half of Hong Kong’s main newspapers and TV stations, including the South China Morning Post.

Zhang said: “Moving key editorial decision-making people to Hong Kong places them under direct Chinese threat.”

NUJ general secretary Michelle Stanistreet said: “Off-shoring the BBC Chinese Service will jeopardise the safety of BBC staff.

“Relocating journalists from London to Hong Kong, especially journalists who have historically been critical of Beijing as they strove for journalistic truth and integrity, just puts them in the eye of the storm.  That is assuming that they want to relocate.

“If the additional ten announced posts are not filled by existing staff, newly appointed local employees will not have the back knowledge to maintain journalistic excellence or their current role as an independent voice of authority in the region.  Worryingly, nor will they have the security of a British passport to protect them from the potential wrath of the Beijing regime.”

A spokesman for the BBC World Service said: “We need to change the way BBC Chinese works to improve our reach and impact in China. In a fiercely competitive market, we need more first-hand reporting in China and cannot continue relying on content produced in London, nine hours behind the relevant time zone. We believe these changes will enable us to provide our Chinese audience globally with an independent and compelling news offer it can’t find elsewhere. They will also help us to explore new ways to circumvent web blocking and censorship.

“While safety is always of paramount importance, BBC Chinese staff are able to report from Hong Kong independently and without interference from authorities, and we believe this will continue in Hong Kong which hosts regional headquarters and offices for more than a 100 leading international media organizations. The BBC faces challenges to press freedom all over the world every day – and this move will not change our commitment to impartial journalism in any way.”

Lord Patten said it was sometimes going too far to demonstrate “balance” because the shadow of the process led by anti-EU Culture Secretary John Whittingdale was “hanging over it”.

“The BBC has an extremely difficult job. It is having to cover this referendum with the shadow of a charter review and Mr Whittingdale hanging over it,” he told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

“I think that may make people excessively deferential when trying to produce balance.

“You have the governor of the Bank of England on, or the IMF chief, so you feel obliged to put up some Conservative backbencher that nobody has ever heard of on the other side of the argument.

“It does occasionally raise eyebrows. But I think I would prefer the BBC to be being criticised for being excessively balanced rather than for doing anything else.

“It is a very great broadcaster which is dedicated to telling the truth and that is an unusual thing in the world of the media.”

The BBC Trust has published guidelines, which can be read in full here, setting out how the BBC should go about ensuring “due impartiality” in its reporting ensuring that both sides of the referendum campaign are given fair coverage.

These include stating that the corporation must not commission opinion polls during the EU Referendum campaign and treat those commissioned by others with caution.

The BBC claims that the total audience for its international services has grown 12 per cent year on year to 348 million.

The breakdown is:

• TV: 162m
• Radio: 147m
• Digital (including social media): 80m.

The BBC uses its own methodology to de-duplicate these figures to come up with its weekly audience total.

This figure is nearly all outside the UK, but also includes those inside the UK tuning in to the World Service and watching the BBC World News television channel.

The BBC claims that its biggest audiences outside the UK are as follows:

• US and India: 35m
• India: 23m
• Pakistan: 13m
• Iran: 12m
• Egypt: 11m
• Tanzania: 10m
• Brazil: 8m
• Afghanistan: 7m
• Bangladesh: 6m.

BBC press release here.

Former BBC Trust chairman Lord Patten has spoken out in defence of the “besieged” BBC as the Government prepares to publish a White Paper on the corporation’s future.

As part of a speech at the Reuters’ Institute Lecture on the future of the BBC, he also addressed reports that Culture Secretary John Whittingdale is said to want a BBC that is more “distinctive”.

In response, Patten said in his lecture: “Yes, it really would be ‘distinctive’ to strike Strictly or Bake-Off from the schedules because they’re too good and too popular. It would also be ridiculous. A BBC One that’s not popular wouldn’t be the BBC that licence payers demand.”

Whittingdale is being widely tipped to include a bar on the BBC going head-to-head with commercial rivals as part of the review of its charter.

He is due to publish a White Paper within weeks that will set out a tougher new regime as part of a proposed deal to grant a new Royal Charter to safeguard the service for another 11 years.

In the speech delivered at Oxford’s St. Anne’s College, Patten said the forthcoming charter is “the one chance we have to stop the BBC becoming more and more the plaything of the government of the day”.

He called for the end of the link between Charter renewal and the new fixed term Parliaments.

“How ridiculous it is that, because the Charter expires eighteen months after a general election, the BBC is bound to become a priority for any incoming government,” Patten said.

Patten also spoke of a “besieged” BBC and called for “everyone who cares” to “make our voices count.”

He said the corporation was under attack “by government. By the press. By Sky. By Google. By Apple”.

“Once a giant in the communications market” the BBC is “now dwarfed by multinational platforms who drive up the cost of content – of acquisition, of talent, of production, and of ideas – but have no interest in the UK except as a market”.

He added: “BBC’s real income has fallen over the past decade by more than 15 per cent,” he said before adding, in the past five years alone, “BSkyB’s revenues went up by more than 16 per cent, and ITV’s increased by 21 per cent”.

He said that in order for the BBC to produce programmes and services that inform, educate and entertain, terms spelled out in its Royal Charter, it would require a BBC “not just free of political control but free of political threat”.

“A BBC that can stop looking over its shoulder and waiting for the next White Paper,” he stated.

On the subject of politicians who “grab an easy headline at the BBC’s expense” he said “constituencies where the voters worry more about the BBC than they do about having a job … don’t exist.”

He also put forward the idea of a new Commission “to guarantee the independence not just of the BBC but of all broadcasting”.

Its roles, he said, would be to appoint the chairman and non-executive directors of the BBC. It would also recommend and publish proposals for future levels of BBC funding.

Finally, it would appoint the chair and deputy chair of Ofcom.

“Such a Commission would make it much more difficult for future governments to raid the licence fee,” he said.

Patten also talked of the public’s overwhelming support for the BBC. “The consultation exercise plainly failed to provide the answer Mr Whittingdale wanted,” he said.

The review of Mr Whittingdale’s plans for a reform of the BBC, one of the largest-ever public consultations, saw 81 per cent of respondents indicate satisfaction with the corporation’s content.

Patten praised the corporation’s output, including dramas such as Happy Valley, Wolf Hall, Sherlock and Line Of Duty and said: “No-one would invent the BBC today. But thank God our predecessors did. The BBC is one of this country’s greatest institutions.”

The BBC is set to regulated by Ofcom for the first time and run by a unitary board appointed by the government and the BBC itself.

The move means Ofcom, rather than the BBC Trust, will have responsibility for adjudicating on serious complaints and imposing sanctions where necessary.

Ofcom currently regulates commercial broadcasters and has the power to fine and publish critical adjudications.

The BBC’s charter will also be renewed every 11 years, rather than 10 years at present.

Culture Secretary John Whittingdale will outline the full proposals in Parliament later today as the Government white paper on the future of the BBC is published.

The BBC revealed today a new deal with local press publishers which includes funding 150 local council reporters.

“The BBC is a world-class broadcaster and one of our country’s greatest institutions. Our plans will mean that the BBC will keep making the great programmes we love and will continue to thrive in the future,” a Government source said.

A key reform laid out in the white paper is the formation of what the Government is calling a “strong unitary board for the BBC”.

The BBC will be responsible for appointing at least “half of the board members” and Ofcom will be the external regulator of the corporation.

Specific details of who would elect the other half of the board have not yet been detailed.

This change was one of the key suggestions made by Sir David Clementi last year as he detailed the results of an independent review into the way the BBC was governed.

The former deputy governor of the Bank of England recommended that the current governing body, the BBC Trust, be abolished and suggested the corporation be regulated entirely by Ofcom.

The length of the charter will be extended to 11 years so that it is independent of any political cycle, and there will be a mid-term “health check” to ensure things are functioning as they should be.

The new Charter will also seek to champion and strengthen the independence of the BBC, with special “protections” for the BBC’s editor-in-chief, the Director-General.

Key debates in the run up to charter renewal have been the question of government interference in the editorial independence of the BBC.

MPs expressed concern in parliament around reports that the Culture Secretary would look to prevent the BBC from screening popular shows at peak viewing times.

Whittingdale denied these claims as he addressed parliament and assured MPs there was no truth to the suggestion he would prevent the broadcaster from going head-to-head with commercial rivals.

It is reported in The Times that the BBC will continue to keep secret the pay of “talent” earning more than £150,000. According to the paper this means that the pay of around 100 of the BBC’s stars will remain secret.

It reports that pay for those earning above £450,000 a year, around ten individuals, will be revealed.

The new paper states that the licence fee will increase in line with inflation for five years, meaning the current annual fee of £145.50 will rise from 2017 until 2022. Coupled with this change, the Government also plans to introduce a new process for determining what the licence fee cost is every five years.

“This will give the BBC the financial certainty it needs and increase its independence from government,” the paper explains.

The Government is also closing the BBC iPlayer loophole, by extending the licence to include viewers watching BBC content on catch-up through the iPlayer or other digital platforms.

Plans for the above were already set in motion in July 2015 when the corporation reached an agreement with the Government which saw it agree to pay for the cost of providing over-75s with free television licences. In return, the Government pledged to review the licence fee and how it functioned in regard to the iPlayer.

• Income from public money frozen at £3.7bn for five years
• New powers for Ofcom to regulate BBC journalism
• Funding scrapped for Jeremy Hunt’s Local TV network
• £8m of BBC money to fund 150 new local press council reporters
• All TV and radio commissioning to go out to open competition
• Licence fee safe and non-payment still a criminal offence

The BBC white paper paves the way for more cuts at the corporation as licence fee income will be frozen at £3.7bn a year until 2022.

But many at the corporation will be relieved by a proposed settlement which trims the power and influence of the media giant far less than some had anticipated.

The new proposed BBC charter will run for 11 years, to 31 December 2027, with the aim of distancing future reviews from the Parliamentary election cycle.

The licence fee remains and is set to go up by inflation from £145.50 at the present to £160.50 by 2021/22. Non payment will remain a criminal offence and measures will be taken to close the “loophole” whereby those who access the BBC purely via iPlayer get it for free in the UK.

In future the corporation’s journalism will be regulated by Ofcom, a state-run regulator, rather than the BBC Trust (whose members were appointed by the government).

Ofcom will be given new powers to fine the BBC and force it take action if it deviates from its charter.

The Trust will be abolished and instead the BBC director general will report into a unitary board. Half of the members of the board will be appointed by the BBC itself and the other half by the government through a public appointments process.

It is proposed that the BBC’s core “public purpose” will be reformed to ensure that it does not undermine commercial news providers.

The white paper proposes that the public purpose ought to say the BBC “should offer a range and depth of analysis and content not widely available from other UK news providers, using the highest calibre presenters and journalists, and championing freedom of expression, so that all audiences can engage fully with major UK and global issues and participate in the democratic process as active and informed citizens”.

The white paper welcomes proposals already in train from the BBC to cut back on lighter “magazine-style” content online.

It states: “While the BBC will maintain a full range of subjects and stories, its focus will be on rigorous, impartial analysis of important news events and current affairs.”

Ofcom’s new powers over the BBC

Ofcom’s proposed new powers over the BBC will include:

• assessing the performance of the BBC board in meeting its charter obligations
• monitoring and reviewing performance with powers to remedy any identified failings
• regulating editorial standards to ensure the BBC meets requirements in areas such as accuracy, impartiality, harm and offence
• holding the BBC to account for its assessment of both market impact and public value, alongside regulation of commercial
• acting as the appeal body in terms of complaints.

Ofcom will also have the power to undertake additional investigations of BBC activity and issue fines. It will also be able to order the BBC to stop proposed changes or reduce the scale of its services.

New deal with local press

It is proposed that a new fund will be set up, totaling £20m a year, to enable organisations outside the BBC to compete to provide public service content.

In terms of local newspapers, the BBC will spend £8m a year funding a network of 150 reporters to cover councils and public services. They will work in the commercial sector and make their content available to both their employers and the BBC.

Local newspapers will be able to bid for the reporters.

The review says: “The government expects the BBC to use its privileged position to support the provision of news and information and specifically we expect to see a positive partnership with the local news sector. ”

There will also be a news bank to provide free syndication of audio and video content to local newspapers and a new BBC Data Journalism Hub, partnering with a university, that will “make data journalism available for news organisations across the UK”.

Pay for Chris Evans to be revealed (but for few other top stars)

Currently 50 per cent of BBC TV and radio programmes must be made in-house. In future, the white paper proposes that all commissioned programmes will be put out to open competition (except for news and news-related current affairs).

The BBC has resisted calls for it to name all staff paid over £150,000. Instead it will identify all employees earning over £450,000 a year (around ten people).

Top Gear presenter Chris Evans (who is believed to be one of them) told the BBC this morning: “It isn’t exactly breaking news that people who do what I do for a living, compared to people in the real world, get paid too much money.

“We’ve got jobs that people would kill for, we get to do things that people would pay to do if they could afford it, and sometimes those things aren’t available to buy. Most of us work part-time anyway. Just pay us less; that’s what I would do. It isn’t exactly rocket science.”

The remuneration committee of the new BBC board will also approve the pay levels new staff and freelance talent above £250,000.

Local TV funding scrapped

Despite the increasing licence fee, and the growing number of households in the UK paying it, BBC funding will stay flat partly because it has to take on the cost of free TV licences for the over-75s (£745m per year).

The white paper states that this funding pressure on the BBC is “less than some in the industry are facing and less than those faced by many in the public sector”.

BBC funding for Local TV, which was the pet project of Jeremy Hunt as Culture Secretary under the last Coalition government, will be scrapped.

There are currently 20 local broadcasting mainly on Freeview Channel 8 in cities around the the UK. They benefit from £25m of licence fee money which was used to set up the transmission network and £5m a year over three years to buy their content for the BBC.

This meant each station might sell content worth £300,000 a year to the BBC under the arrangement.

Some 11 more stations are due to be launched this year and three more in 2017. There will be no additional funding for the fledgling network beyond the original £40m.

Tony Hall: White paper reaffirms our mission

Tony Hall, director general of the BBC, said: “This white paper delivers a mandate for the strong, creative BBC the public believe in. A BBC that will be good for the creative industries – and most importantly of all, for Britain.

“There has been a big debate about the future of the BBC. Searching questions have been asked about its role and its place in the UK. That’s right and healthy, and I welcome that debate.

“At the end, we have an 11-year Charter, a licence fee guaranteed for 11 years, and an endorsement of the scale and scope of what the BBC does today. The white paper reaffirms our mission to inform, educate and entertain all audiences on television, on radio and online.”

White paper available here in full – A BBC for the future: A broadcaster of distinction

Radio 4’s Today breakfast news show lost 300,000 listeners in the first quarter of 2016 following the departure of long-serving presenter Jim Naughtie at the end of last year.

According to figures released by Rajar, it had an average reach of 6.8m listeners per week in the first three months of this year compared with 7.1m in the first quarter of 2015.

Naughtie was replaced by Nick Robinson who works alongside regular Today presenters John Humphrys, Justin Webb, Sarah Montague and Mishal Husain.

BBC Radio 2 is the most listened to radio station in the UK with weekly reach of 15.5 m (up 2.8 per cent year on year.)

Radio 4 dipped 2.9 per cent year on year to 10.6m listeners per week.

Radio 5 Live (including Sports Extra) grew 0.6 per cent to 6.1m on average across the quarter.

The BBC World Service grew its reach inside the UK by 8.4 per cent to 1.5m listeners per week.

Overall the BBC’s local/regional radio network was slightly down by 0.3 per cent year on year to 8.8m listeners per week.

In the commercial sector, LBC (now available nationally on digital radio) grew 13.5 per cent to 1.5m listeners per week. Talksport fell 4.9 per cent year on year to 3.1m.

In London, LBC 97.3 grew 13 per cent year on year to 1m listeners per week, comfortably ahead of BBC Radio London, which fell 32.6 per cent year on year to 354,000 per week.

Full UK radio station listening figures for Jan-March 2016 (source: Rajar)

A journalism podcast investigating one of the UK’s most notorious unsolved murders has gone to number one this week in the iTunes downloads charts.

Untold tells the story of Alastair Morgan’s 29-year campaign to find out why his brother was murdered and to expose the police corruption which saw five investigations fail to bring those responsible to justice.

Presented by Peter Jukes, the podcast was originally broadcast in six parts with the help of £10,000 in crowdfunding. Now, with the help of sponsorship from website developers Squarespace, it has beeen revampeed and expanded to ten parts availanble on the podcasting distribution platform Acast.

Jukes said that the podcast has already generated tens of thousands of downloads and that his investigation has brought new material to light about the circumstances surrounding Daniel Morgan’s murder.

He said: “It is like LA Confidential: its about the media, and corruption and corrupt police.

“It’s about the nexus of police, private investigators and confidential inquiries that took of in the 1980s.

“They were bribing cops, getting personal information, bribing and blagging and the News of the World was very closely involved. Phone-hacking was the benign side of it.”

Daniel Morgan was murdered with an axe outside the Golden Lion pub in Sydenham in 1987 after telling friends he was going to share evidence of major police corruption with the media.

He was a partner in the private investigations agency Southern Investigations which would later be found to have widespread illegal dealings with the News of the World.

Former detective sergeant Sid Fillery was involved in the first failed investigation into Daniel Morgan’s murder before retiring from the police and replacing him as the business partner of Jonathan Rees in Southern Investigations.

The pair stood trial in connection with the killing but proceedings collapsed in 2008.

Morgan told the House of Commons earlier this year: “When the private investigator took over my brother’s company with the prime suspect you’d think the British press would be scratching their heads and saying: ‘Hey, what’s going on here?’ But not a bit of it.

“They saw it as a business opportunity and within weeks of my brother’s murder the News of the World was in business with them. There were commercial transactions that went on and which continued well over a decade. And not just the News of the World. There was also Mirror group newspapers and those are the ones that we know of.

“I knew there was corruption in the investigation within three weeks of my brother’s murder, I had seen it.

Karl Rosander, president of Acast Stories, likened Untold to US-based podcast Serial.

He said: “Serial captured the attention of people around the world, creating a new generation of true-crime enthusiasts. The show’s reach was international, and the UK has not had an equivalent – until now.

“‘Untold’ goes further than Serial, however, because Daniel’s murder represents the tip of an iceberg of corruption within the British policing and media establishment. By unravelling the story through a podcast, the Untold team can circumvent these institutions and have their voices heard, when others might want them silenced.”

www.untoldmurder.com

The BBC is the most important source of information on the EU referendum, according to a poll of eligible voters, with newspapers coming in second and social media also factoring.

More than a third (34 per cent) of the 1,638 UK adults, polled by BMG Research on behalf of the Electoral Reform Society, put the BBC as one of their three most valued sources on the Brexit debate.

British newspapers as a whole, including regional and national publications, came in behind with 20 per cent of those questioned saying they were an important source on the referendum.

Participants were asked: “Which of the following have been most important in informing your decision about the EU referendum so far?” and were told to choose three out of 13 options. Four of these related directly to the media.

The findings, published the day before Britain goes to the polls to decide whether to leave or remain within the European Union, show a divide among younger and older Brits in terms of which sources were most valued.

For 18 to 24-year-olds social media and friends are more of an influence than broadcasters or publishers, the figures show.

Overall, 16 per cent of those polled valued social media as an important source of information on the referendum. Of these, one third (33 per cent) are aged 18-24 while 8 per cent are over 65.

Almost one quarter (24 per cent) of 18 to 24-year-olds valued the BBC’s coverage compared to 41 per cent of over 65s. Similarly, almost double the proportion of over 65s (29 per cent) said British newspapers were their most important source of information compared with 18 to 24-year-olds (16 per cent).

A total of 17 per cent said other British television and radio Broadcasters, excluding the BBC, were important sources on the referendum.

Katie Ghose, chief executive of the Electoral Reform Society, said: “While it’s great that people are getting their information about the EU from a variety of sources, in these last couple of days it’s crucial that voters get the facts and opinions from both sides to help them reach an informed decision.

She added: “The big demographic divides in how people are getting their information shows that we need to do all we can to create a level playing field in this last couple of days, in order to ensure we’ve had a genuinely balanced debate with equal access to the views and facts.”

The Electoral Reform Society has launched Better Referendum, a free online community tool to give people a platform to talk about the issues surrounding the referendum.

Picture: Shutterstock.

A reporter for the BBC Radio 4’s Today has revealed being racially abused while reporting from Basingstoke.

Sima Kotecha was interviewing people to discuss reports that the Leave campaign’s focus on immigration had led to an increase in hate crime.

She said on Twitter: “In utter shock: just been called p**i in my home town! Haven’t heard that word here since the 80s..!”

She later added: “Wow really touched by the outpouring of support – THANK YOU x”

And: “Your messages make me SO proud to be British.”

Fellow journalists were among those sending Kotecha messages of support.

They included:

BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg: “This is absolutely awful, hope you’re OK.”

James Chapman (formerly of the Daily Mail, now working in PR for George Osborne): “This is absolutely awful, hope you’re ok.”

And Alexi Mostrous (The Times): “That’s appalling.”

News Corp has agreed a £220m deal to buy the owner of UK national radio station Talksport.

Wireless Group also owns weekly free titles Sport Magazine and 21 local radio stations in the UK and Ireland. Wireless Group was born this year out of the sale of UTV Media’s TV stations.

News Corp is paying 70 per cent over the closing price of 185p per share of yesterday.

It is a major further move into UK broadcasting for the publisher of The Sun, Times and Sunday Times.

Talksport is the UK’s most popular commercial radio station with reach over 3m listeners a week, according to RAJAR.

News Corp also owns 40 per cent of Sky Plc.

It said in a statement: “News Corp believes that Wireless represents an excellent strategic fit with its existing operations, broadening News Corp’s range of services in the UK, Ireland and internationally.”

News UK has the rights to broadcast Premier League football highlights online and Talksport has the radio broadcasting rights.

News Corp said: “Wireless’ audience complements the audience of The Sun, and there is significant opportunity to increase engagement and monetisation through cross-promotion and leveraging Wireless’ and News Corp’s respective talent and advertising sales forces. The acquisition also raises the prospect of further international digital expansion for the Wireless brands.

“The UK and Ireland are key markets for News Corp. In the past few years News Corp has acquired Storyful in Ireland and Unruly in the UK. Those companies continue to operate as standalone businesses and they are adding value to the wider News group’s global assets. The proposed acquisition of Wireless follows this trend.

“News Corp, which is evolving rapidly into a more digital and increasingly global company with a diverse revenue mix, has a proven track record of investing in content that drives audiences and in businesses that complement its existing brands and platforms.”

News Corp chief executive Robert Thomson said: “The proposed investment is a clear sign of our commitment to, and belief in, the United Kingdom as a place to do business successfully and profitably.

“We look forward to welcoming Wireless into News Corp ‘s global family of businesses. With its strength in radio, as well as its digital and international growth potential, Wireless will help improve the engagement of our publishing brands, especially those within News UK.

“There is no doubt that Wireless is a company reborn since the sale of its television assets last year and we are excited by its prospects.

“We plan to leverage Wireless’ portfolio of radio and digital audio sports rights, including the Premier League, in the UK, Ireland and beyond, through News Corp ‘s digital platforms. We believe the businesses together can be far more than the sum of their parts.”

Talksport’s Colin Murray has today resigned from his post as a presenter at the radio station in protest at its acquisition by Sun owners News Corp.

Liverpool FC supporter Murray used the hashtag #JFT96 to make the announcement on Twitter, understood to mean “Justice for the 96” in reference to those killed in the 1989 Hillsborough disaster.

Murray made clear his resignation was “due to a change of ownership”. It comes just two weeks after News Corp struck a £220m deal to buy Talksport from previous owners Wireless Group.

Claiming he had been offered a new contract until 2019, Murray said: “While there are parts of News Corp that aren’t a problem, it is the inevitable future working relationship between Talksport and The Sun that has made my position unsustainable.

“Commercially, I delivered all-time record ratings and, creatively, I was left alone to mould a show of which I was intensely proud.”

The Sun famously carried a front page report falsely accusing Liverpool fans of acting disgracefully during the fatal crush that occurred during an FA Cup semi-final match between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest at Sheffield Wednesday’s home ground.

As a result, some fans of the club have boycotted the daily tabloid ever since. Then editor Kelvin MacKenzie later described the story as a “fundamental mistake”.

In April, an inquest into the disaster returned a verdict that the 96 victims were “unlawfully killed”. It came after 27 years of campaigning for justice from the families.

The Sun has officially apologised for its coverage of the disaster on two occasions, but it came under criticism for not putting the inquest outcome on its front page when other national titles did.

An exclusive partnership with Talksport made the Sun the official sponsor of presenter Alan Brazil’s paper review during Euro 2016.

The deal, which featured Sun journalists giving pre-match interviews and a post-match phone-in show with expert Sun insight and analysis, was struck before the recent takeover announcement.

The BBC’s flagship radio news and current affairs programme, Today, recorded record figures in the second quarter of this year with 7.3m listeners.

The figures, compiled by Rajar, compared with 6.8m listeners a week in the first quarter of the year and 6.7m in the same period last year. They are the highest figures Today has seen under the current system of industry audience measurement (which dates back to 1999) and suggest listeners may have been looking for information in the run up to the EU referendum on 23 June.

According to the BBC, Radio 4, BBC Radio 6 and BBC Asian Network all reached record audiences in the second quarter.

Overall, radio is reckoned to reach a record 48.7m UK adults a week according to Rajar.

BBC director of radio Helen Boaden said: “The overall radio industry in the UK is in incredibly rude health. I’m delighted that in today’s digital world, audiences continue to appreciate the power of radio – its ability to provide daily companionship and entertainment, to share stories and to find and curate the best music with such a deep understanding of different audiences across the UK. Radio is a vital part of the UK’s media ecology and we should all celebrate that.”

Radio 4 saw an overall 8.8 per cent increase in its weekly reach in the second quarter, to 11.5m listeners.

Radio 5 Live (including Sports Extra) rose 5.9 per cent to 6.2m.

UK listeners of the BBC World Service fell 6.1 per cent to 1.5m a week.

BBC Asian Network reached 676,000 listeners, up from 607,000 in the same period a year earlier.

Overall BBC local and regional radio station listening numbers fell 5.1 per cent to 8.4m a week.

Talkradio, the new speech station launched by UTV in March, recorded a reach of 224,000 a week. Sister station Talksport grew 6.5 per cent year on year to 3.3m. Both stations have been bought by News Corp in a deal which was announced in June.

LBC, the London-based station now available across the UK, grew 12.3 per cent to 1.7m.

PICTURE: Today presenter John Humphrys.

Complete breakdown of UK radio stations listeners for April to June 2016

Source: Rajar, figures are for weekly reach

Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp has completed a £220m deal to buy Wireless Group, with Talksport and Virgin Radio now under the media magnate’s ownership.

It is a major further move into UK broadcasting for the group, which publishes The Sun, Times and Sunday Times under subsidiary News UK and has a 40 per cent stake in broadcaster Sky.

Talksport is the UK’s most popular commercial radio station reaching over 3m listeners a week, according to RAJAR.

Robert Thomson, chief executive of News Corp, said: “This acquisition eloquently illustrates our belief in the United Kingdom as a place to invest and do business.

“The strength of Wireless, with its digital and international capabilities, especially in sports coverage, will help our publishing brands engage with readers and advertisers.

“We are proud to welcome this valuable company with much potential into News Corp’s family of businesses.”

Rebekah Brooks, chief executive of News UK, added: “It will allow us to bolster our products by sharing the best journalistic content and broadcasting talent in the industry.

“Additionally we can offer cross-platform opportunities to advertisers and partners which we know that they want.

“We are excited to press ahead with new ideas that build on the strengths of both businesses”.

In July Talksport presenter Colin Murray announced he would be resigning from his post in protest at the takeover.

As a Liverpool FC supporter he said the “inevitable future working relationship” between Talksport and The Sun made his position “unsustainable”.

The Sun famously carried a front page report falsely accusing Liverpool fans of acting disgracefully during the Hillsborough disaster in 1989, for which it has since apologised.

Wireless Group, which was created this year out of the sale of the UTV Media’s TV stations, also owns weekly free titles Sport Magazine and 21 local radio stations in the UK and Ireland.

In 2009 The Sun launched internet radio show SunTalk. Billed as the “home of free speech”, it went out five days a week from 10am to 1pm presented by former Talksport host Jon Gaunt.

The show was cancelled a year-and-a-half after it started amid reports that it had been planning to transfer to digital radio.

Though said to have been unrelated, two days before the show’s closure frontman Gaunt lost a legal battle with Ofcom after calling a London councillor a “Nazi” in 2008, over which he had been fired from Talksport.

Outgoing BBC director of radio Helen Boaden has said she values “slow news” and questioned whether the media does enough to “explain and explore” in today’s fast-paced environment.

Boaden announced on Friday that she will be retiring from the corporation after 34 years of service in March and leaving her current role as director of radio at the end of this month.

She will be replaced by James Purnell as director for radio and education.

In a speech prepared for the Prix Italia festival, published in the Independent, Boaden said: “I am both curious about and thrilled by digital technology. But I am old enough and wise enough to know that nothing comes without a cost.

“To be frank, I worry about the direction in which we’re going. By ‘we’, by the way, I mean my profession, our profession – the media generally – not the BBC in particular.

“It seems to me that the media can sometimes rush very fast in order to stand still. Some of this is inherent in a particular medium.”

She added: “I feel very fortunate that I have spent most of that career enjoying the benefits of digital technology professionally and as a consumer. I could not live without it.

“But today in a world of fast, I am unapologetically speaking up for the virtues of slow.

“Slow Journalism which is engaging and dynamic of course but embodies impartiality, accuracy, expertise and evidence; the things which take time and resource.”

Boaden moved to her current role in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal, having been the BBC’s director of news at the time Newsnight spiked allegations of child abuse against the presenter.

She offered to resign when ITV later exposed Savile as a paedophile, saying at the time is was “not because I suppressed journalism, but as head of news I felt we had made a bad mistake, we missed a story [and] it was on my watch”.

BBC Director-General Tony Hall said Boaden had been a “champion for our audiences” and an “unerring instinct for what is right for them”.

“Helen speaks for public service broadcasting so eloquently and persuasively,” he added. “We owe her an enormous debt of gratitude. The BBC had been Helen’s life’s work and we shall miss her.”

In a statement, Boaden said: “The last few years running BBC Radio, with all its creativity, innovation and sheer fun, have been especially productive and happy.

“I am very proud that my final job at the BBC has been director of the radio division.

“I may be leaving but I shall always root for the BBC and its amazing teams who provide the very best education, information and entertainment, as well as useful and inventive technology.”

Boaden will be responsible for myBBC, the BBC’s major digital project, after stepping down from her current role in October.

She will also lead the BBC’s contribution to Hull City of Culture and in Spring is set to take up a Harvard Fellowship.

The BBC has said it will also be recruiting a new director of radio, within Purnell’s team, to give creative leadership and focus.

The former editor of investigative journalism agency Exaro News has launched a weekly podcast reporting on child sex abuse issues.

Mark Watts has joined Talk2Me Radio for the CSA Exposed podcast, which aired its first episode this week and has already called on listeners to help crowdfund its continuation.

Watts was dismissed as Exaro’s editor-in-chief in June, shortly before the agency dramatically folded within a day after owners New Sparta took the decision to close it down.

While at Exaro, Watts led an investigation into controversial claims of a VIP paedophile ring at the heart of Westminster that lead to the creation of Operation Midland by the Met police.

The operation closed in March with no charges brought and has been widely condemn by the media.

According to Watts, his podcast will report on developments from the Independent Inquiry into Child Sex Abuse, police operations and alleged cover-ups.

“We will also break new disclosures to shed more light on a subject that many would like to ignore,” he said.

“There is growing evidence that very prominent people carried out child sexual abuse, some with impunity.”

He added: “Talk2Me Radio has decided to launch this programme because the media cannot, in general, be trusted to act as watchdog on a story that they missed for decades.”

Bloomberg Radio has launched across Greater London.

The new channel, broadcast on DAB digital radio, will include morning show Bloomberg Daybreak Europe (6-10am), Bloomberg Markets: European Close (4-5pm) and a simulcast of Bloomberg Television London throughout the day.

Al Mayers, global head of Bloomberg television and radio, said: “This is an exciting step in the expansion of Bloomberg Radio around the world as we continue to grow our premium audience of business and financial decision-makers.

“Each morning, a broader audience of waking listeners in the UK will now be able to start their day with live breaking news, insights and in-depth analysis of the most pressing business and financial issues from Bloomberg.”

Bloomberg employs 2,600 journalists and analysts worldwide. Programming will be put together by staff from across the London, North American and Hong Kong offices.