New Statesman Scotland
Border Television is an oddity created by the regulators 30 years ago. The ITV franchise reaches only 0.5 per cent of the UK population, but it is "in play", with several bidders assessing its value.
Border straddles a contrived area that includes the south of Scotland, the Lake District, the Isle of Man and Berwick-upon-Tweed in the east. It tries hard to reflect its diverse homeland, but it can satisfy no one. All the towns of the Tweed Valley, such as Peebles, feel an affinity with Edinburgh in the Scottish Television area. Cumbrian homes feel more natural neighbours to Granada.
Previous attempts to take over the station were discreetly blocked by two local grandees. Viscount "Willie" Whitelaw, the then MP for Penrith and the Border and home secretary, deterred any bids; and Sir David, now Lord Steel, the then Liberal leader and also a director of the company, persuaded others to keep off its patch.
For all its efforts, the Carlisle-based Border Television has never been able to nourish any regional loyalties because it straddles three "nations". The Isle of Man persists in the ambition of its own station. Originally, this was a dream of creating a TV equivalent of Radio Luxembourg, but now that there is a fountain of new channels on cable and satellite TV, its ambitions are more modest.
Border's natural destiny is to be gobbled up between its neighbouring ITV channels - Tyne Tees, Granada and STV. Scottish Radio Holdings says that it is preparing a bid for the smallest ITV contractor, but it cannot go unchallenged. Paul Corley, the chief executive of Border, is saying nothing until he has the terms of any bids, but the odds must be closing on this broadcasting oddity surviving as a separate entity. It cannot get the Scotland Office excited by any need to defend its status. Border is petty cash in broadcasting money terms, but it is still a tasty corporate morsel.
The last "customer" to use The Maiden was the Earl of Morton. In 1581, he was beheaded by the Edinburgh city guillotine for his part in the conspiracy to kill Lord Darnley, the Queen's husband. The macabre death machine is still on display in the Royal Museum of Scotland, where it both frightens and intrigues the parties of school pupils that are herded around the remnants of Scotland's past.
Now a distiller, which presumably wants to be thought of as being "at the cutting edge" of its industry, is offering to build a full-scale replica of The Maiden and return it to Edinburgh's Grassmarket, where it used to perform its function to the thrill of bloodthirsty crowds.
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