Scottish Newspaper Society hopeful over more 2012 Olympics accreditation for Scots newspapers
The Scottish Newspaper Society has said that the British Olympics Association (BOA) could review the ‘inadequate’ number of media accreditation places handed to Scottish newspapers to cover the London 2012 Olympic Games.
Jim Raeburn, director of the Scottish Newspaper Society, who confirmed that the whole of the Scottish newspaper industry had been handed just four places at next year’s games in London, said that he had been told that there was a possibility of a ‘second tranche’ of accreditation places becoming available and that he hoped this would mean an increase for Scottish newspapers if so.
“I have been making representation to the British Olympics Association regarding what we believe to be a serious short supply of accreditation for the Olympic Games. Some papers have got a position, but we see it as being pretty poor. What the BOA are saying to us is that the Olympics receive thousands of applications from media bodies across the world and they are given a share for the UK. Scotland compares well in their view with the rest of the UK, but we feel that it is inadequate,” explained Raeburn.
“Discussions are on-going. BOA are hoping that they might get a second tranche of placements to allocate, although I don’t think they are anticipating that they will be a big number. It’s at that point that we would hope that our argument will be reviewed.”
He continued: “As far as the Scottish newspaper industry is concerned, you’ve got to look at the make-up of the market and it’s significantly different from other parts of the UK in that we have certain UK titles who have strong sales within Scotland but they are well represented at the Olympics through their London offices. If you look beyond papers such as The Scottish Sun and the Scottish Daily Mail then, for example, the other so-called UK broadsheets, their sales in Scotland aren’t huge. The predominant titles are papers such as The Press and Journal, the Courier, the Scotsman, the Daily Record, The Herald and their related Sunday titles. And some of those, The Sunday Mail, The Sunday Post, have got pretty big figures. I don’t think they have properly taken those into account in the number of places that they have allocated.”
Raeburn also highlighted the case of newspaper publisher DC Thomson, which has titles predominantly based within Scotland, but has been denied any media accreditation despite its application.
“I have made clear in the strongest possible terms that I believe the DC Thomson group have a very strong position and that that position will be rectified,” commented Raeburn.
BOA has explained to The Drum that it had just over 400 media accreditation spaces available and that the decision over accreditations was taken by an independent media panel, which considered experience of reporting on the Olympics, as well as circulation numbers when deciding the number of places given to each newspaper title.
As a result, one place was handed to The Herald, The Scotsman, The Daily Record and a freelance photographer for the whole of the Scottish newspaper industry.