Hello again,

I've been reading your comments and feedback on the blog and elsewhere and wanted to respond to some of the points that people have made. I commented last week on the blog and Streetlight2 has identified some of the other things many of you are asking about so I've based my answers around them:

The presenters on 4Extra - what's the thinking behind changing them from the R7 team?

Now that Radio 4 Extra is aligned with Radio 4, the presentation teams are working together. Some of the Radio 4 presenters were keen to work on Radio 4 Extra, which is very different from reading the news on Radio 4! Of course Jim Lee, a stalwart of Radio 7/4Extra, has worked on both networks for over 8 years and Alan Smith, who was with Radio 7 in the early days, is now back with us again. Former Radio 7 presenters will have the occasional presence on 4Extra; in fact you can hear Helen Aitken in a couple of weeks interviewing a comedy troupe performing a Sherlock Holmes spoof.

All of the presenters have other work of course, both on radio and television, and fans of Alex Riley can see him popping up regularly on BBC Three.

What about the lack of drama programming?

The drama remit for Radio 7 was originally to broadcast a minimum of 50 hours per week. As Radio 4 Extra, we committed to a minimum of 55 hours of drama per week, and we actually broadcast more than that. You might be surprised to know that on Radio 4Extra, we broadcast on average of 68 hours per week, including of course the 24-hour overnight repeats.

As Head of Programmes launching Radio 7 over 8 years ago, and faced with a blank sheet of paper, I was keen to schedule longer drama on the archive station, and introduced two 90 minute plays at weekends, plus a 75-minute Woman's Hour archive omnibus on Sundays. The omnibus has been popular, and to build on that we have introduced a second 75 minute omnibus on Saturdays, made up of the previous week's Radio 4 Woman's Hour serial. With adding some new elements to the schedule, we stopped broadcasting the 90 minute drama on Sundays, but brought in the 60 minute children's/family drama slot, commissioning 8 new dramas in the process.

But of course, radio stations evolve and as with any radio station we will continue to review our output.

On Radio 4 Extra I was also keen to retain the 60 minute dramas, daily from Monday to Friday, plus the daily 45 minute dramas. These have included Fortunes of War, Howard's End and Ben Hur, three terrific and substantial dramas, plus currently for Easter, the landmark Dorothy L Sayer's production, The Man Who Would be King, in twelve 45 minute episodes. We have had good feedback on these productions, and are planning to follow-up with the Complete Smiley dramatisations, beginning in May.

The 7th Dimension and Crime and Thriller hours have remained the same, with the 1.00am repeat of the Crime and Thriller Hour being re-instated for the night owls from the week beginning 16 May.

Complaints about broadcasting The Archers, Ambridge Extra and Desert Island Discs. If some of these programs are available on Radio 4, then why put them on Radio 4 Extra?

Following the research and consultation we undertook, the BBC Trust wanted to ensure that there wouldn't be too many changes in the re-branding and in fact 85% of the Radio 4 Extra schedule has remained unchanged.

The Archers and Desert Island Discs are very popular strands, so we decided to build on these strengths to attract Radio 4 listeners (many of whom were/are unaware of the existence of Radio 7).

Regarding The Archers, we considered some archive programming, but with some missing programmes this would be difficult to sustain; we also felt that a repeat of the omnibus was not quite right, so the decision was made to commission a short, new Archers serial - Ambridge Extra. This will be running until the end of June, followed by a summer break.

I was interested to note that in the most recent podcast chart, Ambridge Extra came in at number 2 - just behind Adam and Joe.

When I started Radio 7, archive Desert Island Discs was on my shopping list, and I was keen to group the DID programmes in batches featuring The Comedians, The Actors, The Musicians etc. I have always thought that listeners would value the opportunity to hear archive editions of DID and the launch of 4Extra provides this as does the new DID website, updating information on the castaway, linking into the schedule when possible. For example, we began with children's authors, and when Jacqueline Wilson was last week's castaway, we broadcast one of her readings on the 4 0'Clock Show.

We will be following up with The Authors and The Comedians.

Any change to a network can be difficult to accept, and when the idea was initially mooted to change Radio 7, I admit I had my reservations.

Like some listeners, I was concerned that the station might become too serious.

However, I truly believe that there are many benefits in being so closely aligned with Radio 4. Some fresh ideas have been introduced, but at the same time I feel that we have managed to retain the entertainment essence that launched Radio 7 eight years ago - we continue to bring you great radio comedy and drama.

It would be impossible to please all of our listeners all of the time, but I hope that all of you manage to find entertaining programmes to listen to on Radio 4 Extra most of the time,

Best wishes

Mary

Mary Kalemkerian is Head of Programmes at BBC Radio 4 Extra

• The photograph is from the BBC picture library. The caption reads "Picture shows (l-r) Tim Brooke-Taylor, Graeme Garden, Jo Kendall, David Hatch and Bill Oddie, five young comedians from the world-travelled 'Footlights Revue' Cambridge Circus, who star in the new comedy revue series I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again, which begins in the BBC Light Programme on Monday 4th October, 1965."

Today we announced a series of new programmes which will be appearing on our digital radio stations. Also, we confirmed that we are changing the name of BBC Radio 7 to BBC Radio 4 Extra in April. You can find all the details in the press release.

Some people have questioned why we are altering a much-loved service: is this just unnecessary management tinkering? Firstly, let me offer a few words of reassurance. Radio 4 Extra will not be fundamentally different to Radio 7. The vast majority of the programming will remain much-loved archive productions, and we will continue to focus on comedy, drama and entertainment rather than offering news or current affairs...

Continue reading this post on the BBC Radio blog...

Tim Davie is Director of Audio & Music

• The picture shows Roy Plomley and his guest Noel Coward on the occasion of the twenty-first anniversary of Desert Island Discs in 1963. Coward had been on the list of guests drawn up by Plomley when he devised the programme in 1941.

Editor's note: this week's Feedback focused on the English language, on Royal visits to Ambridge an on the conclusion of the BBC Trust's review of Radio 4 - SB.

There are many incidental pleasures to be derived from the latest BBC Trust Review, a copy of which is now available on its website.

For example, on page 48 it publishes a useful table which shows the cost per listener hour (CPLH) for BBC network radio stations. That isn't the same of course as how much each station costs, and obviously the more listeners there are the cheaper the cost per listener hour.

Still I was intrigued to see that Radio 3 costs over ten times as much CPLH as Radio 1, and around 5 times as much as Radio 4. Surprisingly, (to me anyway), Radio 5 live costs only a little less than twice as much CPLH as Radio 4. The station which has the lowest cost per listener hour is, unsurprisingly, the most popular, Radio 2.

Mind you don't get carried away with the idea that Radio 3 is massively expensive. It still only costs 6.3 pence CPLH.

The Trust, whose proud boast is that it is dedicated to "getting the best out of the BBC for licence fee-payers", published its latest review on Tuesday 8th February, after what it said was a 12-week public consultation.

It considered the overall performance of Radios 3, 4 and 7, had some pungent things to say about what it called the failure of BBC radio's strategy for children, and also backed the management's proposals for accessing past radio programmes.

The press reaction was, shall we say, mixed. I probably don't have to tell you which newspaper published the following headlines over critical articles.

"Oh no! Don't let the dumb down-brigade ruin Radio 4. Its the last bastion of civilised, aspirational broadcasting."

And the Daily Mail also said:

"Radio 4 has 10 million loyal listeners. So what does the BBC think of them? Too many are white, southern, and elderly".

The Trust's review is far more subtle and intelligent than that and addresses real issues that matter to you. It is worth an hour of any BBC listener's time. Shortly after the review's publication I talked to the Trust member who led it, David Liddiment.

He spent most of his TV life working for Granada television in Manchester so is particularly sensitive to the views of those outside the south east. The first excerpt from our Feedback interview is about the Trust's backing of BBC management's desire to widen Radio 4's appeal:

In a second, and shorter extract, David Liddiment talks about the failure of children's radio to a attract significant numbers of children:

In next week's Feedback I'll be in Manchester to explore further the BBC's plans to move more programme departments out of London, in particular to nearby Salford. Will listeners notice the difference and do you care where your programmes come from? Do let me know what you think.

Roger Bolton is presenter of Feedback

• Listen again to this week's Feedback, produced by Karen Pirie, get in touch with Feedback, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback web page.
• Feedback is on Twitter. Follow @BBCR4Feedback.
• The review of service licences for Radio 3, Radio 4 and 5 live as well as reports relating to archives and children's output are on the BBC Trust's web site.
• Radio 4 Controller Gwyneth Williams blogged about the service licence review earlier this week and, on last week's Feedback, Roger spoke to David Liddiment from the Trust about their recommendations.

The BBC Trust's service licence review was hugely positive for Radio 4 and Radio 7. I have seen some of the listeners' responses on Radio 4 to the Trust. We are widely considered a 'national treasure' and the appreciation for what we do is humbling. The Trust's reseach received a record number of responses and revealed that eighty per-cent of the audience approved of us with a score of eight- or more out-of-ten. The reasons cited included "the passion and knowledge of the presenters; the range and depth of programming; extremely high production standards; and an intelligent and challenging tone". Add this to the new Rajar figures (one-in-five of us in the UK listen every week and Radio 4 accounts for one-in-every-eight radio listening hours) and the kind of quality delivered by Radio 4 for audiences is unarguable.

A broader picture too about radio seems to be emerging: we fit in with people's lives; we are modern, flexible and cheap. Radio 4 Extra (which is what Radio 7 will become) is another way of enjoying our drama and comedy programmes with something else thrown into the mix. There is a developing Radio 4 archive of documentaries and history programmes, science, film, arts interviews from the brilliant Front Row - all opening up other ways to find and share our programmes. Radio 4 is not confined to its successful schedule but can be enjoyed in different ways and this is a broad approach to the challenge posed by the Trust in their document this morning about expanding the Radio 4 audience in the future.

So let's think about David Liddiment's specific two 'buts' - prompted by our own excellent Sarah Montague on Today this morning (listen to the whole interview below). One, he said Radio 4 has a huge skew to the South-East of England. Those in the North don't listen as much as those in the South. And two, 35-50s aren't listening to Radio 4 as much as they were. Well, our audience has been quick to reply online; here are two examples from Twitter:

 

Fairly young still, living in the North, and listening to @r4today - no need to change this at all, dear BBC Trust! #r4todayless than a minute ago via webviews of the world

beyondmaps

 

Today program making me mad. Radio 4. Don't put regional accents on because it's pc. Put the best reporters on there. AAAAAGGGHHH mad.less than a minute ago via Echofoncerys matthews
cerysmatthews

And I'm sure that listener appreciates the excellent File on Four, our flagship investigation programme based in Manchester with its first class reporters. We want talent on Radio 4 - wherever we can get it and we will continue to look widely everywhere for the best reporters and presenters. Of course we are keen for people all over Britain to enjoy our programmes more and the Trust understands this and supports our endeavours.

Partly that is about getting the best programmes and contributors from as many places as possible but mainly it is about excellent programmes and talent, both on and off air - the best on Egypt at present for instance, from those who know and carry authority, whether it is Magdi Abdelhadi from the World Service or Jeremy Bowen, our Middle East Editor (did you hear his recent programme on the Lebanon and wine? - highly recommended). We have plans to take more of our programmes out and around the UK - the Moral Maze, for instance, and a new poetry masterclass with Ruth Padel. I think too that as we develop a more international sensibility - which is only keeping up with our audience - we will be more welcoming to new listeners wherever in the UK they happen to live.

And of course as I have already said we have other ways of listening to Radio 4 in our developing archive and easier ways of searching and sharing our programmes.I am delighted that the Trust has endorsed and encouraged our plans for extending the Radio 4 archive on our website. We know how popular the archive is. For example the In Our Time archive is one of the BBC's most valued sites. In the coming months we will be making even more of our factual programmes permanently available. We will also put together some more collections of older programmes and interviews to support our seasons and events. The collection of Film Interviews was one of the gems of the Film Season. We are building something similar for World Book Night as part of the BBC Year of Books. Here is a sneak preview of the collection of Radio 4 interviews with the featured authors. Our web team have a range of other plans in store in the next few months.

So we are responding to the challenges raised in the Trust report in our own Radio 4 way and we will carry on trying to find and make available, in the words of Matthew Arnold, more of "the best that has been thought and said in the world"- for more listeners everywhere.

Gwyneth Williams is Controller of BBC Radio 4 and Radio 7

• Read the review of service licences for BBC Radio 3, Radio 4 and Radio 7 and the new permissions on the BBC Trust web site.