Ashford Local Radio - Ofcom Licensing

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Programme Speech
“A debate would be fantastic! It gets me really involved. Should be a regular slot.”
Research shows, for our listeners, it’s more than just wall to wall music that they want.Those in the over 30 age group
want to hear a ‘Voice for Ashford.’ Quality speech output is not just for news. We propose to run during school time a
three times a week phone-in hour – probably in the afternoon – whereby local leaders can be brought to account by our
listeners.The 1-2-1 hour will start with a quick overview of the person and their area of responsibility. Listeners would
then be encouraged to e-mail or phone in their questions off-air. Filtering and balance checks will ensure the presenter
reflects the feelings of the population. Under certain circumstances and topic areas, the listener would be allowed on air.
(Call backs will be made in such instances)
Subject matter will vary between council departments, local decision makers and government to money matters, health
and lifestyle issues.Topicality could also play a part in this innovative style of local radio.
The hour will not be allowed to get ‘cluttered’ but will kept flowing with bursts of speech and music. With this and other
programming strands, Ashford will at last have its own voice.
Presentation Style
“…a good presenter should be warm, lively, witty and professional.”
ALR’s presentation will be fast paced and wary of being “bogged down”. Professional presentation with the ability to
entertain and inform is demanded by ALR’s audience.
News Service
www.ashfordlocalradio.com
News and information gathering is ALR’s top priority. ALR reports
events and generates news through its own programmes. A typical
broadcasting day would see the stories of the morning creating the
interviews and speech content for the afternoon and subsequently
content for the following morning’s news.
“…if a bit of local news came up, the morning presenter would try to
get an interview with that person during his show, whereas you wouldn’t
get that - including BBC Radio 2 you wouldn’t get that, because they
have a very set format, whereas this format tended to be a little bit
more flexible.”
Weekday local news bulletins begin at 6am and continue to 7pm with recorded local news bulletins running to 11pm.
ALR has an on-call system where at any one time a journalist is available in the event of a major event or incident. Once
again ALR’s policy of priority is applied to the news running order with a local story given highest consideration.
The traditional roles of journalism and presentation are merged at ALR with all presenters given training on interview,
legal and reporting techniques and all journalists given training in presentation. All members of staff are expected to
contribute towards sourcing and gathering news and information and are given clear job descriptions on this subject at
point of employment. ALR is a station with a small group of programming and news staff expected to deliver high levels
of local content so flexibility and raising the skill level is vital to success.
In addition ALR has a strategic news alliance with the local Adscene newspaper where both organisations will have access
to the other’s news stories.This will equate to ALR having an in depth local news sourcing operation.
ALR subscribes to the Independent Radio News service for national and international news.
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