Big Centre Television

Box Set: Community Noticeboard

During August I was informed by the new manager of Made in Birmingham that I was no longer required to work on the Birmingham News Weekend Magazine. Things change all the time, so you simply take it in your stride. I had effectively been producing the programme single-handedly for the best part of 2 years by this point. I stayed within the News department though, continuing to present the main bulletins in rotation with Mike Prince, plus I was now to produce many of the news packages too. I also produced an increasing number of promotional trailers for the station which can be seen elsewhere on this site.

The Weekend Magazine continued… but unfortunately not much thought had been given to who was actually going to compile, produce and present it! Working fully in the day-to-day newsroom my time was now completely taken up and by the time it was realised just how much work went into the magazine – all of which I had been doing for the best part of two years – there wasn’t much time left before transmission. As I was by then fully underway with my daily News bulletin responsibilities the programme had to be simplified and whoever had spare capacity was asked to put it together. I would have dearly loved to have gone back to continue making it, but it was clear that the priority was the daily news and so I continued with that.

Behind the scenes, far-reaching changes were just about to hit the whole of the company. Between November-December 2017 virtually all of the staff across all of the Made Television regional offices were made redundant as the company needed to drastically reduce itself in size in order to continue operating. Our new manager was the first out of the door. Most operational activities migrated to the head office in Leeds (including all transmission – which was then sent back to the transmitters via Birmingham!) and by the end of the year everyone who had been there since the beginning of the original Big Centre TV had left the company.

After this the station went through further changes, becoming “Birmingham TV”, and then “Local TV: West Midlands” which continues with a skeleton staff in the Birmingham office, and its lovely to see a couple of my friends still on air!

Obviously the changes which brought about our leaving were very painful at the time, but I’m still incredibly grateful for the opportunities that Big Centre and then Made in Birmingham gave me. I made sure I got involved in as much as I could – its simply something I’ve always done.

Back to the Weekend Magazine, and for the final weeks of its existence, I continued to produce the weekly news review, as well as my Community Noticeboard. And that’s what you can watch on this page.

A quick note about how the listings below work. Videos all play in the main big screen, and you choose from the thumbnail listing underneath! Oldest first, newest last. Each title is the original transmission date backwards, followed by the programme name. So “170909 Community Final” is the segment for 9th September 2017.


This article, along with various others in my website are part of the wider story of Big Centre Television as seen from the perspective of the programmes I was making at the time. Most of the articles contain a video gallery of the original shows that I made.

I was with Big Centre Television from the very first day of production in January 2015 until the last of the original team were made redundant in November 2017 when the bulk of production and operations were being moved up to Leeds, the HQ of Made TV with whom Big Centre had merged in October 2016. Big Centre had a wonderful team all the way through, I miss them all and I remain really proud of what we ultimately achieved.

Contents (click an entry to go to that page)

  1. The Beginning
  2. Spring 2015 - An (Early) Day In The Life
  3. July/August 2015: Postbag
  4. Summer 2015 - Reading The Television News
  5. Summer 2015: Crossroads Check-In
  6. Summer 2015: Tiswas Pies Again! (new 8th July 2022)
  7. August 2015: The Story of Children's Television
  8. Bloopers and Behind the Scenes
  9. Autumn 2015: The Big Centre Magazine
  10. Winter 2015: The Midland – Weekend Edition
  11. Continuity - The Bits Between TV Programmes
  12. Spring/Summer 2016: The Big Magazine
  13. Autumn 2016 - Spring 2017: Weekend Magazine (Walsall)
  14. Promotional Trailers
  15. Summer 2017: Weekend Magazine (Birmingham)
  16. Autumn 2017: Community Noticeboard... and The End...

As time goes on, I'll be filling in some of the gaps as well as adding more to these existing parts of the story too. If there's anything missing, or you'd like me to talk about something in particular, send me a message on social media (see the very top or very bottom of this page) or contact me through the website.