The BBC has shrugged off complaints over this year’s Eurovision Song Contest.
Eurovision took place last weekend, and proved hugely popular with viewers, pulling in the most UK viewing figures in seven years, while Måneskin had the highest peak in the UK charts for one of the contest’s winners since Conchita Wurst in 2014.
However, the show’s evident popularity hasn’t stopped some people from lodging complaints about the annual event with the BBC.
A post on the corporation’s Executive Complaints Unit (ECU) page revealed they’d received a string of complaints “from viewers who feel that the Eurovision Song Contest is political”, while others suggested it was a “waste of the licence fee”.
By way of response, the BBC said: “Ever since the Eurovision Song Contest first burst onto our television screens in 1956, the competition has continued to be staple springtime viewing for BBC audiences.
“The accusation that the contest’s voting is ‘political’ is nothing new. The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) is strongly committed to secure the fairness of the Eurovision Song Contest and has implemented a wide range of measures to ensure this.”
They added: “Eurovision is the most watched, live non-sporting event in the world and the 2021 Contest provided BBC viewers with over eight hours of content in three shows.
“The Grand Final on BBC One attracted an average of 7.4 million viewers. It is extremely cost effective for a popular prime time entertainment programme.”
In 2021, the UK was represented by singer-songwriter James Newman at Eurovision, with his song Embers.
Unfortunately, James proved unpopular with Eurovision voters, finishing at the bottom of the leaderboard and giving us our second “nul points” result in history.
After returning home from Rotterdam, he insisted he was focussing on the positive, and has since received a wave of public support, including from Coldplay frontman Chris Martin.