2010: Socially strong, professionally poor. How to sum up 2010 for the freelance production sector?

When the broadcasters sneeze, the freelancers get hypothermia. Last years recessionary hiatus in commissioning, and this years jockeying for senior positions at C4, ITV and the BBC, meant that the first six months of 2010 offered lean pickings to freelancers looking for a new job, or waiting for a recommissioned old one. Our production freelancers are far down the food-chain, and have seen their incomes dwindle in real terms for twenty years. Its not enough to say that there is no money any more in television production - the cash is there but concentrated in the hands of those who own the fundamental intellectual property and distribution rights, not those who actually make the programmes. It seems this income polarisation is also happening in parallel sectors other than screen production so dont take it personally. Despite our worries, television production overall is in good health. Many within the freelance sector live on very narrow margins, and it doesnt take much to push them out. A Broadcast survey found out earlier this year that women get pushed out more than men, 5,000 women left the TV workforce in the previous 36 months compared to just 750 men. Women now make up less than one in ten of all TV workers over the age of 50. That is not good enough and equality needs to be overhauled. Another 5,000 freelancers - perhaps 10% of our workforce - have been hit from a surprise angle this year, because they put their tax returns through one accountancy firm, which HMRC has now come down on like a sack of bricks. The tax man is a jealous god, and if your accountant files unsatisfactory returns on your behalf, it is you that is held responsible. This may yet spell personal disaster for a significant number of honest, hard-working programme makers. Freelancers will put in the hours when a production demands it, but a standard six-day week has started appearing in their contracts. Why? This is an unfair and exhausting innovation, and should be resisted at every turn. This is what Bectu is for, but many freelancers dont even think of joining. Freelancers training provision shifted in 2010. The Indie Training Fund (disclosure: Im currently on its board) raises money from the indies to subsidise training for their workforce. Instead of giving it all to organisations like Skillset for disbursement to training bodies, the ITF is bringing the freelancers closer to the indies by organising its own training provision and setting up a membership scheme for freelancers to access the subsidies directly. Perhaps the brightest point of the freelancers year has been the growth of social media, providing information and common purpose. The new Series Producers Association is 80-strong, the Facebook Unit List page has over 4,900 adherents, and the long-established TV Watercooler discussion boards most popular strand about the accountancy fiasco has been read about 8,000 times. I predict that social media will turn our freelance production sector into a force to be reckoned with in 2011.