Liverpool to submit ‘compelling’ bid for Channel 4 HQ

Liverpool is submitting a bid for Channel 4’s new national HQ.

Mayor Joe Anderson and City Region Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram have teamed up to formally launch the city’s bid today (April 23).

They are saying Channel 4 “would find a soulmate in Liverpool” in a move that would energise the broadcaster while simultaneously transforming Liverpool’s creative and digital sector.

According to the mayors, the city has several high quality ready-to-go locations that could serve as the station’s new home.

If successful in the bid, the Channel 4 HQ would be the latest in a string of projects to boost Liverpool’s creative and digital sector.

Plans were revealed last month for a new film campus at the former Littlewoods Building on Edge Lane – a development that could see Liverpool become the ‘Hollywood of the North’.

The city is also developing its Ten Streets district – one of the potential locations for Channel 4.

Liverpool’s Film Office was the first in Europe and today, the city is the most filmed outside London. Hundreds of films and TV shows are shot in Liverpool every year

A move for Channel 4 will be the biggest structural change in the station’s 35-year history. The plan is for the broadcaster to set up three new ‘creative hubs’, the largest of which will be the national HQ.

Further, Channel 4 News, headed up by University of Liverpool alumni Jon Snow, will open three new news bureaux and triple its news jobs by 2020.

Mayor Anderson said: “Liverpool and Channel 4 are soulmates in so many ways, our attitude, spirit and creative output make us a perfect match. We also have a long, successful history together from the day it launched and the airing of the first episode of Brookside.

“The city and the station have undergone huge changes since that historic day and the timing has never been better for Liverpool to help Channel 4 write this new chapter in reshaping the nation’s broadcasting landscape.”

He added: “We have a compelling argument to make not just in one location but several and we have the talent and know how to make it happen.”

Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram commented: “Liverpool City Region has everything Channel 4 needs – amazing locations, quick and easy access to production hubs and arguably most importantly a supply line of up and coming talent.

“Channel 4 would revolutionise the city region’s creative industry, no question, and crucially would give a new generation of working class kids the opportunity to forge a career in the TV and film industry.”

He continued: “Choosing Liverpool would send out a signal that Channel 4 has the appetite to be bold and creative in rebalancing the nation’s media landscape and together the partnership would be a winning one.”

The bid is backed by five-time Bafta nominee Phil Redmond, creator of Hollyoaks.

Phil said: “Liverpool is an international cultural powerhouse and has always been renowned for its creativity and zest for innovation. The city has been part of, not just Channel 4 since its first day, but a strand within the UK’s creative DNA.

“From the written word, through performance, sport and production, to the national museums and leading edge science and technology, Liverpool is always a first mover.”

Speaking further, he explained: “Alongside this, the legacy of Brookside lives on with Hollyoaks at Lime Pictures, and that, plus the best Screen School and Film Office in the UK, provide a creative firmament unmatched anywhere else. Outside London - Liverpool is the premier creative city.”

Prof. Nigel Weatherill, vice-chancellor of Liverpool John Moores University, said Liverpool is the “obvious partner for the broadcaster”, adding: “We have hosted a series of open debates, led by Professor Phil Redmond and with Channel 4 participation, to open up the conversation to the creative industries and the public, the response from the community has been overwhelming.

“The relocation to Liverpool would be a great opportunity for Channel 4 to return to a city that has been the incubator for some of their most loved programmes and we now have a thriving creative sector with a talent pipeline through the universities.”