BBC One to receive £30m from closure of BBC Three

Director General Tony Hall has announced that BBC Three will be moved to the iPlayer in 2015 and that its budget will be reduced from £85m to £25m.

16:02 07 March 2014

Director General Tony Hall has confirmed that BBC One Drama will receive an additional £30million towards its budget following the closure of BBC Three as a TV channel. He added that BBC Three will be moved to the iPlayer in autumn 2015 with a reduced budget of £25m. The move, according to Mr Hall was “financially necessary.”

Explaining the decision to move the channel online, he said: "I want younger and less affluent audiences to be better served by the BBC. Younger audiences are increasingly moving online and on demand. The challenge is to take the brilliance of BBC Three into that world.”

He added: "tough decisions" needed to be made to face up to the fiscal challenges of the BBC, but said the plan was "strategically right and financially right too".

He stressed that BBC was incurring additional costs despite the fact that the license fee had not increased.

Meanwhile, the future of BBC Four remains unclear as confirmed by director of television Danny Cohen.