S4C

Produced by Red Rooster Films for S4C, the film is set in South Wales in the aftermath of the miners’ strike in the mid-80s. Adapted by Urien Wiliam from Ruth Carter’s original script, Coming Up Roses, it was the first Welsh language film to receive a UK theatrical release when it was screened (with English subtitles) in 1987.

Did Mr Bates vs the Post Office have you glued to your TV screen?” asked ITV on social media. The question – presumably rhetorical given the New Year drama’s colossal ratings – was plugging an archive clip of what seems to be the first TV news coverage, in English, of the UK’s biggest miscarriage of justice. “In English” is important.

Welsh language channel S4C turned 40 in November but, as a new film commissioned to celebrate its birthday reminds us, it almost didn’t draw its first breath.

Y Sŵn (The Noise) tells the story of how the Conservative Government reneged on its 1979 manifesto pledge to introduce a Welsh-only channel and then – no spoiler alert needed – caved in.

When Wales play their opening World Cup game in Qatar later this month, few supporters will be cheering on the national team as fervently as Siân Doyle, the Chief Executive of S4C. She needs no reminding of the campaign’s significance to the Welsh-language channel, which, in a happy coincidence, celebrated its 40th anniversary on 1 November.

During an RTS Cymru Wales tour last month, Bevan and Roger Crothers, head of technology at BBC Cymru Wales, said the £120m Central Square building was conceived as a fully integrated IP operation, which will be the largest digital broadcast centre of its kind in Europe when complete.

The Chair of Welsh–language broadcaster S4C, who has been in post for six months, was talking to BBC Cymru Wales’ media and arts correspondent Huw Thomas.

“The sector is full of creative people… with bold ideas. I want to see S4C being a home for those ideas,” said Williams. “We want to work with large stable companies who can provide that certainty to us with regards to programming, but we also want to work with smaller companies and even people who haven’t produced for anybody in the past.”

This month, Owen Evans celebrates three years as Chief Executive of S4C.

It’s been “a very busy time”, says Evans, pointing to a move to a new Carmarthen HQ, a deal with the BBC to broadcast from the corporation’s new Central Square base in Cardiff and improved digital services.

It was the measure of her professionalism and wit that she could offer advice while gently chiding her fellow continuity announcers.

Mari Griffith, though, was much more than a radio announcer. She was, in turn, a singer, presenter, independent producer and, in her later years, a successful novelist. Mari, who has died at the age of 79, was also a long-standing RTS Wales Centre Committee member.