The BBC has stated that it is committed to religious broadcasting as new data shows an overall decline in airtime devoted to religion in the UK.
Ofcom’s annual Communications Market Report noted 171 hours of religious content shown by public service broadcasters in 2025, a marginal increase of just three hours on the previous year, and an increase of 31 hours from 2022. However, it sits well below the 254 hours of religion and ethics content shown in 2013, and the 219 shown in 2018.
Last year, ITV and Channel 4 aired one hour of religious programming each, while Channel 5 has featured no religious programming in the last ten years. The BBC’s hours have remained fairly constant for the last 20 years, with a high of 210 hours in 2018 and low of 139 in 2022.
Reflecting faith and belief
BBC’s Head of Religion and Ethics, TV, Daisy Scalchi, claimed: “The BBC’s commitment to religion and ethics content is demonstrably strong.”
She added: “The BBC provides almost 99 per cent of the UK’s broadcast religion programming across a wide variety of content, featuring documentaries, factual entertainment, worship, events and live debate, as well as titles in Children’s, Nations, BBC Bitesize and Education and a dedicated Religion Editor in News.”
Scalchi also stated that religious representation is not limited “solely to religion-specific programmes”, stating there are “religious characters and storylines across entertainment and drama”.
Religious literacy
Head of Communications at The Christian Institute Angus Saul said: “While less than three hours a week does not seem like much, for the seventh year in a row, it has been the only public service broadcaster producing more than an hour’s worth of religious-specific content in a full year.
“However, questions can legitimately be raised about the content of such broadcasting with many Christians feeling they are poorly represented on-screen. Evangelicals are often as presented as bigoted fundamentalists, while extremely liberal LGBT-affirming characters are presented as ‘true Christians’.
“It is clear that, regardless of how many hours of content are shown, religious literacy is falling in the UK. This needs to change, and a good start would be to include more Evangelicals in the decision making process.”
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