TV Foundation Unveils New Subdivision Inspired by James Graham's MacTaggart Lecture: The Impact Unit

The TV Foundation, the charitable arm of the Edinburgh TV Festival, today announced a ground-breaking industry initiative that has been inspired by recent MacTaggart Lectures – the prestigious flagship and agenda setting lecture at the annual Festival – and revealed in this year’s provocative keynote from playwright and dramatist, James Graham.

In a clear call-to-action, Graham’s lecture outlined how the TV industry needs to coordinate and strengthen its approach to class and social mobility. Following over 18 months of preparatory work at the TV Foundation in this area, today saw the launch of its new Impact Unit to create a permanent function which will help shape the way the TV industry works to make it open to all; a place where new perspectives, ideas and stories thrive. 

TV can and does have a real-world impact; for many this is in the form of a career through the hundreds of different disciplines and roles employed throughout the industry, but also for millions of viewers, through the stories we tell. The Impact Unit will build on the TV Foundation’s existing career development programmes, working with exceptional talent who, for a variety of reasons, find barriers to progression. Initially, working in the area of representation of class and social mobility, the Unit will:

• Create a pan-sector working group in September that will be open for applications
• Contribute to developing measurements and monitoring, which speak to the specifics of the sector
• Highlight the organisations in TV who are Class Confident, and establishing a set of expectations that employees can consider in career planning
• Recognise the TV Festival’s own role in dismantling barriers to networking and connections
• Introduce a Social Mobility Bursary for the TV Festival to start in 2025
• Report on progress at the next TV Festival in 2025

The Unit will also develop its new stream of work to look at TV content with purpose; initially focusing on the climate crisis working with industry leaders to find new ways to put more and better climate storytelling on our screens.

The Impact Unit will be led by Gemma Bradshaw in an expansion of her remit since joining the TV Foundation last year from One World Media.

Campbell Glennie, CEO for the TV Foundation and the Edinburgh TV Festival said:

“The MacTaggart Lecture is unique in its power to effect change and influence conversations taking place in television. James Graham’s brilliant speech today joins the ranks of those most resonant of speakers who have been willing to reach inside themselves to make a difference.

“The launch of the Impact Unit is the culmination of months of work evaluating what the TV Foundation can be doing to address pressing issues head-on. We want to provide a collaborative umbrella to take forward all the intersectional issues around class and social mobility that we are exploring this week at the Festival and convene a passionate group of people to effect real change. Edinburgh is a brilliant marker for progress and we’re looking forward to supporting those who are also hungry for a fairer industry.”

Expressions of interest to join the Impact Unit’s industry group can be sent to tvfoundation@thetvfestival.com