1. Aliyah Ryan
Assignment: 3a
There are different types of employment contracts that are used within the TV and
film industry. An example f this is a fixed term contract, which we have looked at in a
previous assignment. A fixed term contact is where companies give their workers a
start and finish time for how long they would be working at their business. If the
employers feel you were assets to the business they may offer you a full time
contract after your fixed term contract has finished. People within the TV and film
industries that may use a fixed term contract are free lancers, part time workers and
full time works, each of these roles have different types of contracts.
A free lancer is someone who is self employed and gets work from clients they have
previously worked for marketing them and creating awareness for themselves. Free
lancers get to choose who they would want to work on a project with and would
get paid by the hour depending on who they work for and however long they are
working on the project for.
Full time contracts is where someone works up to 35 hours a week, full time workers
can also work overtime, this is where workers work extra hours can cannot be paid
for theses extra hours depending on their employer. Like full time part time contracts
are the same as full time contract but have different hours of the week they can
work.
http://toma9696.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/types-of-contracts.html
Confidentiality and exclusivity play a role when I come to contracts. Confidentiality is
a situation in which information must be kept secret and private (taken form the
English Dictionary). Confidentiality relates to employment contract as some of the
information f the workers may have confidential information that cannot be
exposed. And example of a confidentiality contract case is with the BBC and their
TV programme “Top Gear”. The main star “the Stig” was an anonymous person who
always wore a helmet when driving and doing stunt, his identity was not known to
their work. When the character “the Stig” now known as Collins wrote in his
autobiography that he was ready to tell the world he was “The Stig” character. The
BBC then got an injunction to prevent Harper Collins from publishing the book, as it
would be breaching the confidentiality agreement that Ben Collins had signed.
Exclusivity is where someone has agreed to provide exclusive services or products to
your business; this plays a major role when it comes to contracts. For however long
the contract states that the worker has to work for the business/employer they would
have to work there and would not be able to get another job until the contract
ends. For example if a presenter works for the BBC and has a contract for a year, the
employee can chose to quit their job but will be unable to work for another
company such as ITV until their contract with the BBC has ran out.

2. Aliyah Ryan
Channel 4’s company have codes of practices like many other businesses, channel
4 codes of practice focuses on codes of practices for commissioning programs for
independent producers. One section of the codes of practice that interested me
was the development funding procedure, this is where channel funds the producer
with their project depending if the producer needs funding or has no money to fund
their self’s. I think that channel 4’s codes of practices are reasonable and benefit the
producers as well as themselves. This code of practice does hinder the producers to
a certain extent as I feel because channel 4 has a 9 month exclusive option to
commission the program once development is complete; the producers will be
waiting around no certain if their program will be produced and will have to wait 9
months for this decision to be made.
Before a program is aired on channel 4 the independent producers go through
many procedures. Below is a screen shot taken from the Channel 4 website that
sows their policies and procedures for their service. Channel 4 certain problems they
can face when their shows air aired and make sure that they the program benefits
people who are visually impaired, making sure that the audience can read subtitles
and that they match what the audience is watching, for example if the audience is
watching an American film they should use American works such as “mom” so the
audience does not feel left out and get the full impact of the show they are
watching.
Channel 4 deal with many social concerns, one that they have dealt with it teenage
pregnancy, I have chosen to look at this social concern as it happening all over the
world and channel 4 is helping create awareness. Channel 4 have a page on their
website that gives information to parents and teenagers about teenage pregnancy
and give then names of organisations that can give them help. This article allows
parents and teenagers to see that being a teenage parent can be hard and
sometimes people cannot cope with it resorting them to live on benefits as they find
it hard to get a job without any qualification as they have dropped out of school. It
also highlights that some teenagers are able to cope with their pregnancy and
looking after their children and often stay with their Childs partner. It also highlights
that “relationships often break down under the strain of parenthood or even before
the baby is born, which then again resort to the young mothers living off of benefits,

3. Aliyah Ryan
finding it hard to continue their education or training, or to get a good job in the
future. It's also difficult for them to have much of a social life, and even harder to
make new and lasting partnerships.”
http://www.channel4learning.com/support/programmenotes/micro/parentsandtee
ns/bg-pregnancy.html
Channel 4 also address other situations such as benefits, they have a new TV show
called Benefit streets that documents people live who live in Birmingham who are all
on benefits and the struggles they go through. Benefit street “This documentary
series reveals the reality of the life on benefits, as the residents of one of Britain’s most
benefit-dependent streets invite cameras into their tight-knit community”. I think the
way in which Channel 4 have addressed this situation and group of people is really
good as you get to see what the people on benefits go through and how hard it
can be at times. From watching it I I also feel like the people who are creating the
documentary could have helped the people who were on benefits when it came to
certain situation that had happened. For example a group of Romanians were in
danger after calling the police on their boss for working up to 16 hours a day without
pay, when the boss was outside the house with his “men” they people form channel
4 were still filming and were not helping the situation; when they could clearly see
that the Romanians were frightened for their lives. There have also been criticisms of
the show and channel 4 that have been in the newspapers, one newspaper The
Daily Mail have criticized channel 4 for child exploitation. The article states “Channel
4 accused of broadcasting 'utterly reprehensible' clashes between parents and their
children” the article then says “Channel 4 was accused of exploiting children as
young as seven by showing children on Benefits Street swearing and misbehaving.
Critics said it was 'utterly reprehensible'”