JURIES RETURN IN EUROVISION REVAMP
The Press Association
Sept 15 2008
UK
Juries are to return to next year’s Eurovision Song Contest, it has
been announced, following criticism of tactical voting by former
eastern bloc countries.
The world-famous contest has been labelled a politically-motivated
farce because of the decision by some countries to vote together.
Sir Terry Wogan had threatened to quit the commentating job he has
held for 37 years because of the repeated tactical voting. Now it
has been announced that the 2009 final, due to take place in Moscow,
will feature votes from viewers as well as a jury.
Sir Terry had called for a return to juries to judge the contest
after Russia won this year’s contest, while the UK, with Andy Abraham,
came last.
Russia received the maximum 12 points from former Soviet states
Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Belarus and Armenia, as well
as Israel.
The UK has only finished in the top 10 once in the last 10 contests
and has finished outside the top 20 four times in that period.
Sir Terry has criticised the contest for becoming "ridiculous",
stating: "The UK and the BBC has to decide whether they want to
take part anymore. I don’t want to be presiding over yet another
debacle… Russia were going to be the political winners from the
beginning."
A BBC spokeswoman said: "We are waiting with interest to hear the
details of how the mix of jury and telephone voting will work."
Ruurd Bierman, chairman of the Eurovision reference group, said:
"We strongly believe in televoting as a way of measuring the opinion
of our millions of viewers across Europe. After the public debate
about neighbour and diaspora voting, we decided to give the national
juries a say in the outcome of the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest."
Svante Stockselius, executive supervisor of the Eurovision Song
Contest, said: "Nothing is more democratic than the vote of the
public. But a jury takes the opportunity to listen to the songs
several times, before they make up their minds. In Belgrade, we saw
a difference in judgment of the public and the back-up juries, and
we believe a combination will make the show more interesting."