How woke ruined Blue Peter: BBC made Britain’s favourite children’s TV show so relentlessly preachy it became unwatchable, says CHRISTOPHER STEVENS

Blue Peter was once the BBC’s flagship – the longest-running children’s programme in the world, watched by eight million during its heyday every Monday and Thursday teatime.

That flagship has now been scuttled and sunk. Instead of taking pride in this beloved 66-year-old show, the broadcaster has taken the live programme off air. 

Now it will be pre-recorded only – a prelude towards its inevitable cancellation.

Is it really any surprise? After all, the BBC appears to despise everything Blue Peter represents: Initiative, family fun and striving for achievement.

In recent years, after imposing an agenda of worthiness and virtue-signalling on the show, Broadcasting House executives watched audiences dwindle to less than 40,000 and stripped it back to one live episode a week.

Now this national institution has been virtually killed off, destroyed by the neglect and mismanagement of the very organisation that ought to have valued it most.

Once beloved for its common sense and no-nonsense fun, yet Blue Peter became so relentlessly preachy that it was practically unwatchable (pictured: the 42nd host Abby Cook)

Blue Peter was once the BBC ‘s flagship – the longest-running children’s programme in the world, now the broadcaster has taken the live programme off air (L-R Valerie Singleton holding Jason, the cat, John Noakes holding Shep, the dog, and Peter Purves holding Petra in 1971)

So much for ‘here’s one I made earlier’. Now the BBC catchphrase could be: ‘Here’s one I ruined earlier.’

Once upon a time, Blue Peter’s presenters were household names who seemed permanent fixtures in our lives. 

The fearless John Noakes appeared on screen twice a week without fail, from 1965 to 1978, performing daredevil feats such as climbing Nelson’s Column in his jeans.

His colleagues Val Singleton and Peter Purves served ten and 11 years apiece, while in a later era Konnie Huq became the longest-serving female presenter, fronting the show for a decade in 1997.

If the presenters were national treasures, that’s to say nothing of its pets. Never mind whether you’re a Boomer, a Gen X-er or a Millennial, what really dates you are the Blue Peter dogs you grew up with.

I’m a child of the Sixties: mine were Petra and Patch, followed by Shep. For younger viewers, it will be Bonnie the retriever or Mabel the border collie.

The show has been increasingly focused on environmental issues 

Once beloved for its combination of common sense and no-nonsense fun, however, Blue Peter became so relentlessly preachy that it was practically unwatchable.

Long since banished from BBC1 and hidden away on the CBBC children’s channel (Freeview channel 201, if you weren’t aware of its existence), the show was described by insiders just two years ago as ‘a very unhappy, sinking ship’.

Budgets were slashed as the show was relegated to one live broadcast a week, on a Friday, and repeated on a Saturday. 

Where the team were once sent on adventures all over the world to Morocco, Mexico or Sri Lanka, now they rely on leftovers from other programmes.

Cheap filler has become so desperately needed that the current line-up of presenters Abby Cook, Shini Muthukrishnan and Joel Mawhinney now read out letters from readers each week – a tactic that used to be confined to local radio.

But, by far, the worst aspect has become the constant emphasis on political correctness. 

One recent episode saw Abby visit a racetrack to sit in a replica of a Formula E car built from recycled electronic waste. 

The machine – constructed chiefly from computer circuit boards and broken smartphones that were glued together – achieved a top speed slightly below walking pace.

Abby rewarded its builders a ‘green Blue Peter badge’, to highlight how they are ‘raising awareness of environmental issues’.

It’s one of nearly half a dozen new badges to join the traditional blue, silver and gold. Others come in purple and orange, which aptly reflects the show’s preoccupation with the LGBT rainbow flag.

‘The rainbow flag has six beautiful meanings,’ declares the Blue Peter website, with sections headed ‘Four facts to know about Pride’ and ‘What do the colours of the Pride flag mean?’ This latter page offers children a quiz to ensure they have correctly learned to interpret every hue.

It’s a far cry from reciting the Green Cross Code to stay safe on the roads, as viewers did in the 1970s.

Also on the web pages, children are asked: ‘Who are the black heroes in your life?’ They are encouraged to ‘make your own eco-bunting’ and bake ‘vegan banana pudding cups’.

The accumulative effect is one of exhausting, overwhelming worthiness. Britain’s favourite children’s show has degenerated into Woke Peter.

Even the theme tune was ruined. 

That traditional sailor’s hornpipe – jaunty, foot-tapping and catchy – was recorded in a dozen different interpretations, including a rock rendition by Tubular Bells maestro Mike Oldfield.

You wouldn’t recognise it today. The original tune was almost completely expunged – replaced by a cacophony of electronic bleeps, drum machine snares, robotic hand-claps and nasal blares. 

The noise lasts for 40 seconds and only during the last eight does Barnacle Bill creep in, like a shameful former colleague the Beeb would rather disown.

No wonder children don’t want to watch.

Television has changed comprehensively since the days of (L-R) Peter, Lesley Judd, Valerie and John Noake in 1972. But it isn’t so long ago that a couple of million viewers still watched

True, television has changed comprehensively since the days of Val, John and Pete. But it isn’t so long ago that a couple of million viewers still watched agog.

That ended in 2011, when the show was relegated to CBBC. Audiences dwindled to almost nothing and one repeat broadcast, aired in 2017, was seen by no one at all.

Val Singleton, now an 87-year-old TV veteran whose career spans current affairs programmes such as The Money Programme to quiz shows like Backdate, has no doubt that the move to a minority channel was ‘a great mistake’.

Back in 2023 she told me: ‘There was still interest, and that all suddenly evaporated.

‘I can’t remember the last time I watched it. And yet I used to watch it religiously. Put it back on BBC1, that’s when it starts to appeal to families again… if it’s got good content. 

Children loved it so much, I still have people come up to me when I’m out, to tell me how excited they were to earn a Blue Peter badge.’

Above all, Val regrets the loss of an educational platform that enabled the BBC to do much good – ‘the incredible charity appeals at Christmas, which involved so many people’. 

The 1972 ‘treasure hunt’, for instance, collected 225 tons of scrap metal and raised enough money to build two community centres for elderly people as well as eight vans delivering hot meals.

The glory days ended in 2011, when the show was relegated to CBBC and audiences dwindled to almost nothing (L-R Mwaka Mudenda, Abby and Joel Mawhinney) 

She also deplores the over-excited enthusiasm of the presenters which, far from attracting children, can send them scurrying for shelter. 

‘We just said, “Hello,” she remarks. ‘I never thought it was just kids watching. We were always aware there were lots of adults tuning in too, and not only parents.

‘Actors and actresses used to tell me they watched before setting off to the theatre. 

And I used to imagine that perhaps the Queen might be watching before some evening function or other.’

That’s a lovely thought. Blue Peter, by royal appointment. The BBC has no idea what it has thrown away.