Qualla: S4C

S4C: Introduction

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Hywel Williams, CC BY-SA 2.0. On 17 September 1980, Gwynfor Evans, the founding president of Plaid Cymru and the first Welsh nationalist ever elected to Westminster, announced that he would refuse food until the Conservative government honoured its manifesto pledge to create a Welsh-language television channel. He was 68 years old. He had spent his life in the slow, patient work of trying to keep the Welsh language alive in a world that had no obvious use for it. He had now run out of patience. Margaret Thatcher's government had won the 1979 election promising the channel, then dropped the promise within months. Evans set a date for the strike to begin. Two years later, on 1 November 1982, the channel that he had nearly starved to make happen went on the air.

Read more: S4C on Qualla

Image: Hywel Williams | CC BY-SA 2.0

S4C: The Bargain in the Land

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dyfrigj at English Wikipedia (Original text: Dyfrig Jones), CC BY-SA 3.0. For most of the twentieth century, Welsh speakers had been treated as an afterthought by broadcasters. The BBC and HTV ran occasional Welsh programmes at off-peak hours, satisfying nobody. Welsh speakers felt patronised; English speakers in Wales found their own scheduled program...

Read more: S4C on Qualla

Image: Dyfrigj at English Wikipedia (Original text: Dyfrig Jones) | CC BY-SA 3.0

S4C: The Threat

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Col Ford and Natasha de Vere, CC BY 2.0. On 17 September 1980, Evans announced that he intended to fast unto death from the autumn forward unless the channel were granted. He was not a young man, and he was not bluffing. He had survived prison for his pacifism, sustained Plaid Cymru through three decades of electoral fa...

Read more: S4C on Qualla

Image: Col Ford and Natasha de Vere | CC BY 2.0

S4C: What S4C Made

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Eric Jones, CC BY-SA 2.0. S4C was structured like Channel 4 - it commissioned everything, produced almost nothing in-house - but had a Welsh-language remit and a Welsh audience. BBC Cymru Wales contributed news and Pobol y Cwm, the soap opera that has now run continuously since 1974, longer than EastEnder...

Read more: S4C on Qualla

Image: Eric Jones | CC BY-SA 2.0

S4C: The Move to Carmarthen

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Llywelyn2000, CC BY-SA 4.0. S4C spent its first decades headquartered in Cardiff. In March 2014, after a long search for a way to anchor more of the Welsh-language creative industry outside the capital, the channel announced it would move to Carmarthen. The University of Wales Trinity Saint David led the bi...

Read more: S4C on Qualla

Image: Llywelyn2000 | CC BY-SA 4.0

S4C: An Existential Threat

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit David Dixon, CC BY-SA 2.0. The channel's funding history is unhappy reading. In 2010, S4C received about £102 million from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. In 2013, the new Coalition government cut that by around 93 per cent and transferred responsibility to the BBC licence fee. By the early 20...

Read more: S4C on Qualla

Image: David Dixon | CC BY-SA 2.0

S4C: What the Channel Still Carries

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nilfanion, CC BY-SA 4.0. Gwynfor Evans died in 2005. The channel he forced into existence is now in its fifth decade. The Welsh language he wanted to save has continued its slow demographic retreat - 39.9 per cent of Carmarthenshire spoke Welsh at the 2021 census, down from 50.3 per cent in 2001 - but th...

Read more: S4C on Qualla

Image: Nilfanion | CC BY-SA 4.0