WFTV Announce New Mentoring Scheme For Women In NI

Women in Film and TV (WFTV) has announced a new mentoring scheme for Northern Ireland women.

The programme is designed to help those with more than five years' experience working in TV production take the next step in their career.

WFTV NI also took to the stage at the 2019 Belfast Media Festival (BMF) with a panel of women, all with first hand experience of 'duty of care' in the television industry, to debate the critical issue of who’s looking after the people who take part in TV programmes.

Jannine Waddell, Chair of WFTV NI said: "Duty of Care has become the most significant story in TV in recent months and as a programme maker it’s a subject very close to my heart. I felt we needed to explore this critical issue in depth and I’m delighted so many leading women from the industry came together for WFTV to highlight the issue this week at BMF."

The session was chaired by Kelda McCann, MD of leading Northern Ireland television production company Crawford McCann and committee member of WFTV NI.

Kelda McCann said: "Duty of Care has always been on the minds of factual programme producers — our contributors are at the centre of what we do. There is a massive responsibility when someone invites you into their life to tell their story. The changing media landscape and rise of social media means new challenges and we have to adapt as programme makers. It also means Duty of Care is quite rightly something all genres need to be thinking new about. Duty of Care also extends to programme makers – we frequently deal with challenging subjects and this can have mental and emotional consequences."

The panel included:
• Lauren Bradford, an academic and criminologist who published ‘Hidden Victims' exploring the experience of families bereaved by homicide as they have gone through the criminal justice system.· Emma- Rosa Dias, MD of Afro-Mic Productions who has experience of working in front and behind the camera.
• Jacky Martens, Assistant Editor of BBC’s flagship News at 10.
• Alison Millar, a multi-award winning film maker and MD of Erica Starling Productions.
• Tracie O'Neill, Executive Producer of Stellify Media.
• Beejal Patel, BBC Documentaries Commissioner with vast experience in producing ground breaking factual series with school children and pre-schoolers.
• Liz Tucker, Chair of Women in Film and TV (UK) and a multi-award winning documentary executive producer and director.

wftv.org.uk