British TV’s Working Class Problem Is At Both Junior & Senior Level — Diamond Report
A new Diamond diversity report finds that working-class people are under-represented across UK television, at both junior and senior levels. The findings provide evidence for long-standing concerns that the industry does not reflect the class make-up of the country.
Working-class people accounted for about a quarter of programme contributions in the year to 31 March 2026, compared with 39% nationally; privately educated people accounted for 13%, nearly twice the national average. Children’s TV had the lowest working-class share on screen, at 16.8%, while current affairs was closest to the national average on screen at 39.1%. Off screen, current affairs had the lowest share, at 19%; the report analysed 180,000 contributions using 12,000 diversity forms.
In short
- Working-class people made about a quarter of UK TV contributions.
- Their share was similar in junior and senior roles.
- Class representation varied sharply between genres.
Explained simply
Diamond is the UK television industry’s system for collecting information about who appears on screen and works behind the scenes. Its reports compare people’s backgrounds in television with the make-up of the wider population, including whether they grew up in working-class or privately educated households.
The findings cover both programme contributors, such as presenters and guests, and off-screen workers. This matters because television helps shape which people and experiences are represented, while workforce diversity can affect who gets opportunities to make programmes.
Art Culture Entertainment TV UK World