[Matt]

Celebrity Big Brother to return to Channel 4

Channel 4 is understood to have decided to bring back Celebrity Big Brother to its main network next year.

Discussions have been taking place with the programme's producer Endemol for some months, and Channel 4 executives have now agreed to bring the show back, MediaGuardian.co.uk has learned.

This year the show was rested from the main Channel 4 network as part of a "creative renewal" by the broadcaster following the race row that engulfed the January 2007 series.

The treatment of the Bollywood actor Shilpa Shetty by her fellow housemates Jade Goody, Danielle Lloyd and Jo O'Meara elicited more than 50,000 complaints and led to effigies being burnt on the streets of India.

It is understood that under Channel 4's contract with Endemol, the broadcaster does not have to screen any Big Brother show if it does not want to.

However, it is believed insiders now feel it is the right time for Celebrity Big Brother to return.

A Channel 4 spokesman said no decision had been made about whether Celebrity Big Brother will return.

Channel 4 announced last August at the MediaGuardian Edinburgh International Television Festival that Celebrity Big Brother would not air on its main network this year.

Instead Channel 4 broadcast a replacement reality series on digital entertainment service E4 called Celebrity Hijack.

The Celebrity Hijack launch night was simulcast on Channel 4, but otherwise the replacement show was broadcast entirely on E4.

Channel 4 instead aired a successful food season in January with chefs Jamie Oliver, Gordon Ramsay and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, called the Big Food Fight.

Events since January 2007 have moved on to the extent that Goody recently appeared on the Indian version of the show, Bigg Boss, which is presented by Shetty.

But Goody, who was hugged by Shetty as she entered the Indian Big Brother house on Sunday, only spent two days on the show before learning that she had cervical cancer and flying back to the UK for treatment.

Channel 4 is also in a difficult financial position with falling advertising revenues and would welcome the ratings boost Celebrity Big Brother usually brings.

The broadcaster is facing potential budget cuts due to the downturn in advertising currently affecting the commercial broadcasters, plus it is arguing it will face a £150m "funding gap" within a few years.

Channel 4 maintains that the gifted analogue spectrum it currently receives from the government is worth about £150m a year, or 15% of its total income, and that after digital switchover this would need replacing with alternative funding.

The company's chief executive, Andy Duncan, has also come up with a series of ideas to boost Channel 4's public service output through his Next on 4 initiative, including the 4IP investment fund, which partners with regional development funds to fund new digital ideas.

One insider said: "The climate is now very different for Channel 4 than it was this time last year, so it has been decided to bring Celebrity Big Brother back."

It is not yet known when the popular reality show will air, though it is expected to be broadcast in January.

Although Celebrity Big Brother is coming back, Channel 4 is in talks to air another food season with Ramsay, Oliver and Fearnley-Whittingstall following the success of the Big Food Fight season.

The trio are set to take on a new controversial issue relating to the nation's eating habits after tackling intensive poultry farming this year.

Source: MediaGuardian.co.uk