S4C budget cut by UK government for next two years

Welsh-language channel S4C will have its budget reduced, the UK government has announced.

The £7m grant will be cut by 1% by the Department of Culture Media and Sport (DCMS) in 2013, with a 2% reduction the year after.

From next April, the majority of S4C's funding will come from the BBC licence fee.

S4C's chief executive Ian Jones said the channel was considering "the implication of this announcement".

"We note that DCMS has ensured that new cuts are consistent across the bodies it funds," he said.

"In the case of S4C these cuts are in addition to the cuts that had already been announced to our budget - 36% between 2010 and 2014.

"We will now consider how to deal with the implication of this announcement, bearing in mind the economic effect that cuts to S4C's budget causes."

DCMS says it would not be commenting on the cut to S4C's budget but said the minister Maria Miller had said "inevitably" the UK government had to find savings.