WINDS of change were blowing through Scottish – and British – politics in the 1970s with the thorny subject of devolution occupying politicians’ minds, along with high unemployment and a severe economic recession.

Devolution was also preying on the grey matter of BBC executives who had to decide how they would cover a Scottish Parliament should Scotland vote Yes in the 1979 referendum.

Architects were engaged to draw up plans for a new BBC broadcasting centre in Edinburgh, to replace the ageing facilities at No5 Queen Street, and a site acquired at Greenside Place – which, once the project was abandoned, became known as “the hole in the ground”. It is now occupied by the Omni Centre and a car park.

Now that turbulent time – as witnessed by a BBC insider – has been recalled in a new book entitled, You Can’t Do That Here! This Is The BBC!: Or one man’s odyssey around the fringes of radio.

It has been written by Lawrence Lettice, who started working with the BBC in an administrative role on leaving school in 1974, and who left when the BBC at Queen Street closed in 2002.

More often than not Lettice was fairly anonymous, but with his series of anecdotes – in the first book about the BBC in Edinburgh – he takes the reader around the fringes of broadcasting at the time and into its heart.

“I never set out to write a book,” Lettice told The National. “I was swapping stories with two former BBC engineers and one of them planted the seed in my mind to write some of them down before we all got too old. Nearly three years ago I started writing some of the anecdotes and it snowballed from there – one story connected to another, then another and so on, from when I started in 1974.

“There’s never been a book written about the BBC in Edinburgh and this isn’t a definitive history of it, it’s more recollections through my own eyes as someone who fulfilled a fairly mundane role, although I was privy to a lot of things that happened there.”

One of those was the dramatically dubbed Greenside Project, to build the new headquarters of BBC Scotland. “We were shown drawings and designs, scale models, the works, and it was impressed upon us that this was definitely going to happen,” said Lettice. “Then they pulled it and sold the land and put the money back into refurbishing… Queen Street.

“It was a tragedy in so many ways because we were led up the garden path. We were promised so much and, when you think of how Scotland has changed politically, having a major broadcasting centre in Edinburgh would have been a great thing, but it never happened.

“I think we were cheated in so many ways – then, when they decided to close down Queen Street, that didn’t go down well. When you think of what the BBC in Edinburgh was supposed to be and what it is now – a broom cupboard up from Holyrood – it’s very sad.”

Lettice doesn’t try to explain why the project was abandoned, but costs for the new build were escalating and the BBC in London dragged its heels over a decision.

“Perhaps Glasgow and, by implication, the power-brokers in London just got cold feet and decided not go through with it – although there were many, particularly among the union members, who felt the entire withdrawal had the air of implied political interference,” he added.

The book has many lighter moments, such as one episode that saw the architect’s scale model of Greenside crumble, much like the project itself, as two worthies tried to carry it down a stairway.

Another featured the late radio reporter Kenny McIntyre and one of the maintenance crew Bob Kilgour, who dangled radio reporter Ninian Reid over a first-floor bannister by his ankles early one morning, for reasons that are not explained.

However, it also has its share of pathos, particularly the chapter called the Death of Broadcasting House, which covers three deaths that happened in quick succession.

Lettice recalled: “Alex Colquhoun was murdered in his flat after he had been out with a group of us for a Christmas night out. Then young Fraser died suddenly and at his funeral Dorothy, the receptionist, fell and was rushed to hospital. She died after reacting badly to the anaesthetic.

“It was so tragic – three deaths virtually one after the other. So I’ve paid a tribute to the three of them but I’ve looked back with some fondness and humour at them too.

“I’ve tried to recapture the unique atmosphere of the BBC in Edinburgh, especially during the 70s and 80s. I thought it was a nice way to remember what the place was like for all of us who worked there.”