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NEXT Monday sees Mark Thompson formally take charge of Channel 4 as chief executive - released at last from three months of "gardening leave" imposed by Greg Dyke.

It is a critical moment for the network, which is poised to declare significant losses for 2001 and under pressure for the 16 to 34-year audience, while upstarts such as Channel 5 have stolen some of its best lines about being innovative.
So what can we expect? The general view is that Thompson will descend from exile in his north Oxford home to provide some much needed leadership, review E4 and Film Four, beef up the remit to experiment and innovate, while reassuring politicians. Then he will leave, with the credit of a neat turn around on his curriculum vitae.

But that is far too simplistic. Thompson's arrival coincides with C4's expensive and hard-nosed capture of The Simpsons, snatched from the BBC. It will sit nicely with its portfolio of top US imports,  Friends, Frasier and Sex and the City.

Thompson's track record to date proves he knows how to get channels ticking. As controller of BBC2 from 1996 to 1998 he focused on making the popular good, pushed up ratings and was proud to champion new presenters, such as Jamie Oliver. Then, as director of TV and Dyke's right-hand man from 2000 to 2001, he tore up schedules and marched serious strands off to BBC2, to boost BBC1's ratings drive.

But more detailed clues of how C4 will evolve are contained in its 2002 statement of programme policy, published two weeks ago, which bears signs of Thompson's input, yet has been largely unreported. Michael
Jackson left a tricky legacy for his successor, with his declaration, in a final speech attended by scores of politicians, that public service broadcasting was a "pointless" battle standard. This is dangerously loose posturing for any terrestrial network at a time of major communications legislation, let alone one not paying for its broadcast
spectrum.

Here is the new Thompson-era spin: C4 is rechristened as the "independent voice of PSB", that is, it is distinct from the BBC because it has the freedom to raise its own funds and a genuine detachment from the establishment. It's a good start.

In this context, a tabloid news Big Breakfast replacement, on offer from April, makes sense, and is also a balance to Channel 4 News. There is a market gap, though GMTV does a pretty good job for its older audience, but it's not one the BBC could readily fill outside the proposed BBC3.

C4 also aspires to be the "broadcaster with the most to say". The Royal Television Society Journalism Awards, due to be held this week, are likely to heap garlands on Saira Shah's brave reports from the Taliban-controlled Afghanistan in Under the Veil.

The regime also promises to make "drama more integral" to the schedule. The aim is to have three, long-running drama series by 2003 but, So far, only Teachers has been salvaged from a series of trials.

Finally, it will give priority to modern documentaries, find a successor to Faking it, while adding in "longitudinal series" (studying institutions) such as Oxford University.

So, Thompson is set to run C4 in a pragmatic manner, because he's a realist, aware C4 has to fight for its place in the sun and the best ideas.

In an age when the same programme - The Simpsons - can appear on any channel, the task of finding points of distinctiveness is harder to meet.