Public Service Broadcasting (Communications Committee Report)

My Lords, I add my congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, on his quite exceptional chairmanship of our Communications Committee. It would be hard to find a more diligent and hardworking Select Committee, and I certainly hope, along with the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, that it will at last be established on a permanent basis. Debating our report before the Government had fully responded was clearly not ideal. However, I am grateful for their interim reaction which at least gives your Lordships a further opportunity to re-emphasise the points that we regard as crucial if public service broadcasting is indeed to survive in this economically challenged and rapidly changing digital world. As the report starts by saying, defining public service broadcasting has challenged many of our interviewed experts, quite apart from ourselves. Inevitably, we all have our own preferences. I prefer—perhaps not least because of the citizen consumer battles during the passage of the Communications Act 2003—the definition proposed by my noble friend Lord Birt of "a programme tradition with citizens rather than consumers in mind". I shall emphasise four issues in the report, the first of which, the Government’s response indicates, will find favour. British experience since the BBC ceased to be the monopoly public service broadcast provider has convinced everyone that there must be at least one public service competitor for the BBC. I agree with other noble Lords that ITV, with its successful track record of combining PSB with commercial programming and, above all, its impartial, independent news, is the one of the most obvious candidates. We should not forget either its commendable record of sourcing UK content. On the other hand, because of the undeniable and increasingly rapid move of the advertising industry to the internet, ITV, as it made abundantly clear to us, will need adequate financing for any future PSB role, all the more so in light of the Treasury’s confiscation of the valuable analogue spectrum. I underline, secondly, the crucial need for the continuance of a second nationwide, independent, impartial public service broadcaster news service. Again, ITV’s track record clearly makes it one of the major candidates, so long as the necessary finance and partnerships are assured. It is clear, too, that UK citizens want this. Ofcom’s research showed that 86 per cent of our citizens wanted international news to be available on more than one public service broadcasting channel. In this context, the BBC has already suggested some sharing of facilities and the use of some of its material in regional news programmes. One understands that many conversations are still under way and one expects to see many of these initiatives rolled out in due course. In light of Ofcom’s research showing high citizen demand—72 per cent—for specific nations and regions news services, I agree that the Government should also consider the relaxation of competition rules to allow some combination of print news and broadcast media companies. Children’s PSB programming is another area where more resources are needed, with 76 per cent of parents urging more UK-sourced provision. Here, too, PSB competition is important, but—I could not agree more with the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester—the BBC clearly has the major responsibility. We must therefore hear rather more from the BBC about what priority children’s programmes will have in its future plans. I would include in that not least its online programmes. Many people, for example, will want to know what will replace the recently axed children’s online service, BBC Jam. There was particular concern at Radio 4’s decision to end the last existing BBC children’s radio programme, put out on a Sunday evening. My noble friend Lady Warnock made a quite brilliant speech on behalf of Sound Start—which has previously piloted a children’s radio programme—on 14 May, criticising Radio 4’s decision and stressing the importance of listening for the development of children’s imagination. I urge those responsible for Radio 4’s programming and, failing that, the BBC Trust to think again. My third point is on the proposals being advanced for partnerships and alternative forms of funding for public service broadcasting. The BBC Worldwide/ Channel 4 merger suggested by Ofcom, and perhaps still favoured by the Government, seemed to many if not all of us on the Select Committee a step too far. It would make good sense—and it is one of the benefits of the state that we are in—to use this time to see what kind of partnership can be developed and to see whether the BBC will form as good a partnership as it has promised to form. BBC Worldwide, under the direction of John Smith, has done exceptionally well. Not least, it earned one of this year’s prestigious awards for industry. Channel 4, with its hugely successful record of commissioning films, has far more international revenue to be exploited. A partnership would also give time to see how all that could be developed. My fourth point is on the vexed question of where further funding can possibly come from for the underfunded, yet citizen-valued, PSB areas; whether news, drama or children’s programmes. As we say in paragraph 81 of our report, in some of those areas a case may already be outlined for contestable funding, to which would-be PSB programme-makers could apply. If by 2012 there is an underspend of the BBC licence fee fund—and many figures have been put on this—I, too, would go along with believing that it should be one source of funding. I am less sure about going much further than that. Equally, I can see no reason why the considerable value of analogue spectrum should accrue only to the Treasury. However, if that was to happen—which I would support—how should such resources be allocated? It would not, I hope, be through the creation of yet another quango. Surely, Ofcom could do the job by setting up an organisation not dissimilar to its consumer panel. We may all have been aware of the fact that, although there was something called a content board, it was in fact the consumer panel that seemed to do a considerable amount on behalf of the citizen. Above all, it published its reports so that they were in the public domain. I urge that particular form on Ofcom and the Government to think about very seriously.