Digital Economy Bill

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Inglewood

Report: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 29th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I take the noble Lord’s word for that because he knows more about it than I do.

[Lord Inglewood]

The Minister said that the Government did not consult on taxes in the way that has been suggested. I put it to my noble friend that there is not another hypothecated tax like this, so there is no precedent one way or another for this set of circumstances.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

The point that I made was that, when setting taxes, the Government have to take account of the overall revenue raising, and this is just one element of revenue raising. I agree that whether it is a hypothecated tax is another question, but the point is that it is a tax and the Government do not consult on taxes.

Perhaps I may continue. I was talking about public consultation. The BBC’s funding needs are complicated and technical, as we have seen with every licence fee settlement, and agreeing the overall package is a finely balanced act. The requirement to ask the BBC for information and seek external advice is a sensible way of ensuring that Ministers’ decisions are well informed.

Despite what the noble Lord, Lord Best, said about consultations, the recent charter review found that, although almost 75% of the public consider the BBC’s programming to be high-quality, just 20% said that they would like to see the licence fee rise even in line with inflation, thereby helping the BBC to maintain those high standards. At the same time, the BBC also needs to become more efficient from reducing layers of management and property costs.

Public consultation needs to be approached with due sensitivity. It is right that decisions that balance the funding needs of the BBC and pressures on family budgets are taken by Ministers, who are accountable for those decisions, and that they are not decisions strongly influenced by an unelected new body. In answer to the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, the Government’s view is that it should therefore remain for the elected Government of the day to decide how to approach reaching an appropriate level of BBC funding in a detailed and extensive negotiation with the BBC. Despite the difficulties associated with the last licence fee settlement, as I have said, it resulted in what the noble Lord, Lord Hall, has said is a strong deal for the BBC, giving it financial stability, and we can see that the licence fee will rise for the next five years.

The noble Lord, Lord Lester, has tabled an amendment to put a duty on the Secretary of State to ensure that the BBC is funded to function effectively and independently as a public service broadcaster. I am pleased to see the noble Lord in the Chamber today—it was unfortunate that he was not able to participate in last week’s debate on his previous amendment. Without repeating myself unduly, I remind noble Lords that the Government remain of the view that the BBC is best governed through a royal charter. A statutory underpinning, however limited initially, would leave the BBC under a constant threat of change from what parliamentarians of the day might see as the “national interest”. Where a change might be genuinely required, the uncertain legislative timetable, party-political debate and pressure could all militate against resolving the issue at hand in an efficient manner.

Digital Economy Bill

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Inglewood

Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard - continued): House of Lords
Monday 20th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Ashton of Hyde) (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords for their remarks. In returning to this issue, I am sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Lester, is not here to speak to his amendment as we have debated this issue at length with him as part of the recent discussions on the BBC’s royal charter. We have debated it at Second Reading, in Committee and in other debates and Questions. The amendments that the noble Lord, Lord Lester, has tabled, and my noble friend Lord Inglewood has proposed, seek to constrain future royal charters for the BBC through statute. I should have said that I hope the noble Lord, Lord Lester, makes a speedy recovery and returns not to bring this subject up again but other subjects.

I note that, following the discussion we had in Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Lester, made a number of changes to his amendments proposed tonight in the areas of governance and funding. I appreciate the thought that he put into this and the dialogue that we have had on this so far. However, we still maintain that very serious risks are associated with the amendments and therefore we cannot support them.

As noble Lords will by now appreciate, the disagreement between the Government and those who tabled this amendment comes down, as the noble Lord, Lord Wood, said, to a matter of principle. Is the BBC best governed and protected through a charter or through a charter underpinned by legislation? I accept that there are instances where it is desirable and appropriate for a charter to be underpinned in statute but it is the Government’s view that this does not apply to the BBC.

Noble Lords may be interested to know that this is a discussion as old as the BBC itself—indeed, it is almost exactly 10 years older than the noble Lord, Lord Lester. When the then Postmaster-General announced in July 1926 that the BBC would be established through its first royal charter, he remarked that the new corporation would derive its authority from royal charter rather than from statute to make it clear to the public that it was not,

“a creature of Parliament and connected with political activity”.

In practical terms, noble Lords will appreciate that there is little difference between the effect of the BBC’s charter and its accompanying framework agreement and an Act of Parliament. Both are binding on the BBC and on Ministers. Article 3 of the current charter provides:

“The BBC must be independent in all matters concerning the fulfilment of its Mission and the promotion of the Public Purposes, particularly as regards editorial and creative decisions, the times and manner in which its output and services are supplied, and in the management of its affairs”.


That carries the same weight in a charter as it does in primary legislation, but in my view the latter option carries unacceptable risks to the independence of the BBC. From a practical point of view, amending an Act of Parliament in the event that a change is required—with all the party-political debate and pressure that that would entail and the uncertain legislative timetable—is not the right vehicle to make sure that the BBC can be governed effectively. Who can tell what political pressures will exist entirely unconnected to the detail of the BBC charter when the charter comes up for renewal?

Charter review remains the right vehicle. It affords an ample opportunity for debate and consultation but also allows for full consideration of all the connected and complex key issues, for effective decision-making and, crucially, for a negotiated agreement with the BBC.

Incidentally, I cannot resist mentioning that my noble friend Lord Inglewood referred to the Government as Dick Turpin in this case. I may be entirely unfamiliar with the story of Dick Turpin but I did not realise that he gave £3.7 billion annually to his victims.

Therefore, I submit that a statutory underpinning will leave the BBC under constant threat of change and monitoring what the Parliament of the day sees as the national interest. I fear that fellow parliamentarians, some of whom may not have my noble friend’s pure motives, will find it an irresistible temptation to tweak here and there, and, even with the best of intentions, we cannot expect the BBC to operate effectively and plan for its future in such circumstances.

I believe that this should be a matter for the Government of the day to decide ahead of the next charter review. The charter model has stood the test of time since 1926—through economic depressions, world war and huge technological change—to achieve what has been praised throughout the passage of this Bill as the BBC we have today. Given your Lordships’ ongoing interest and informed views, I am confident that the Government of the day will be minded to consider this carefully. With that explanation, I hope my noble friend will be able to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Inglewood]

My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend for his very full response to the remarks that have been made on this amendment. He went to the heart of it at the outset when he said that he was opposed to the suggestion in the amendment because it would constrain the royal charter in the future. But that is precisely the reason why we moved the amendment. The mechanism of the royal charter enables the Government, in practice, to have a huge and relatively unscrutinised and uncontrolled ability to adapt and adjust the framework for the relationship they have with the BBC to their own preferred ends.

As I listened to my noble friend, it occurred to me that it was about 25 years ago that I stood at the Dispatch Box at which he was standing a moment ago, discussing the same issues. It crossed my mind—ignoble though it may be to say it—that almost the same speech could have been given to me to deliver all those years ago.

It is perhaps a mistake to simply assume that because something gives the impression of having worked reasonably well for 70 years—it may or may not have—it will continue to work equally well in the years to come. I look around the Chamber this evening and see that some of us are perhaps not quite yet 70 years old but heading that way—and that some may even have passed it. I am afraid that it is the nature of the human condition that when you get to 70 years old, you may not be as fit, spry and sharp as you were in years gone by. So it is not good enough to say that because it has worked well in the past—and it has worked only moderately well—it therefore follows, as night follows day, that you can extrapolate that it will work well indefinitely.

However, I was encouraged by the concluding remarks of my noble friend. He said that he was confident that Governments in the future would seriously consider the point that was being made. I think that is important. On any measure, we have just started a BBC charter and there is a bit of time until the next one comes into effect. While I think that it would have been desirable to have placed in the Bill the statutory provisions that are contained in the amendment, not to do so may not be fatal to the underlying project. Certainly this is something we ought to think carefully about in the hours and days to come—not least the noble Lords, Lord Lester and Lord Pannick, who have not had the advantage of listening to the remarks of my noble friend. Against that background, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Digital Economy Bill

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Inglewood

1st reading (Hansard): House of Lords & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 31st January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Inglewood (Con)]

My Lords, I join those who have spoken in support of these amendments. Like some other noble Lords, some weeks I come up from the country to your Lordships’ House. The shortcomings of the infrastructure in rural Cumbria, where I live, is far too frequently a topic of conversation.

As a number of noble Lords have said, connectivity is the crucial aspect here, because it is now part of the essential infrastructure of contemporary life. It is important that we look at this issue from the perspective of what people need, but the reality is that what we need today may not be what we need tomorrow. We have to try to bridge the gap between the digital haves and the digital have-nots, and we achieve that by looking at the issue in the way that I have just described. Therefore, I am not approaching this matter from a kind of nerdy, technical perspective. What matters is the result as much as the means by which you get there.

Over the years, there has been a lot of debate about whether a universal service obligation should be in our law and be statutorily enforceable. I had the good fortune to chair the Communications Committee, and a number of years ago, when we conducted an inquiry into broadband, we debated this issue at length. On that occasion we reached the conclusion that what mattered was the rollout and that it was quite conceivable that a USO would get in the way. With the benefit of hindsight, that was probably a mistake, and therefore it is interesting to see the provisions for such a legal obligation coming into our legislation.

However, at the end of the day I come back to where I started with all this, and it is why I will be interested to hear what the Minister has to say. It is not the detail but the result that matters here. We have got to move into a world where the digital divide is bridged. This is particularly important for areas in the country, and I speak from that perspective, but it is also true for a number of urban areas. We seriously deny people access to a whole range of commercial, and other, aspects of contemporary life if there is not adequate connectivity. As a number of your Lordships have said, we live in a country that is adopting a different approach to industry. It is crucial to appreciate that the key to increasing wealth creation in areas outside the south-east of England—which I think everyone agrees is desirable—is improving connectivity. That is the way, as noble Lords have said, to improve the potential of SMEs outside the south-east.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Ashton of Hyde) (Con)]

My Lords, I am glad that we are at last able to start this very important Committee. I should immediately declare an interest, which is that I suffer at my home in the country from extremely bad broadband, although we are lucky enough to be able to use microwave technology to do something about this. In addition, last night when I tried to ring my wife from central London on my mobile telephone to complain how overworked I was, I was unable to get a signal. So, I can absolutely sympathise with my noble friends Lord Arbuthnot and Lord Inglewood; I recognise the problems, particularly for rural areas and SMEs, and the Government agree with quite a lot of what has been said in terms of aspirations. I think we will differ when we come to decide how the USO should be used to fulfil those aspirations, and exactly what its role is.

The Government have a clear digital agenda, and our ambition is for world-class digital connectivity. We are determined to ensure that the UK has the digital infrastructure that our businesses and citizens need both now and in the future. The Green Paper published on 23 January makes digital infrastructure a central pillar of the Government’s proposed industrial strategy and identifies good digital infrastructure as a driver of growth.

We support the spirit of Amendment 1, requiring that the universal service order should define a gigabit-speed broadband universal service obligation—or USO—delivered via full fibre to the premises. We differ in that we do not think that the broadband USO is the right tool to use at this stage in the development of the UK’s digital infrastructure market. To pick up on the point of the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, the rationale for a USO is to prevent social and economic exclusion. It does this by ensuring that where the market does not deliver, a minimum set of communication services are made available, on request, to everyone, no matter where they live or work. In doing so, it takes account of the prevailing technologies enjoyed by the majority of people: the USO follows the market, it does not drive market change. The UK’s fibre market is at an early stage of development—currently only 2% of UK premises have full-fibre connection—so I do not think we have reached the stage where there is a case for introducing a gigabit-speed USO. It is not a prevailing technology used by the majority and it is not needed to prevent social and economic exclusion.

We do, however, agree that more extensive fibre connectivity is crucially important to the UK’s future digital growth. We are planning now for the networks that are going to be needed to ensure continued economic growth and development across the UK in both urban and rural areas. In the Autumn Statement we announced more than £1 billion to support digital infrastructure, targeted at supporting the rollout of full-fibre connections and future 5G communications. The Government are consulting on how we might further encourage full-fibre rollout.

Amendment 2, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Fox, proposes a superfast broadband specification for the USO. This specification is, as the noble Lord said, in line with scenario 3 of Ofcom’s USO technical advice, which the Government commissioned to help inform the design of the USO. All the scenarios set out in Ofcom’s report are being given careful consideration. Once that work has been completed there will be a public consultation on the design of the USO and the specifications that will be included in the universal service order, including the minimum speed.

Cultural Property (Armed Conflicts) Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Ashton of Hyde and Lord Inglewood

Tuesday 6th September 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Inglewood (Con)]

My Lords, having heard the remarks of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, it seems to me that the point he makes is very pertinent. In particular, a concern I sometimes have is that parliamentary draftsmen, when bringing forward proposals, identify equivalence between different statutes which, perhaps under further closer examination, are not as equivalent as they would like you to believe. Therefore, there is an underlying and important point in that respect.

Also, now I am on my feet, I will say that in Committee I suggested some proposals on mens rea and Clause 17. I put on record that I am having a constructive and cordial dialogue with my noble friend the Minister on that, which is why there is nothing on the Marshalled List about it today.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown, for taking on this brief. I also take this opportunity to wish the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, a speedy recovery from his operation.

The amendments give us the opportunity to discuss the important concerns of the Joint Committee on Human Rights in relation to the maximum penalty for ancillary offences under Part 2 of the Bill. Noble Lords referred to the fact the JCHR raised this matter in its letter of 29 June, to which my predecessor replied on 8 July.

I understand the concern that the penalty for ancillary offences should not be disproportionate in any particular case. The Government have carefully considered the amendment but we have concluded that we should retain a maximum penalty of 30 years for ancillary offences. This is primarily for reasons of consistency with existing UK legislation: namely, the International Criminal Court Act 2001 and its Scottish equivalent. That legislation provides, as has been said, for a maximum penalty of 30 years for the offence of committing a war crime, and provides expressly that the same maximum penalty applies in relation to ancillary offences. I think that that answers the noble and learned Lord’s question about why it should not be 40 years or life. It is the same as the existing legislation.