Sky and 21st Century Fox: Proposed Merger

Lord Deben Excerpts

Monday 6th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Keen of Elie]

It respectfully appears to me that the reason that we may have had the same issue for the past 14 years is that it reflects the appropriate approach to take to these matters, rather than the straitjacket of some framework, as the noble Lord proposes. It may be that we differ on that point.

I come to the second matter of a fit and proper person. Of course, the fit and proper person test is applied by Ofcom in the context of a broadcasting licence, but we recognise that in looking to behaviour, which is relevant to this question, it would be appropriate to take into account fitness and past behaviour. Whether it is appropriate to adopt a test developed for the Financial Conduct Authority is another matter entirely, but it is clearly open to Ofcom, when approaching this matter, to have regard to how other regulatory bodies consider the questions of fitness and behaviour.

In a sense, the Financial Conduct Authority test is not peculiar to financial services: it reflects what most reasonable people would regard as the relevant litmus test to determine whether somebody is fit and proper for any post, let alone to control a broadcasting medium.

[Lord Deben (Con)]

I thank my noble and learned friend for the Statement. I raise again a point made by the noble Lord, Lord McNally. He pointed to the concern that one has when people say, “There are lots of other ways in which news is disseminated”, and therefore the comparison between one television channel and another is perhaps no longer as important as it once was. His point about it being an exemplar—although each case is judged on its own merits and never are other cases not referred to, at least in the mind of those making the decisions—was important.

It is also true that anyone who travels the world to those places where the media have become less and less plural realises the damage that that does to the free society. I hope that my noble and learned friend will pass on to his right honourable friend the concern of many of us that free speech and the free communication of ideas depend on multiplicity and plurality. If ever there were a case in which that has to be defended, it is this case.

[Lord Keen of Elie]

I am obliged to my noble friend Lord Deben. Of course, a vibrant free press and a plurality of press sources is a fundamental part of any democratic society. That is why the Enterprise Act provisions exist: to ensure that public interest considerations can be taken into account when looking at media mergers.