Local Digital Television Programme Services (Amendment) Order 2024

Lord Northbrook Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Baroness Twycross) (Lab)]

My Lords, over a decade since the first service launched, local TV continues to complement our national public service broadcasters by providing local content, including news and current affairs, to audiences across the UK. From London Live, which broadcasts just a few miles up the road in Kensington, to Notts TV in Nottingham and NVTV in Belfast, there are now 34 local TV services broadcasting all over the UK.

These services bring social and economic benefits to the areas that they serve, not only through making and showing programmes that meet the interests of their local audiences but by providing training opportunities, often giving people their first experience of working in the television sector. For example, one local TV service, KMTV, has developed a partnership with the University of Kent and provides training opportunities for journalism students. In a TV sector that is all too often London-centric, local TV services provide a way into the industry for those based in all parts of the UK, as 11 are based in the north of England, five in Scotland, three in Wales, and one in Northern Ireland.

All these services are carried on the local TV multiplex, which enables their broadcast on digital terrestrial television, known as Freeview. The multiplex is operated by Comux UK, which is co-owned by the local TV services themselves. The multiplex plays a central role in the local TV ecosystem by providing subsidised carriage for all the local services and is funded by using the profits generated from the carriage of a small number of national services.

However, the climate for local TV has been challenging. Services have struggled to maintain consistent audience numbers and develop sustainable revenues from advertising. Last year, the TV advertising market in the UK experienced its biggest decline since the 2008-09 financial crisis. While this has impacted all commercially funded broadcasters, it has been particularly acute for local TV services, which operate with a smaller audience base than their national counterparts. The previous Government committed to change the local TV licensing regime to enable the extension of the local TV multiplex until 2034, and to consult on the options for the renewal or relicensing of the 34 individual local services. That consultation ran from June to September last year and received responses from current licence holders, media and telecoms companies, and members of the public.

In the consultation, the then Government set out their proposals for a light-touch renewal process for the multiplex licence, led by Ofcom, and the conditional renewal of all 34 local TV services, subject to Ofcom’s assessment of their performance to date and their plans for the next licence period. Respondents to the consultation were broadly supportive of this approach. Some respondents, particularly the incumbent licence holders, raised concerns regarding the disproportionate burden that renewal might place on licensees. They also emphasised the importance of the renewal process being concluded in a timely fashion to deliver the certainty that the sector and its commercial partners require.

My department has taken these responses into account in drafting this order and worked closely with the independent regulator, Ofcom, which will administer the renewals process, to refine its provisions. A previous version of the order was laid in draft before Parliament earlier this year on 7 May, but it was subsequently withdrawn. This was because the delay to the order coming into force caused by the general election meant that Ofcom would not have had time to complete the renewal process and still be able to run a competitive relicensing process in the event that any licences were not renewed.

In light of this, the updated order includes additional powers for Ofcom, with the consent of the current licence holders, to extend the local TV licences by a period of 12 months. This will ensure that Ofcom will be able to conclude the renewal process at least 12 months before the extended licences would otherwise expire. The order has been considered by the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments and the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. Neither committee raised any concerns about the legislation.

The Government believe that the renewal process provided for by this order is in the best interests of the sector’s long-term health and sustainability by providing stability over the next licence period, while ensuring a proportionate degree of regulatory oversight. We want local media, including local TV, to thrive and, importantly, keep communities informed about local issues and decision-making. Enabling the renewal of the local TV licences is an important part of these plans. I beg to move.

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to Daniel Cass, chief executive of That’s TV, for his views and queries on the order. The local TV sector welcomes the power granted to Ofcom to renew the UK’s current 34 local TV services on Freeview. It is important that the renewal process implemented by Ofcom does not become unduly onerous. The draft order requires Ofcom to assess both programming and business plans for the new licence period from 2026 onwards. However, Freeview is diminishing. This makes business planning for the new licence period highly challenging.

The DCMS should seek to ensure that Ofcom focuses on what is most important. In particular, the aim should be for Ofcom to protect core local news delivery on local TV services in the new licence period. For most local TV services, their news bulletins are funded by the commercial advertising secured around their non-news entertainment programming. If this model is to remain viable in the coming years, it is unlikely to be a realistic option for Ofcom to be puritanical about non-news programming and how it is delivered. If Ofcom asks local TV services to deliver more local programming than the market can realistically support, this will have the opposite of the desired effect, with services closing.

The costs and benefits of holding licences needs to remain at the forefront of Ofcom’s assessment process, or it risks becoming a fantasy exercise. On Freeview, local TV services benefit from electronic programme guide prominence regulated by Ofcom. However, there is no guarantee of either carriage or prominence for the digital apps now being planned by local TV operators. I suggest to the Minister that the Government need to work with the industry to secure a pathway for local TV operators to launch their apps on internet-connected TV platforms.