Lord Puttnam
Main Page: Lord Puttnam (Labour - Life peer)
Baroness Neville-Rolfe
My noble friend will be interested to know that I made a brief reference to that in the Statement. I think it is called contestable funding. It is part of the consultation and it would in principle allow new entrants, such as small Welsh production companies, to play a greater part in the creation of TV and radio programmes and online content in the future.
Lord Puttnam (Lab)
My Lords, the noble Baroness is quite right: the world is changing rapidly. Somewhat to my surprise, it has been very widely reported this week that the UK has come top in the world for its use of, and reputation for, soft power. Would she like to suggest any other organisation in this country that contributes more to that reputation than the BBC?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe
The simple answer is no. I think that the existence of the BBC World Service and all that it does was absolutely key to that assessment.