TV Licence Fee

Alan Brown Excerpts

Monday 20th November 2017 Westminster Hall

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Moon. I, too, congratulate the hon. Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones) on putting both sides of the argument on the petitions. She touched on the issue that I will initially focus on, which is one of the disadvantages I see in the current licence fee arrangement—the enforcement on those who do not have a TV licence. I raise the matter on behalf of a constituent, who has been in contact with me recently to outline his concerns and experience. The Library briefing paper prepared for this debate neatly sets out the laws indicating when a TV licence is required. However, I would argue that the implementation of those laws, unlike other general aspects of law, appears to assume that someone is guilty of the offence of not having a TV licence unless they prove otherwise, whereas normally the law presumes innocence until it is shown otherwise.

My constituent is

“deeply concerned with the manner in which TV Licensing chooses to communicate with unlicensed occupiers; with the accusatory and extremely menacing tone they use in their letters; the relentless requirement for them to “investigate” unlicensed properties; and perhaps most of all by their assumption that those without a TV Licence are most likely guilty until proven innocent.”

He has forwarded copies of communication he has received. Some of the letters he has received contain headings such as:

“Official warning: we have opened an investigation,”

and:

“Your address has been scheduled for a visit by an Enforcement Officer.”

Furthermore, the body of that letter states, “You know. We know.” As my constituent says, the text and headlines cannot be interpreted as anything other than threatening. The language is as bad as that of the rogue car park companies that we all receive complaints about.

The rhetoric ramps up further as the letters continue:

“Our Enforcement Officers visit an address every 5 seconds. Day. Evening. Even weekends. And if no one answers, they can come back.”

One has a bold blood-red stamp stating, “Enforcement Officer Visit Approved.” The next phase is a letter implying that a court case is imminent, with another implied threat:

“We want to ensure you have the information you may need before a hearing is set at your local court. Please read the information below carefully and keep it for your records. You will be allowed to take it into court with you.”

The letter then continues under the heading “What to expect in court,” before offering advice on how to avoid a court summons. It is quite clear that there are heavy-handed threats of court action. The solution offered effectively involves purchasing a TV licence, although there is acknowledgement at the foot of the letter that people can contact TV Licensing to inform it that they do not need one. Even that comes with the caveat:

“We may visit to confirm this.”

There is no doubt that that is extremely intimidating. It is certainly intended to make someone feel that they have to purchase a TV licence. I accept that there is a mechanism for people to highlight to TV Licensing that they do not require a licence. I am sure that is TV Licensing’s excuse for being so heavy-handed: it claims that it offers that alternative. However, that comes only at the end of the letter, and the general content of the communication is always about the requirement to have a TV licence and the threats associated with not having one. It is way too heavily skewed towards intimidation. I would like to hear the Minister’s view on that process and the companies involved in it. It is fine to target those who should pay, but it should not be by intimidation. Quite often it is those who are innocent who feel threatened, whereas people who are willing to deliberately evade often have no concern about such communications anyway.

I am also aware that many people do not know what their rights are regarding inspector visits. My constituent wrote to TV Licensing stating that he was removing its implied right of access to his private property. That was respected for a period, but the licensing authorities have now contacted him. The BBC states:

“We do not recognise this withdrawal in Scotland as different laws apply.”

My constituent is quite tenacious. He has contacted the BBC on that point and submitted a freedom of information request, but the BBC refused to release the information—it has had legal advice and will not divulge that information. I would argue that for the sake of transparency, it should release the information on why its understanding is that implied rights of access do not apply to Scotland because of different laws north and south of the border. Again, I would be interested to hear the Minister’s response to that. It is an important point, because many people do not understand what rights an inspector has to enter their property. That goes along with intimidation and threats in letters, which make people feel that they must let an inspector into their home, but that is not actually the case.

I would like to make a few points about the BBC’s use of TV licence funding, which feeds into why so many people are against the current funding arrangements. As the hon. Member for Warrington North mentioned, there has been a well publicised scandal about the over-inflated salaries being paid and, of course, the inexcusable inequality of women’s pay, whereby a woman presenter is paid substantially less than a male presenter on the same show. That is utterly bizarre and, as I said, inexcusable.

If we look at how viewers in Scotland are treated, we see that only 72% of the licence fee raised in Scotland is actually spent in Scotland. That does not compare well with the situation in other devolved nations. The hon. Lady spoke about the BBC’s fantastic football coverage. I would point out that Gary Lineker gets paid more to present “Match of the Day” than the whole Scottish premiership gets for its highlights package. To me that is simple proof of the tunnel vision the BBC has at executive level.

The BBC’s coverage of the Scottish referendum was frankly woeful at times, and from what I can tell its coverage of Catalonia and the violence perpetrated by the Spanish state has also been sadly wanting. I say “from what I can tell” because I must put on record that I am actually one of the people in Scotland who does not hold a TV licence. I choose to withdraw my funding. It is all legal and above board: I do not watch live TV any more, and neither does my wife. That was a choice we made, but I think it shows how the current model might not be sustainable. Myself and my wife made that choice following the Scottish referendum. We no longer watch live TV, and we do not miss it. It shows that if a habit is broken, it can be hard to mend it.

[Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)]

Has the hon Gentleman suffered the trauma that many people who have ceased watching television have suffered of repeatedly getting letters from TV Licensing insisting that it gets access to the property to prove that they do watch?

[Alan Brown]

Yes, I did suffer that. I alluded to what my constituent has had to put up with, and it was the same for our household, which was bombarded with letters that became increasingly threatening. My wife, who does all my paperwork, contacted TV Licensing and filled in an opt-out form online. That kept it at bay, although the letters have started again, so we need to go through the process again. That shows that people are continually assumed guilty rather than innocent.

From a Scottish perspective, the BBC has resisted calls for a “Scottish six” programme for years. It appears to have caved in to Unionist politicians who have pressurised it, in the fear that a national and international news programme created in Scotland, the same way as Radio Scotland is managed, would somehow create a nationalist nirvana. That is clearly an absurd proposition. Equally absurd is the UK Government’s resistance to devolving powers over broadcasting to Scotland. That is somehow seen as the Scottish National party trying to get its hands on control of output, whereas the SNP actually called for the measure when we were in opposition. It is a further example of Unionist parties conflating the SNP being in government and control being given to the Scottish Parliament. It is the Scottish Parliament as an institution that would control broadcasting powers if they were devolved to Scotland.

[Huw Merriman]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the BBC has a very difficult task when it comes to balancing the changing landscape of our institutions and politics? Some matters are devolved to Scotland, others are not. It is therefore difficult for the BBC to ride two horses, as it were—perhaps in the same way as it is for us.

[Alan Brown]

Perhaps it is difficult, but with the respected journalism that we have heard about today, it should not be too difficult for the BBC to ride those two horses. I must say that it failed spectacularly during the recent general election in Scotland. It allowed too much of the audience participation debates about the general election in Scotland to focus on devolved matters, rather than on matters reserved for Westminster, and that clouded the issues. The BBC needs to work harder on drawing the distinction between devolved matters and reserved matters.

[Gareth Johnson]

I just wonder how the hon. Gentleman knows so much about the BBC coverage of late when he does not watch the BBC.

[Alan Brown]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention—I must say that I anticipated it. I actually watched some of the key set-piece debates that the BBC showed at my parents’ house, so it became a family gathering. [Hon. Members: “Ah!”] Yes—that helped to spark internal family debate while we watched the television. It took shouting at the television to a different level.

To conclude, I have highlighted many issues with the current TV licensing system and the operation of the BBC.

[Bill Grant]

My hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) beat me to that intervention.

I do not recognise the concerns of the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) about the BBC’s performance in Scotland. Having been a councillor for 10 years and in Parliament for a short period, I have never had a complaint about BBC Scotland, and I do not see it in the way that he does. The public seem to value and appreciate BBC Scotland and the BBC in general. It may be a political perspective that he is giving this afternoon, but it is certainly not a public one.

[Alan Brown]

I do not pretend to speak for the entire public. I am expressing a view, but it is one shared by many other people. It might be a political view, but politicians clearly have different views, and there are always two sides to an argument. I recall Ian Davidson calling “Newsnight Scotland” “Newsnat” and having a pop at the then presenters. It could perhaps be said that when the BBC annoys those on both sides of an argument, it is doing its job. I am not saying that the entire public share my view, but it is shared by many people who have the same kind of political allegiances.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

With regard to the point made by the hon. Member for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (Bill Grant), in a study published by the UK Government around the time of the White Paper on the BBC, in 2016, Scots gave a score of 5.8 on general favourability towards the BBC, which was the lowest of any UK demographic.

[Alan Brown]

I thank my hon. Friend for that helpful intervention. It certainly makes the case and is a strong rebuttal to the previous intervention.

I am trying to reach a conclusion, which all hon. Members will be grateful for. As I said, I have highlighted many issues with the current TV licensing system and the operation of the BBC. I do have sympathy for those who have called for the scrapping of the TV licence, but I am also well aware that we need to be aware of the Trojan horse aspect of some of the other vested interests, such as the Murdoch empire. We certainly want to allow true public broadcasting services to be able to continue and thrive—I mean that sincerely—so to that end, I appreciate that the TV licence still serves a purpose. However, as I started by saying, reform of the enforcement process is required, and as per the recent observations of the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport, the licence fee cannot continue indefinitely as a funding model for the BBC. Certainly a different model will be required at some point in the future.

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[Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mrs Moon. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones), the Chair of the Petitions Committee, on introducing the debate. Her speech was comprehensive and extremely well delivered.

I rise to support the BBC and the licence fee, which are often seen as interchangeable by their opponents. The licence fee is often used as a proxy to attack the BBC. The BBC is under attack, whether by the SNP, which is still smarting from the result of the Scottish independence referendum and looking for someone to blame; by activists on the far left, including their deplorable condemnation of Laura Kuenssberg, putting out fake news that she would speak at an event at the Tory party conference; or by those on the right of the political spectrum who say that the BBC is full of lefties—if only it was.

The BBC has to be defended. The hon. Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson), who is not in his place, talked about the licence fee being the least worst option. In a similar, semi-humorous way, I might suggest that if the BBC is being attacked politically from all sides, perhaps it is getting something right.

I have to say to my good friend, the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown), that he is missing out. He cannot watch everything, because the volume of output from the BBC, across all its channels and radio stations, is so great. There must be something on that he could enjoy and take something from. He is a good friend of mine, but he is cutting off his nose to spite his face. By not watching the BBC, he is missing out. He puts me in mind of the families who cut themselves off from the electricity grid in the 1970s and ’80s, because they did not want electricity generated by nuclear power. They would sit around a candle. I say to him, “Come back. Give the BBC a chance,” because there is some really good stuff on there.

[Alan Brown]

When I last checked, I still had my nose, so I have not cut my nose off to spite my face. It is good of the hon. Gentleman to do the BBC’s bidding and implore me to come back, but I made a conscious choice and truthfully, I do not miss watching live TV. It is interesting that he says there is so much choice, but I do not miss that.

[Christian Matheson]

The hon. Gentleman has an excellent and an excellent nose and an excellent face. I am a big fan of Radio 6 Music. I know that politicians are supposed to listen to the “Today” programme, but I do not; I listen to Shaun Keaveny on the breakfast show on Radio 6. The BBC’s flagship programme at the moment is “Blue Planet”. I want to address the point made by my hon. Friend the Chair of the Petitions Committee about the ability to invest in programmes such as “Blue Planet”. There was a remarkable scene a couple of episodes back that involved filming a huge shoal of millions of groupers that were about to spawn, with sharks circling to eat the groupers as they gathered. The film crew went down, but the groupers had not spawned; they went down the next day, and the groupers had spawned and left. So what did the BBC film crew do? They waited a year, and then they came back to a similar area the next year. That level of commitment, investment and astonishing quality would not be possible without the security and certainty that the licence fee gives.

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[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Moon. The debate has been excellent, with a significant degree of cross-party consensus on the licence fee and the BBC. I join others in congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones) and her Committee on presenting this debate for our discussion today.

My hon. Friend made an excellent speech at the outset of the debate, for which many Members have rightly paid tribute to her. She set out very clearly the terms of the debate and told us how other countries fund their public services. She pointed out right at the outset an issue that the Chair of the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee, the hon. Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins), raised later in an intervention, which is that there is a limited pool of advertising available if the BBC were to move to an advertising model. She also pointed out how the licence fee helps to preserve the independence of the BBC, although it is expensive to collect.

I disagree with my hon. Friend on one point, though. She was rather harsh about CNN in her remarks. In fact, CNN makes some excellent programmes here in the UK, including one of its new shows, which is on at lunchtime, called “CNN Talk”. I recommend it to hon. Members—I think it is on on a Friday. No, I am not on it and I am not being paid for saying that. I simply want to point out that the BBC exerts a positive gravitational pull on other organisations such as CNN in this country. It gives them the incentive to produce good programmes such as “CNN Talk”, which is a new programme that links up well with social media and is about British politics. We should welcome such quality programming being made here in the UK. It is significant to compare that with Fox News, which had to withdraw from the United Kingdom because it could not meet the standards that Ofcom requires for impartiality in our news programming, whereas channels such as CNN and CNN International were able to do so.

The hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman) told us how much he loves “Mrs Brown’s Boys” as well as “Blue Planet”. I was mentioned on “Michael McIntyre’s Big Show” on the BBC on Saturday night—fame at last. The hon. Gentleman made an interesting point about the growing use of pundits and political commentators in programmes, and I absolutely agree with him: why not simply ask us politicians on a bit more to give our opinions if people really want to know what is going on in politics?

The hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) does not watch the BBC any more, which is a pity because I always enjoy watching him—along with dozens of other people—on the BBC Parliament channel. He is also missing out on the excellent rugby coverage on BBC Alba, the Gaelic language television service that covers the PRO14 rugby very well indeed. I frequently watch that. I hope he chips in towards the cost of his parents’ TV licence, since he seems to go round there fairly frequently to watch the BBC safely outside his own home.

[Alan Brown]

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the Parliament channel, and certainly many people in Scotland watch that. It is another advantage my wife sees in not having a licence fee, because she is not subject to having to watch BBC Parliament to catch me on it, so it certainly frees up a lot more time for her as well.

[Kevin Brennan]

That may explain why the hon. Gentleman’s wife agreed with the decision not to have a TV licence.

The hon. Member for Eastleigh (Mims Davies) made an excellent speech and highlighted her previous career both in the BBC and in commercial local radio. I completely agreed with the point she made about BBC local radio. In fact, as you will be aware, Mrs Moon, there is a programme late at night on BBC Radio Wales presented by Chris Needs, which I think ought to be funded by the NHS or social services, because it draws in people late at night who might be lonely and have no one else to talk to. It is an extraordinary service to the nation. Sometimes we forget about the role of radio in bringing comfort and companionship to lonely people.

The hon. Lady also advocated flexibility around the TV licence. I understand the point she makes, but there is a danger that if we unpick the simplicity of the licence concept we could get into difficulties. It is already costly to collect. The more we complicate it, the more difficult it will probably be to collect, and that might undermine the whole principle in a way that she would not intend. We should beware of unintended consequences to a suggestion that she makes with the best of intentions.

My hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) rightly condemned both the far left and the far right for their attacks on journalism and on individual BBC journalists. I endorse everything he said. He told us that he had watched “Pobol y Cwm”, the Welsh language soap opera that appears on S4C. He might be aware that the news on S4C is produced by the BBC. It is not parochial news only about Wales; it is an international news programme produced in the Welsh language by the BBC. It does not seek in any way to present the news in a narrow parochial way.

The hon. Member for Solihull (Julian Knight) described his childhood trauma at being the only Julian brought up on his estate. He said that to abolish the BBC would be an act of “cultural vandalism”. I completely endorse that phrase and those remarks. He said there had been a tendency towards “despite Brexit” coverage on the BBC around the time of the referendum, but there was a time when one could not turn on the BBC without Nigel Farage’s visage appearing at every turn. It is a debatable point whether the BBC has been unfair on that particular topic. However, the hon. Gentleman made a good point about Ofcom’s oversight, which I agree is to be welcomed.

The hon. Gentleman made a point about the value of the back catalogue in potentially raising more funds for the BBC. That is a valid point, but licence fee payers have already paid for the back catalogue, so people would be charged twice if they were asked to pay again to access the back catalogue. There is a fine line to be drawn between making public service broadcasting available to people in this country who have already paid for it through the licence fee, and being able to commercialise it in an appropriate manner, perhaps on an international basis.

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[Matt Hancock]

I was just coming on to that. As the BBC’s new regulator, Ofcom will require the BBC to allocate its TV network spend and programme hours based on population, and in Scotland that will mean at least 8% a year. Because the Government represent and govern the whole UK, we are dealing with that point, but the way to do so is to help the BBC ensure that it reflects the whole nation, rather than make unreasonable and mean-spirited attacks on it.

Let me move on to some of the other speeches. My hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh (Mims Davies) expressed her strong support for the BBC, and in particular for the increased transparency and accountability that we have brought to it. I have enormous respect for her—I consider her a friend—but I want to pick up one little thing. She said that people do not have a choice not to pay the licence fee, but as we discovered from the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown), they do have the choice if they do not watch TV or use the iPlayer. It is not a choice that many people exercise, partly because of how brilliant BBC content is, but they do have it.

Many hon. Members called for more flexibility. As part of the BBC charter renewal, we are introducing a contestable fund, which will ensure more flexibility on how licence fee money is spent on different programming. We will introduce details of the contestable fund shortly.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman) made an excellent speech, and he made a point that I want to pick up. He said that content should be neutral. I think that the language we use is incredibly important. I do not think that the BBC should be neutral; I think it should be impartial. There is an important difference between the two. It should not simply take a neutral position between two stated arguments and split the difference. It should carry out an active, muscularly objective, fact-based analysis of the arguments, then put forward an impartial point. That is actually much harder. It requires more judgment and probably more self-confidence. The BBC should be aiming for true impartiality, based on objective analysis of the facts before it. For instance, my hon. Friend mentioned the slip about universal credit this week. I think that, culturally, the BBC should be appalled when a slip or a factual error is made. It happens, although it is rare. We all make mistakes. The BBC’s attitude should not be defensive; rather, it should be open and responsive to criticism.

My hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh and the hon. Member for City of Chester talked about “Blue Planet II” and the value that the BBC can put into productions, but there is a bigger point. Of course, the BBC has great production capacity and can set long-term budgets. The poor, poor producers of “Blue Planet II” had to go to the south Pacific twice in two years— we all feel their pain—because they missed those extraordinary scenes of the fish shooting up while they were spawning, which we enjoyed. But that is changing, and the context is changing—the length of the BBC funding settlement is not changing, which is a good thing, but the context is.

The nature of the internet means that people now reach global audiences quickly, with Netflix the best embodiment of that, so the BBC is increasingly competing against production budgets in the private sector that are predicated on a global audience. Hence Netflix can pay an enormous amount for a production, whereas the BBC relies on licence fee income plus commercial income, largely from Worldwide which is the commercial exploitation of BBC content. I agree, however, that the BBC has an opportunity to broaden where it gets such revenues from, and I was interested that the director-general talked recently about how to make the most of the amazing back catalogue and see whether the BBC could monetise it further in order to put more into production. That was discussed by several Members, and it was interesting.

The hon. Member for East Londonderry (Mr Campbell), with whom I have debated this subject in the past, pushed hard for more transparencies, some of which we are bringing in, especially on pay. He also wants greater transparency in commissioning, and we have been through some of the detail of his concerns. As I have said in the past, the BBC must engage with those concerns and ensure that it listens to them, responding appropriately. Also, I always stand by to assist him in getting the responses he needs.

I come now to my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Peter Heaton-Jones), who made a brilliant speech—a forensic dissection of the petitions worthy of a journalist of 17 years who trained at the BBC. It was also a brilliant exposition of the BBC funding model—he went further than the hon. Member for Cardiff West who said that if we did not have it, we might not invent it—and how, if it did not exist, we might want to invent it as it is. He also made the point, however, about the need not only for a broader range of people but, crucially, a broader range of people reflecting the whole of Britain.

The BBC has a special responsibility for diversity in its broadest sense, not only in the important protected characteristics such as gender, race, sexual orientation and disability. Those are important, but so is ensuring that BBC, in front of and behind the camera, represents and reflects back to us the nation that we live in. There is no doubt that the BBC is the finest mirror we have on our society. It is incumbent on the BBC, from the programme makers through to those who are on screen, to lead rather than to follow, and to ensure that they represent and reflect the whole of the country they serve.

I will touch on a couple of other points. It is clear to me that this debate has broadly reflected the views of the country. Recently we had a charter review, one of the biggest consultations undertaken by Government. We received 192,000 responses and engaged with more than 300 organisations and experts. The process was overseen by my right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale) who is no wet blanket and by no means an instinctive cheerleader for the BBC, yet we have come up with a solution that has a broad consensus of support behind it.

[Alan Brown]

The Minister is moving on from the contributions made by hon. Members, but may I remind him that part of my speech touched on the threatening nature of the letters from, and the harassment and intimidation by, TV Licensing? I was hoping that he might respond to that at some point.

[Matt Hancock]

I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman for reminding me of that, because I had buried the relevant piece of paper underneath an extremely elegant and new description of who is sitting where in the Chamber. The Perry review found that the existing regime is broadly fair and proportionate. However, when it comes to ensuring that those letters are worded appropriately and to their tone, we expect the BBC board to keep that under review, and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will help. Members across the House have spoken about the tone of the letters, and in no circumstances is it reasonable for people to be presumed guilty until they are proven innocent. The opposite is rightly true in the system we have in this country.

I was talking about the scale of the consultation. The existing model has wide public support: 60% of consultation responses indicated that no change was needed to the licence fee model and only 3% favoured full subscription funding. That has been reflected in today’s debate. We are committed to maintaining that model for the duration of the 11-year charter period, which will provide the BBC with the funding certainty that it needs.

There is also a commitment to considering whether elements of subscription have a role to play in future funding alongside the core licence fee model. It is for the BBC to set the scope of those plans, but we expect progress. The success will be appropriately reviewed to feed into the next charter review process. As my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Julian Knight) pointed out, there are ways to add subscription funding on to the core licence fee—BBC Worldwide does that already—and the BBC’s existing content is a huge potential source of wealth.

In wrapping up, let me say that if we assess the value for money of the BBC, for approximately 40p a day we are offered an unrivalled range of services, including seven national TV services, more than 50 radio services and digital services including the iPlayer, as well as some of the further efforts that the BBC makes on education. That represents great value for licence fee payers. The introduction of the contestable fund; the need to consider the future of children’s content, which was raised by the hon. Member for Cardiff West; the need to ensure that local areas of the country are fairly represented; the support for local news; and, in this era of an increasingly disrupted and diverse range of news sources, the need for objective, factual news domestically and around the world, mean that the case for the BBC as funded by the licence fee is incredibly strong.

Ultimately, our democratic discourse and our freedom as a nation are underpinned by having a debate based on an agreed set of facts that can be objectively verified. In this disruptive digital world, the BBC plays a vital role in helping to improve the quality of that public discussion and in enhancing the quality of public understanding. Although I would push it harder on diversity of thought and distinctiveness of programming, the value that the BBC adds to our public debate and of course to our enjoyment, whether on a Saturday night or at any other time, is second to none.

Before I end, let me add that the support for S4C, which was mentioned by the hon. Member for Ogmore (Chris Elmore), is incredibly important. With that, I bring this lively debate to an end. I submit that we have faithfully debated the petitions and I look forward to continuing this debate in the months and years ahead.