Broadcasting (Radio Multiplex Services) Bill

David Morris Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 13th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Foster]

My hon. Friend makes the fantastic point that sometimes a community radio operation can take a broadcasting risk that a large-scale commercial operation, or even the BBC, with its requirement to satisfy licence-fee payers that their payments offer value for money, cannot take, and can develop a service and show that it works. Earlier this week we were talking about the Green Investment Bank, which was started to address a perceived market failure, but now private investors want to take it on and develop some of its actions into a profit-making venture because they believe the market has changed. As my hon. Friend points out, broadcasting is the same.

A service that may not be seen as inherently profitable, or as something that a broadcaster would want to launch fully commercially, could be allowed to build its name in a community setting. Indeed, an individual can build their abilities and talents with a community service, allowing them to move on in broadcasting more generally. Community services would effectively act as an incubator for what might become successful and popular services. However, if people cannot make that jump, we are in essence restricting the options to those who are tech-savvy and can go online to access such content. People will then find that there are no community services out there when they tune in on their DAB radio, or they will have to rely on FM technology, which clearly puts them at a disadvantage because of the quality of the output they will be able to produce.

The Bill would fix the issue with the scale of digital broadcasting by allowing the creation and licensing of smaller-scale multiplexes that can operate in a local area, giving a new opportunity to create the infrastructure to deliver digital radio. I make it clear that the technology has moved on hugely since the House last considered these issues.

[David Morris (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Con)]

I declare an interest, because I wrote songs in the 1980s. I do not know whether that has anything to do with this debate, but I am just covering myself.

On a serious note, if I remember rightly the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham), when he was Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, announced that he wanted the old analogue system to go digital sooner rather than later. At that time, the public expected that that would occur quickly. Will my hon. Friend clarify the situation?

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[Kevin Foster]

The infrastructure currently is not in place, and we are dealing here with creating the licensing for small-scale multiplexes to allow its creation. On the costs, we know that the existing multiplexes work reasonably well for larger-scale operators; as I have mentioned, those with a turnover of more than £1 million might find this an option for them, although some would debate whether there is, in effect, a monopoly in some areas. I am not looking to affect that situation; I seek to create an opportunity for small-scale operations. The feedback from the industry is strongly that the opportunity is there and the technology is there in an affordable way, particularly with the potential use of tall buildings, rather than having to build separate broadcast masts, but the opportunity of licensing is not in place legally.

As I have said, this is not about forcing anyone to do anything: the Bill does not compel the Minister to provide a service by subsidy; and it does not compel the BBC to spend licence fee money in setting something up—it gives people an opportunity to set something up. My strong belief is that there is genuine demand to take this step, for reasons that I will set out in a moment, but if we do not do it, we are merely blocking it out in legislative terms. We have seen the impact of the trial, with new services coming along. We have seen those develop and flourish, but if we do not want to create that opportunity, we have to ask why not.

[David Morris]

rose—

[Kevin Foster]

I will briefly give way, but I should start to make some more progress.

[David Morris]

I thank my hon. Friend for being so generous in giving way, and I just want to clarify something. If the demand is there—as he said, people could be utilising this technology on laptops—would that not eventually drive the cost down?

[Kevin Foster]

Indeed, and I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. As we have seen in the past, as things have become easier and industries have grown and developed, the costs have fallen. I am convinced that we would see the costs fall significantly in this area if there was more ability to do it. The fact that small-scale multiplexes would exist would reduce the straight broadcasting costs—that would be a key benefit of this Bill; people would no longer have to pay for coverage over a very large area that they did not really need. All the evidence about technology and broadcasting has shown that as time goes on, things get cheaper. As people are able to innovate and use their creative speciality, things get cheaper. We can look back to 50 years ago to see that when we were overly tough in our regulatory system of broadcasting onshore, we ended up with people in radio stations operating from ships just outside our territorial waters to flagrantly get around a licensing system that had become out of date and irrelevant, with its basis in another era. If we are not creating opportunities for this sort of industry to flourish, all we do is push people on to the internet, thereby restricting choice and people’s ability to listen to new and interesting services that may well be able to be provided at much lower cost than has been possible in the past.

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[Mr Nuttall]

I accept that. In making that intervention, my hon. Friend draws attention to another point I was going to make about the Bill, which is that, in many ways, it raises more questions than it answers. Because of its use of words such as “may”, it does not make it clear what will actually happen. When we hear from my right hon. Friend the Minister, I hope he will give us more clarity about exactly how this will play out. There are competing interests, and I can understand that the commercial interests of the larger operators mean they will not want it to be made easier for new competitors to join the market, but that is no reason not to allow new entrants to the market, and more competition would be a good thing for the larger operators.

I particularly support the Bill because I want my area to be able to benefit from the possibility of having its own commercial or non-commercial radio station—a community station. There is, or has been in the past, something called Project 29 radio operating in Bury, and I appeared on it from time to time. It was a very small-scale operation, operating from the centre of Bury with a very small staff, who worked on a volunteer basis, and running community programmes. That sort of small-scale community radio station will be able to benefit if the Bill goes ahead and it is made easier for small operators to be given a digital licence, to operate with modern equipment, which, by definition, would be the latest available, and to broadcast over a relatively small area—smaller, for example, than the whole of Greater Manchester or the whole of Lancashire.

I am conscious of the fact that many Members want to give their time to this debate, so I do not want to extend my remarks unduly, but I do want to refer to the trials that were allowed last year by Ofcom. My hon. Friend the Member for Torbay touched on this. Three different types of trial were allowed, covering different sorts of equipment at different levels of cost. I will not go into all the detail, but the cost of the equipment involved ranged from £9,000, to £17,000, to £19,000. Different licensees were given the different types of equipment to try it out and to see how efficiently it operated. The results are all set out in Ofcom’s report. It is a lengthy document that it would take some time to read all the way through, but it is worth while for those who are interested to study it, because it sets out the detail of the nature of the equipment and how successful it was.

More importantly, perhaps, the end of the report covers the technical scope for the wider roll-out of DAB. In essence, although we can solve the problem of the legislative framework and create a licensing regime, there is an underlying problem about the frequency blocks that DAB operates on. The bands are fixed, and there is not much we can do about that. At the moment, DAB transmitters in the UK use the VHS band 3 frequency blocks, which range from approximately 211 MHz to 229 MHz, known as blocks 10 to 13. Those frequencies provide the spectrum to support the existing three national DAB multiplexes and the 58 local commercial DAB multiplexes.

When Ofcom looked at the prospects for small-scale DAB trials, it was clear right from the outset that further spectrum would be required. Because DAB radio receivers can also tune into lower frequencies than those currently used in the UK, Ofcom examined the availability of frequencies below 211 MHz for use during the trials. It also carried out an initial study looking at whether it would be technically feasible to develop a future frequency plan for small-scale DAB that might provide an opportunity for small commercial and community stations, which currently transmit only on analogue radio, to be carried on DAB. This goes back to the argument about whether we can ever transfer everything on to DAB, because we need the frequencies available to be able to do so, not just the legislative framework. The study says that

“in most areas of the UK, it should be technically possible to develop a frequency plan for small scale DAB which might accommodate those stations”,

so the position is not completely clear-cut, even for Ofcom. It concludes:

“However much more detailed planning and optimisation work would be required to develop a frequency plan which could be implemented in practice.”

[David Morris]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the whole point of this Bill is to enable smaller multiplexes to be set up, creating the network across the country that Ofcom would like to see?

[Mr Nuttall]

Yes, I do agree—that is exactly what the Bill seeks to do. However, as I said, the Bill, of itself, will not achieve that—it will need to be followed up with action from the Department. I hope the Minister can assure the House that if this Bill reaches the statute book, his Department will act speedily in bringing forward the appropriate order to make use of it. I wish the Bill well as it proceeds and hope it receives a Second Reading.

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[David Morris (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Seema Kennedy) and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Torbay (Kevin Foster) on securing this spot in the Chamber. I have to declare an interest: I used to write songs in the 1980s, which always cheers up my hon. Friends.

[Oliver Colvile]

Does my hon. Friend still get royalties?

[David Morris]

That would be telling.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. If Mr Colvile is to ask a question like that, he has to name the tune he is referring to.

[David Morris]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker.

Digital radio affects areas of the UK that should have been honed in on a very long time ago. As I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Torbay earlier, when the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) was Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, his ambition was to have digital radio take over from analogue. My hon. Friend stated that his proposal would involve an optional request from the broadcasting industry, but it must be taken seriously.

We have a few good radio stations in the Morecambe and Lunesdale area, including The Bay radio. Its website states that there is no DAB solution for it currently, but it covers low-lying areas in my constituency and leading all the way up into the Lake district, touching on the Scottish borders. It says on its website that people who want to find the coverage area can click on the application. The option that my hon. Friend has put forward for the broadcasting industry and for the House to consider would help my local radio station immeasurably, and help the people in those communities to keep in touch with what is going on around them.

About 12 months ago, we were hit with the most horrendous floods we have ever seen. There was a power cut, and the only lifeline in the whole area to find out what was going on was The Bay, our local radio station.

[Jo Churchill]

Today of all days, I should like to reiterate how important that last point is. On the east coast, particularly in Suffolk, we have the challenge of the possibility of flooding. As my hon. Friend says, and as my hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Seema Kennedy) has often said, when flooding comes there is not much warning. Enabling community radio stations to give more information is a good thing.

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[David Morris]

I agree with my hon. Friend and thank her for that helpful intervention, which leads me to what happened with The Bay radio. It was flooded and ran the whole operation off a laptop from the first floor of a building. My hon. Friend the Member for Torbay said in his speech that laptops come in very handy for that kind of broadcasting, but one problem is that costs can be prohibitive, which was highlighted by my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall). It is costly to get licences, but with demand, costs are driven down.

I hope the Minister looks on the proposal favourably. We must go forward and progress—if we do not, it will cost us. The radio industry has had certain problems over the years, not least having such a measure to help out in the first place. If The Bay had had DAB, people in the areas to which it broadcasts would have been better informed about what was going on within their localities. Not just my constituency was affected; Lancaster and constituencies further up towards Carlisle were also affected. During the floods, I met the then Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart). Not many people knew that he was running around the vicinity trying to sort out the problems and that he was working very hard, purely and simply because communications broke down in the area. The power cut in my vicinity lasted nearly two days.

Radio is a lifeline for communities. We should enhance the industry and not curtail it. The measure proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for Torbay is very welcome indeed. Larger broadcasters such as the BBC would welcome it because it would drive their costs down. I am not being more favourable to one radio station than to others. I have not mentioned them all, but I must plug Beyond Radio—I am sure it will use it in its jingles.

We must look at this in a sensible and grown-up manner. DAB is the way forward and the future. It was for the right and collegiate reasons that the former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Leigh, wanted to push the project forward, but we have yet to see that.

[Kevin Foster]

My hon. Friend refers to what the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) suggested when he was the Cabinet Minister responsible. The Bill is not about that specifically, but does my hon. Friend agree that, if ever there is a move to digital, we need to ensure that all three layers of radio are represented—national, commercial and community—on the digital spectrum?

[David Morris]

I totally agree. I pay homage to my hon. Friend for his research on the Bill and for speaking for one hour, largely without notes. I was in the music industry once, and it shames me to say that I did not know half of what my hon. Friend told us. His Bill would be a big help to the industry as a whole and I am sure that it will welcome it.