Local Radio: BBC Proposals

Debate between Jamie Stone and Mike Penning

Thursday 22nd June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Sir Mike Penning]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. This is about people. The way that the human resources people and the hierarchy at the BBC have handled this is appalling for a public body. It is so wrong that people are petrified, and have been for months, about whether they have a job. They are being told, “If you don’t accept the job we are going to offer you, you will be out the door.”

Ofcom has responsibility here. More than 600,000 people took part in the consultation that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport held on Channel 4, whereas Ofcom’s review of the BBC operating licence had 12 people respond to it. I cannot believe that Ofcom believes that that is representation in a consultation on the future of the BBC. I cannot believe Ofcom just sat back on that. It has a responsibility to make sure that the BBC fulfils its obligations to the people who pay the licence fee—a fee they have no choice but to pay.

[Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)]

As Members are fully aware, I hail from the far north of Scotland and once upon a time I was a councillor up there. The BBC was well staffed in those days and I bear the scars of its reporting on me. I did not like it at the time but, by God, that is what local democracy was about, and it was properly reported. That is part and parcel of the way we do things in this country, even as far away as where I live. This cutback will fundamentally undermine proper local democracy in remote places such as the far north of Scotland.