Oral Answers to Questions

John McDonnell Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Huddleston]

I thank my hon. Friend for his continued passion and support for the sector throughout the country, let alone in his own fantastic constituency, which I have also had the pleasure of visiting. Perhaps I have travelled a bit too much, although I am sure there is no such thing.

This issue was indeed raised by my hon. Friend’s constituents during the conversation that we had earlier this week, and they provided some compelling information. I make the commitment to him and his constituents that we will look very carefully at the issues raised, and that I will work across Departments to see what solutions can be found.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

8. What steps she is taking to strengthen and promote public service broadcasting.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Matt Warman)]

Public service broadcasting remains critical to the UK’s media landscape, and the Government are committed to ensuring that it continues to thrive. We will present proposals in the form of a broadcasting White Paper to update the existing public service broadcasting framework later this year.

[John McDonnell]

I admit I was hoping that the Secretary of State would answer this question so that I could say “from one red to another”, although maybe not in the full range of meaning of that term. I am the secretary of the National Union of Journalists parliamentary group. NUJ members are concerned about the future of public broadcasting, because of the sale of Channel 4, because of the 25% cut that has already been incurred at the BBC and because of reports that the Government are considering refusing even an inflation-rate increase in the BBC licence fee. Will the Minister meet a delegation from the NUJ parliamentary group to discuss these concerns?

[Matt Warman]

As a former member of the NUJ myself, it would be churlish to refuse.