BBC White Paper
Debate between Julian Knight and Liz McInnes
Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)
The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (John Nicolson) mentioned his BBC past, so I too should declare that I spent five of my happiest years at the BBC, where many of the people I worked with were some of the finest professionals I have worked with anywhere. Many of them existed on low salaries, very much in contrast to the supposed talent that so often fills our pages. That is not a moan about my own salary, of course.
One of the main duties of any Government is the maintenance of our country’s most important institutions, of which the BBC is undoubtedly one; millions enjoy its output every year. For me, though, that does not mean keeping it flush with public money and shielding it from change; it means fighting for reforms that ensure its long-term sustainability and relevance to the modern world. While it produces many excellent programmes and is an important part of the UK’s extraordinary global influence, it is becoming increasingly apparent—except, perhaps, to the corporation’s most highly paid stars—that the BBC must change further. Its broadcasting model, based on the idea of millions of families watching live broadcasts, is increasingly becoming outdated. It has expanded far beyond its initial remit, in some cases smothering independent local journalism in the process, and it has done all that by levying what is one of Britain’s most regressive taxes—the licence fee.
The White Paper on the renewal of the BBC charter offers us the opportunity to do some very important things: to refocus the corporation on the core functions that justify its present place as a state-funded broadcaster; and, I trust, to wean it off the licence fee gradually, over the longer term, and to open itself up to the calming winds of competition and outside production.
When I was setting out on my career, I and many other journalists got our first jobs at thriving local papers. Such papers provided British journalism with a natural talent-scouting system, and that has profited all of us, including the BBC. The BBC was never meant to compete with newspapers, yet the BBC News website now undercuts a lot of independent local—and, at times, national—journalism. Local journalists, working directly in their communities, provide an irreplaceable public service. Can the BBC put journalists everywhere local newspapers currently employ them? Of course not. By contrast, the BBC now seems to concentrate jobs in London and Manchester, and even major cities are suffering the consequences. In my experience, BBC Birmingham is all too often treated not even as Cinderella: frankly, we are not even allowed to sweep the floor when it comes to BBC largesse. I very much applaud the campaign by the Birmingham Post and the Birmingham Mail to try to get a fairer deal for our region.
When the move was made to Manchester, it was lauded because it would increase regional diversity, but in some respects the corporation saw that as the beginning and the end of the process of attempting to reduce its overdependence on the capital. In many ways, the biggest effect has been to increase house prices in leafy Cheshire suburbs, rather than to create genuine regional diversity.
Liz McInnes (Heywood and Middleton) (Lab)
As a Greater Manchester MP, I feel that the BBC’s move to Salford—not Manchester—has done a lot to improve its diversity, and it is nice to hear a lot of northern accents on the radio these days, which did not use to happen.
Julian Knight
What has actually happened is that we have created a bipolar organisation. There has been a move out of other regions, such as Birmingham and other parts of the United Kingdom, to these two centres. That was the natural consequence of the huge sums that were invested. I am not jealous of Salford in that it is obviously fantastic for that community. However, I think the BBC thought, when it came up with this process, that its work was done. I would like genuine diversity, including for the nations, as is discussed in the White Paper, but really for the English regions, with the BBC drilling down into local communities to deliver news and content that makes a difference, but also supporting the private sector.
Current proposals for the BBC to use local newspaper content, such as court circulars and documents—court reporting—are better than nothing, but it is a sad indictment that some local newspapers will now be used, frankly, as wire services for the BBC News website. Previous Governments were rather flat-footed in updating the BBC charter for the online age, and slow to recognise the dangers this unimpeded growth posed to independent journalism and regional diversity.
Another anachronism holding the BBC back over the long term is the licence fee. This might seem strange, given the ferocity with which the BBC’s supporters have fought to defend it, but I believe nothing is doing more to prevent the corporation’s adaptation to the modern world of multi-platform working. My wife and I grew up in a world of mass broadcasts and TV specials watched by tens of millions, yet the number of times a month we watch live TV together these days can be counted on one hand. That is not just due to working in this place, but is genuinely encountered by many people around the country. To younger people raised in the days of on-demand services, Netflix and YouTube, that vanished era is not even a memory, yet the BBC remains committed—addicted—to the regressive tax of the licence fee.
If we came up with a licence fee today, how could we justify it? It is a flat levy—the same for rich and poor alike—which is charged to anybody watching British programming, regardless of whether they consume BBC services or not, and it is backed by the threat of criminal prosecution. It really does not have any place in the broadcasting model for the 21st century.
Hospital Parking Charges (Exemption for Carers) Bill
Debate between Julian Knight and Liz McInnes(9 years, 1 month ago)
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Liz McInnes
I appreciate that, but it always comes as a surprise to the wider public to hear that staff have to pay to park at their own place of work. I am sure that there would be an uproar if such charges were introduced for our exclusive car park facilities in this place. I know that the staff’s objections to having to pay to park at their place of work have been ignored. We have been protesting about it for many, many years. However, I am not here to talk about staff; I just wanted to make people aware that that practice still goes on. I have always seen it as a tax on coming to work.
We are here to talk about carers. I want to use Pennine Acute as an example. Most recently, it has engaged a private parking company, the income of which comes solely from administering fines to people who have parked incorrectly or who have not paid the right amount of money. The business of this private parking company depends on people contravening parking regulations; it actually wants people to contravene parking regulations, because that is the only way that it gets any income.
When I worked at the hospital, I was a workplace rep for Unite the union. I dealt with a lot of staff who were very, very distressed about the letters they had received from this company, demanding a fine that had to be paid by a certain day, and if they did not pay it by that day, the fine would go up. They were given the opportunity to appeal. If the appeal was not successful, some people found that they had to pay an inflated fine because they had had the temerity to appeal.
With regard to my hon. Friend’s private Member’s Bill, my main concern is about carers. What would happen to them if they were to get one of those bills? At least members of staff, if they are in a trade union, can go to a rep and get some help to deal with the situation. I worry about private parking contractors, because they exist solely to make money out of people. Exempting carers from car parking charges would bring much needed clarity to the matter. It would stop these exploitative companies from making money out of them.
Julian Knight
Could the hon. Lady’s local hospital trust not write such a policy into its contract? It would then have discretion over the fines. It would not need to fine carers in a particular situation. That would give them some flexibility, whereas in this scenario, there is no flexibility at all.
Liz McInnes
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, but I am not clear what his point is. He said that the trust could put it into a contract that carers would not be charged—[Interruption.] He means in the contracts of the parking contractor.
Liz McInnes
That would bring us to the issue of how we identify carers, which we have already talked about at length. If we introduce this Bill, it would be clear that carers were exempt. They could approach the hospital trust with evidence that they are in receipt of carer’s allowance. Their registration number would be taken and a badge would be produced with that registration number on, so that there would be no possibility of people transferring permits. They would be valid for only one vehicle. It would take a lot of the stress and worry out of parking at hospital for carers. There has been a lot of talk about how difficult it would be to administer the schemes, but actually it would be fairly simple.
Much is wrong with hospital car parking charges. I applaud the Scottish and Welsh health services for removing the charges. The imposition of car parking charges in England means that staff and others are being treated as a cash cow. While the rate that those charges are put up every single year is way above inflation, hospital staff are suffering from either a pay freeze, or a 1% below-inflation pay rise, which they get only if the Secretary of State deigns to bestow it on them. We really need to look at the whole situation with car parking charges in English hospitals, but at the moment we are considering parking for carers.
At Pennine Acute, there were informal arrangements, to which the hon. Member for Bury North has already referred. Frequent visitors who were in the know could approach the ward manager or departmental manager to ask for help and an exemption from car parking charges if that was available. People need to know that these exemptions exist; that is the problem. This Bill would not cost the NHS a great deal of money, because those in the know are aware that they can ask for exemptions. This Bill is about clarity, so that the exemptions are available to everybody and nobody is kept in the dark about them. That is why we need this Bill.
I fully support the Bill. Points have been made about hospitals introducing car parking fees, but unless a hospital is near a major shopping centre or bang in the middle of a town centre, people will park at a hospital only to visit, attend as a patient or carer or work there, and people should not be penalised for doing any of those things.
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Burnley for introducing this Bill, and I hope that she is successful in removing charges for carers and bringing much needed clarity to what is a very confused situation. Legislation is long overdue. Hopefully, following the introduction of this Bill, we will look at charges for others—patients, visitors and staff. If it is good enough for Scotland and Wales, it is good enough for England. The policy would be very well received in Heywood and Middleton as well as across the country.