Media Convergence: Communications Committee Report

Lord Gordon of Strathblane Excerpts

Wednesday 30th October 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Gordon of Strathblane (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure immediately to follow the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, and thus be the first to have an opportunity to congratulate him not only on securing this debate but on his skilful chairmanship, navigating us through the undergrowth of a very difficult subject, which could easily have led us off in tangential directions. Instead, we managed to focus on some main issues, which he adumbrated this afternoon.

I am one of those who believe that the invention of the internet may well turn out to be more important in human history than the invention of printing. One known unknown is that we cannot predict the nature of the change that is coming about, any more than people could have forecast that one of the prime uses of mobile phones would be text messaging. One known, however, is that it will all happen very fast. The noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, was right to draw attention to the importance of flexibility in the Government’s response. For that reason, the super-affirmative procedure is probably the best way forward from a legislative point of view. I add a further suggestion: it would be useful if the next communications Act did not try to go into too much detail. After all, we have got by in public service broadcasting for a very long time with the simple words, “inform, educate and entertain”. If we left legislation giving us general objectives and then left it to regulatory authorities to use common sense in applying those in the circumstances of the time, the legislation would stand the test of time rather better.

The Communications Act 2003, to which reference has already been made, did not contain much in the way of references to the internet, although I seconded a successful amendment, tabled by the Earl of Northesk, making it an obligation of Ofcom to ensure widespread access to high-speed data transfer, which is the same thing as broadband. The internet was felt then to be different from broadcasting, in that it was a pull-down rather than a push-out medium. Therefore, both libertarians and others united in thinking that we did not need to regulate the internet. My sense is that that is not the public feeling today; we most certainly do need to regulate it. At a minimum, we all agree that we should not allow child pornography on the internet, or incitement and aid to terrorism. However, if we are able to do it for those two subjects, we could do it for a whole range of others, so the decision is about whether we want to regulate, not whether we are inhibited by the technology from doing so at all.

I would like to concentrate mainly on the main theme of the report, content standards. We would all concede that the main argument for public service broadcasting has lost two of its main pillars of support; scarcity of frequencies does not now apply. But as Professor Tommaso Valletti told the committee during the inquiry, the economic argument has gone, but the BBC is the envy of the world—“Why break it?”. That is very much my feeling. It could also be said that PVRs have reduced the power of programme scheduling to create high-quality programmes and get a large audience for them. Some 45 years ago, I presented a political programme on television which secured a somewhat larger audience than would normally be expected for political programmes. I would like to think that it was the intrinsic quality of the programme; realistically, I think that it had a lot more to do with the fact that it was sandwiched between “News at Ten” and “New York Police Department”, and remote controls had not yet been invented, so people could not be bothered to get out of their armchairs to switch me off.

Public service broadcasting is worth preserving and, indeed, encouraging outwith the traditional sector. How can we do that? One way is charging for spectrum. The report is ambivalent on whether we should do this but draws attention to its difficulty. It would remove more funds from public service broadcasters which could otherwise be concentrated on programming. I firmly think that there should be no charge for spectrum for public service broadcasters. That would provide an incentive for more people to provide public service programming.

The noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, referred to EPG prominence, which is also important. I suggest that getting some payment from the platform provider could be addressed. If the trade-off is that there should no longer be a “must carry” obligation on the part of the platform provider, it would enable us to find out what the real market rate for a programme was. After all, the bulk of viewing on Sky is still of traditional PSB broadcasters. It would not want to do without the BBC. Why should it get a payment from the BBC for broadcasting programmes that are one of its main attractions? It is interesting and somewhat ironic that, in the United States, Fox Television is leading the charge for precisely that—payment from cable providers over there.

We also face new forms of broadcasting, to use that omnibus word, and we will need regulation to ensure prominence in non-linear broadcasting television sets. During a visit to the BBC’s Blue Room, the committee was somewhat taken aback to find what we would regard as a traditional television set on which programmes came fairly well down the line. First, you are exposed to various products of the television manufacturer, gaming, online games and everything else and then, finally, you get through to an EPG programme guide. I think that we have all assumed that television sets are passive; they are not now. We must ensure that broadcasting—public service broadcasting in particular—gets due prominence. That was alluded to by Mr Simon Pitts of ITV, whose remarks were reported in paragraph 163 of the report. That will clearly be an issue.

The noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, also referred to what he called TV-like content: things that are received on the same television set side-by-side with traditional public service broadcasting programmes. I think that most of us would shy away from the idea that they should all be regulated as public service broadcasters, but I think that there was a general sense that it would be a good idea if they aspired to produce good programming. Perhaps the kitemark idea is the best way forward. After all, people have a vested interest in being respected. The advertising industry supports the Advertising Standards Authority. Ofcom ensures that it operates, but the industry does it itself because it is in its self-interest. I do not want to go to a chemist who is unregulated; I do not want to go on holiday with an unregulated travel company. Regulation is in the self-interest of the provider.

The British Board of Film Classification has established age categorisation that has stood the test of time and, I think, could be expanded into other spheres of programming. People will make substantial edits to their film to secure a better classification that will ensure a wider audience. That is a good example of enlightened self-interest.

Moving on to what has been referred to in the report as the wild west of the internet, it might be made a little less unruly if the internet providers—four big companies control 85% of the market—could be persuaded that it was, again, in their self-interest to ensure that the more undesirable aspects of programming were simply not broadcast. Name and shame them if they do not do it and they will come round to the idea. We could make a lot of progress in this way.

Finally, the BBC represents a major market intervention —in general, overwhelmingly for the public good. However, during our visit to the Telegraph Media Group, our attention was drawn to the danger of the BBC crowding out other providers by its expansion on to the web. If the BBC is providing a good free online service, it is increasingly difficult for newspaper publishers to erect paywalls and thus to secure payment for content that is often expensive to provide.

The collection of the licence fee has been greatly aided by a requirement to notify of a purchase of a television set. A licence fee request will then follow. However, television can now be watched on smartphones, laptops and other devices. Requiring anyone who buys a smartphone to buy a television licence would, I think, be unsupportable and could well lead to the loss of the licence fee altogether. The alternative is to find another way of funding the BBC. On that gloomy note, I renew my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood.