Public Service Broadcasting (Communications and Digital Committee Report)

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

Thursday 27th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, with his enormous experience as a very distinguished DCMS Minister. I encourage him to spend a bit more time sharing his experiences with us, since he clearly has a lot to say on some of the most topical issues, some of which we will discuss later. I declare my interest as a member of the Communications and Digital Committee, although, like the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, I was not a member when this excellent report was published. I also declare my interest as a former director of the British Film Institute.

Like others, I thank the committee’s chair, the noble Lord, Lord Gilbert, for his fine introduction of the report and his excellent questions, which I hope the Minister will respond to at the end of the debate. I also echo the noble Lord’s concerns about the delay in debating this important report. The committee system of your Lordships’ House is one of its absolute crown jewels, and it is extraordinary that we have had to wait so long for a debate on an issue such as this. The good thing is that it is still timely, although that may not be true for some of the other reports waiting in the queue. I also welcome my noble friend Lady Merron to our Front Bench and thank her for covering the important DCMS brief.

Given the time constraints and the fact that I was not then part of the committee, I will focus on two important issues touched on in the report that may not get much attention today: archiving and the process for setting the BBC licence fee. Having said that, I welcome the Government’s general approach—they share

“the Committee’s view about the importance of public service broadcasting … and its continued relevance”.

Together with evidence from Ofcom that shows that PSB programming remains popular and is valued by UK audiences, that provides a very good basis for the proper debate and discussion that I hope will accompany the light-touch mid-term review of the current BBC charter and the licence fee settlement negotiations for 2022 to 2027.

First, on the BFI national film and TV archive, the report says it is important that UK TV programmes of cultural significance are preserved for future generations. It also recommends that:

“The Government should broaden the requirement to provide programmes to and fund the BFI National Archive to non-public service broadcasters and SVODs which produce content in the UK.”


The Government’s response is welcome but limited: they recognise that the remit of the BFI national film and television archive

“includes the preservation, restoration and dissemination of culturally British screen content”

and that

“this should include programmes and films produced or commissioned by non-public service broadcasters and SVoDs”.

These are fine words, but they will not achieve what is in essence a voluntary scheme. The response goes on to say:

“The Government hopes that these entities share a desire to contribute to British heritage in this way and strongly encourages these entities to entrust guardianship of their screen content to the BFI National Archive, making a ‘reasonable contribution’ to the BFI.”


But this is not the basis for a long-term sustainable plan.

PSBs currently pay £1.5 million per annum and contribute to various one-off projects, such as digitising legacy collections held on myriad obsolescent videotapes with fixed shelf lives, but the BFI needs much more. It is not given the statutory powers or funding it needs to achieve its aims. For example, there is no Sky output—despite the existence of loads of original UK productions —and no streamed TV in the BFI’s collections. Like it or loathe it, most people would expect to have the Netflix series “The Crown” in the national collection, but it is not there. There is no Amazon Prime and no Apple TV. Who is to be responsible for holding examples of material from YouTube and the wider web? Future historians will find that omission very strange indeed.

Unlike the public service broadcasters, none of these new players, streamers and content originators have to supply materials, with a contribution to costs, to the national archive. I believe that the long-term solution is a “statutory deposit” scheme, but there are other options that could achieve the desired outcome. I am glad that the Government say in their response that they

“will monitor progress in this regard”

and remain

“open to considering the full range of options to deliver this outcome, including statutory support for collecting as currently exists for the PSBs.”

This certainly would be welcome, and I would be grateful if the Minister could update us on that.

My second point is on how the BBC licence fee should be determined. The committee reaffirms a previous recommendation that there should be

“an independent and transparent process for setting the licence fee”,

and recommends that the Government should establish a BBC funding commission to oversee that process. I strongly support this proposal. The BBC licence fee is a tax, and as such should be levied by the Government, but the processes of negotiating a charter and of recommending a licence fee to ensure that the BBC has the resources to do what the charter asks of it should be separated and transparent. However, those of us who have had some involvement in the process know that this is not quite how it works. The connection between the two processes is indirect and shrouded in political pressures. The result of all this is bad not just for the BBC—which faces increasingly intolerable pressures to deliver what is expected of it without the right money, and faces threats to its operational autonomy and independence—but for the Government, because of a growing suspicion of unwarranted political interference in the BBC, and for viewers.

The Government say that they have

“no plans to introduce a licence fee commission”.

However, I note that the response also says that the Government will set out in more detail the processes to be followed in due course. I hope that the Minister can elucidate further on this issue when she comes to respond. I look forward to hearing from her.