Free TV Licences: Over-75s

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 11th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

Well, I do not know whether that is a way to deal with the whole issue, as the hon. Gentleman suggests, but he is right to point out that since the licence fee settlement, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has announced direct funding, in fact, of £255 million over three years to support language services for the World Service. He is right to point out that other streams of income are involved, but of course, we are talking about very much larger sums than that over a prolonged period in connection with this concession.

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

I worked for the BBC on and off for 20 years and it is an organisation that I love. I am not now and will never be a Tory Beeb basher, but on this, it has got it wrong. The BBC gets a guaranteed income from licence fee payers of £4 billion a year in a deal that the BBC was eager and enthusiastic to accept, because that gave it a guaranteed cash income that commercial organisations can only dream of. And now the BBC tells us that it cannot afford to continue this concession. Will my right hon. and learned Friend work with the BBC to ask it to live within its means, stop scaremongering about cuts, be more accountable in the way it spends our money and reverse this decision?

[Jeremy Wright]

I shall certainly continue to engage with the BBC and to continue to ask it to live within its means and provide the services that my hon. Friend and I both want to see it provide to a very high standard. As he will recognise, this decision is one that we have already transferred to the BBC. It is the BBC’s decision to make, but I do not believe that this is the end of the conversation about what more the BBC can do to assist the older people we are all particularly concerned about.

TV Licences for Over-75s

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 8th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for St Helens South and Whiston (Ms Rimmer), but I have to say that it is a shame this debate has descended into party politics. Actually, it should be about the future of the BBC—how the BBC’s funding can properly abide by the strictures by which it has to abide and how it is to deliver its services in the future—but we seem to be having a debate other than the one that is sensible.

I love the BBC. I worked for the BBC on and off for 20 years, and it is the best broadcaster in the world. I would never support any sort of arrangement for the future funding of the BBC that I thought would do it damage or that I thought would lead to under-serving the people who deserve to be served by the BBC as the best public broadcaster in the world. The BBC produces some of the stand-out TV in what is now a global TV industry—with “Line of Duty”, which had nearly 10 million viewers on Sunday, as well as “Strictly Come Dancing”, “Bodyguard”, “Blue Peter” and “Match of the Day”—and it has its unrivalled news coverage, its radio, its online services, its children’s programmes and all the research and development it does. I am a passionate supporter of the BBC, but we should be debating how we ensure the future security of funding for the BBC and the future security of provision of service for all the people who enjoy the BBC.

Let us be clear: as has been mentioned in the past, the funding deal the BBC accepted in June 2015 gave it financial stability for five years. It was a deal that saw a guaranteed, copper-bottomed, real-terms increase in funding for the BBC. That is the sort of arrangement private commercial organisations can only dream of. They would think it was all their Christmases come at once to have that sort of guaranteed income for five years. In addition, as was mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale), as part of the deal the contribution that the BBC previously made to the roll-out of superfast broadband—it used to contribute £150 million a year—was cut to zero by 2020, and the iPlayer loophole was quite rightly closed, bringing in an extra £41 million a year.

The BBC was very happy with that deal. It welcomed the deal, and it accepted the deal. I have two quotes for the House, although I will not go over ground that has already been covered. Lord Hall, as I suppose we should properly call him, the BBC’s director-general, said that

“the BBC used this pre-budget window of opportunity to reach a fair deal”.

Furthermore, speaking on the Radio 4 “Today” programme, one of the fantastic institutions that the public quite rightly pay the BBC to produce, he said:

“The government’s decision here to put the cost of the over-75s on us”—

in other words, the BBC—

“has been more than matched by the deal coming back for the BBC. My bottom line was, if I can use this as an opportunity to get back for the BBC things I think are really important—an inflation-set licence fee and an end to top-slicing—then I think that is really important. And that is exactly what we have done.”

The BBC accepted this deal. It accepted this guaranteed, copper-bottomed funding increase and welcomed it, and it now needs to live within its means. I have to say, having worked on and off for the BBC for 20 years, that there are many ways, it is sad to say, in which the BBC does not do so. We have recently seen figures showing that there are now nearly 100 members of BBC staff who earn more than £150,000 a year, and some of them earn a lot more than that. We have recently seen that the BBC’s programme for developing a new “EastEnders” set has gone £30 million over budget and will be delivered three and a half years late—it is almost as though they are building a railway line—and an entire technology project aimed at digitising all its programmes has had to be cut, after spending nearly £60 million. The BBC must look more carefully at how it spends its money and at the salaries it pays its staff. It must ensure that it can continue to deliver the concession that we are discussing, which it accepted in a deal from the Government.

[Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

I apologise for not being here for the opening of the debate. I am the chairman of the all-party parliamentary BBC group, and I want to speak in support of the BBC. Does my hon. Friend agree that although the BBC needs to live within its means, 20% of its budget will be too much for it to absorb, and therefore the BBC should be free to make this decision without political pressure?

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I agree with the last part of what my hon. Friend has said. The BBC should absolutely be free to make this decision without political pressure and without the scaremongering that we have, sadly, heard from the Opposition.

A point has been made about loneliness. Of course, older people rely very much on the BBC. I represent North Devon, a constituency with a higher than average proportion of older people and people who live alone. I will not take lessons from anyone about how best to represent them and ensure that they get what they need.

I can tell that you are eager for a denouement, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I want to give other hon. and right hon. Members the opportunity to contribute. Let me conclude by saying that I am a huge supporter of the BBC. I love the BBC, and I love the programmes and services it delivers, but it must live within its means. We must accept that, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon has said, after robust negotiations the BBC accepted responsibility for the continuation of this concession. I call on the BBC to do so.

Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Thursday 7th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mims Davies]

I reiterate that this is not a gagging clause. I repeated that when I met the charities group in December and spoke at its event here in Westminster, and the Prime Minister wrote to Sir Stuart Etherington and reaffirmed the point. If the hon. Lady wishes to meet me to discuss those who feel that they cannot speak out, I would be very happy to do so. It is absolutely right that we should be able to hear the sector’s voice and to hear its expertise, its insight and everything that it can bring to Government to tackle burning injustices. As I say, I am very happy to meet her to discuss the matter.

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Jeremy Wright)]

On the eve of International Women’s Day, I am sure that the whole House will join me in congratulating the England women’s football team on winning the SheBelieves Cup this week. I also congratulate all our outstanding British winners in this year’s Oscars, particularly Olivia Colman for her Best Actress award. We are proud of them all, and they remind us of how sport and culture can unite us.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I thank the Secretary of State for his answer. I am a former employee and a huge supporter of our public service broadcaster, but on the issue of TV licences for those over the age of 75, is it not the case that the BBC accepted responsibility for this concession when it made an agreement with the Government? Should it not now deliver that in full, and do so without the threats of cuts to services?

[Jeremy Wright]

My hon. Friend correctly relays the history of this. As I said earlier, it is right for us to await the conclusions of the BBC’s review of this matter. It is far more sensible to comment on something when we have seen it rather than before we have seen it. Once we have seen it, we will all be able to reach a judgment. It is the Government’s clear expectation that this concession should continue.

Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Thursday 6th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Luke Hall (Thornbury and Yate) (Con)]

6. What steps he is taking to improve broadband and mobile phone coverage in rural areas.

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

8. What steps he is taking to improve broadband and mobile phone coverage in rural areas.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

17. What steps he is taking to improve broadband and mobile phone coverage in rural areas.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Wright]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. Although I am sure that the bid to which he refers will be considered, I cannot tell him whether it will be approved. However, I can tell him that there will be support from my Department to get as much of the rural parts of our country as possible covered under the existing superfast broadband programmes and adjuncts to it, of which there are several. Then, we must of course look at full fibre roll-out and ensure that that process gets to as many places as possible. If possible, we will do so in an even more efficient way.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I welcome the progress we are making, but will my right hon. and learned Friend work with me, with Connecting Devon and Somerset and with the contract holder, Airband, to ensure that North Devon does not have to wait unduly for a fast, reliable and affordable broadband service?

[Jeremy Wright]

Yes is the short answer but, as you would expect, Mr Speaker, I will not leave it as a short answer. All I will say in addition is that there are a number of ways in which we can help. We want to work with local areas, and there may well be very specific local solutions in areas such as North Devon so that we can expand coverage more successfully.

Data Protection Bill [Lords]

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 15th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[John Grogan]

I will not give way because I am being urged to conclude. We should not look back in anger at all those frustrations, but plan a progressive media policy for the future and we should not subcontract that to a judge.

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

I will be extraordinarily brief because not much more needs to be said. The House’s view is settled and its will is clear. Those at the other end of this building are asking us to consider effectively a rehash of new clause 18, which this House debated at length, analysed and rejected. We defeated that new clause on Report prior to Third Reading. We do not need to rehearse those arguments.

Members of all parties are absolutely right to say that victims need to be at the centre. I am confident that the Secretary of State and his team, through some of the concessions that have been introduced today, even at this late stage, have the victims at the centre of their thoughts.

[Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I will not because time is so brief. The will of the House is settled and the other place should not throw the Bill back at us. We have made the decision and we just need to get the measure on the statute book.

Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Thursday 10th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. It is almost impossible to overplay the amazing advances in broadcasting production in Northern Ireland over the past few years. It has been an absolute triumph and a great addition not only to the economy but to society and culture in Northern Ireland. I am sure that Channel 4 will consider that, too.

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

4. What steps he is taking to improve broadband and mobile phone coverage in rural areas.

[The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Matt Hancock)]

As well as moving Channel 4 outside London, we are clear that we need to continue to improve broadband and mobile connectivity in rural areas. We hit the target of achieving 95% coverage by the end of last year, and our broadband universal service obligation will be implemented by 2020, to make sure that nobody is left behind.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I thank the Secretary of State for that answer and welcome the progress that is being made. Does he agree that, in a rural area such as North Devon where small businesses, often based in people’s homes, form the backbone of the economy, it is vital that we deliver a good 4G and broadband service for entrepreneurs?

[Matt Hancock]

I agree incredibly strongly with my hon. Friend, who is a great champion for North Devon. Coverage there is only 85%, so there is much further to go, but I was delighted that Ofcom said yesterday that the average download speed had risen by 28% over the past year. That shows that, although there is further to go, we are making progress.

Data Protection Bill [Lords]

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 9th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Liam Byrne]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. What strengthens his argument is the way in which the Secretary of State has sought to bring forward one argument after another, all of which have been knocked down.

When we were first told that Leveson 2 could not proceed, we were told that there had been a day, sometime in about 2010, when magically, all of a sudden, all the abuse that we had ever heard about before categorically, unequivocally and without doubt ceased. We were all quite surprised about that. We were even more surprised, therefore, when John Ford presented his evidence to the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee on 13 March. It is worth setting out what Mr Ford said, because not everyone luxuriates in membership of that Committee:

“I illegally accessed phone accounts, bank accounts, credit cards, and other personal data of public figures… My targets included politicians of all parties. In most cases, this was done without any legitimate public interest justification.”

Mr Ford goes on to reflect on whether the practice had magically ended, as the Secretary of State asserted, or whether it was ongoing. He was asked directly to reflect on the Secretary of State’s assertion that it was all over—nothing more to see; time to walk on by. Mr Ford writes in his letter:

“I am sorry to inform you that Mr Hancock is totally wrong”.

Who can imagine such a thing? He goes on to say that

“having spent 15 years in the business, it is no surprise…that I still know people in the illegal data theft industry, and specifically,”—

this is the nub of the argument—

“that I know individuals who are still engaged in these activities on behalf of newspapers.”

The idea that magically this bad behaviour suddenly stopped and is not ongoing is argument one that has been knocked down.

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

As reprehensible as those activities are, the fundamental point is that they are criminal acts. They are against the law. The right hon. Gentleman is wrong to conflate that point with the question of press regulation. Those are criminal acts to be dealt with by the courts.

[Liam Byrne]

Actually, it is not wrong to conflate press regulation with these matters, because the purpose of press regulation, in case the hon. Gentleman has not spotted it, is to try to stop such offences happening again. That is how public policy tends to be made in this country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Whittingdale]

Deep in my heart, yes I do. As I was about to say, I believe that there is a different climate. Of course, it does not mean that no newspaper ever does something that is a cause for complaint or invades people’s private lives—I have suffered at the hands of the press, but that is the price we pay in this place. However, I believe that the imposition of sanctions of the type that are proposed under the amendments would be deeply damaging to a free press.

In terms of what has changed, I challenge those who criticise IPSO to say where it now fails to meet the requirements under the royal charter. I have been through the royal charter, and there are perhaps three tiny sections where we could say that the wording of the IPSO codes is not precisely in line with the royal charter, but those are incredibly minor. They make no substantial difference whatever. IPSO has not applied for recognition under the royal charter, not because it does not comply, but because there is an objection in principle on the part of every single newspaper to a Government-imposed system, which this represents.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

The fundamentally worrying thing is that this seeks to make a connection between local media organisations having to join the state regulator and their facing, if they do not, the awful costs that they might have to pay even if they win a court case. The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne) described that as an incentive, but it is not—it is coercion. It is only an incentive inasmuch as a condemned man on the gallows has an incentive not to stand on the trapdoor.

[Mr Whittingdale]

Of course, I agree entirely with my hon. Friend, and I am glad that he focused on local newspapers, because I referred to two changes. The first is the establishment of IPSO, which I believe in all serious respects is now compliant with what Lord Leveson wanted. The second is the complete change in the media landscape that has taken place in the last 10 years.

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State mentioned the number of local newspapers that have gone out of business. We are seeing more continue to do so. There is likely to be further consolidation within the newspaper industry and the economics are steadily moving against newspapers. That is a real threat to democracy, because newspapers employ journalists who cover proceedings in courts, council chambers and, indeed, in this place. The big media giants who now have the power and influence—Google, Facebook and Twitter—do not employ a single journalist, so my right hon. Friend is absolutely right to have established the examination into the funding and future of the press. It is about looking forward, and that is where the House should be concentrating its efforts. It should not be looking backwards and going over again the events of more than 10 years ago; the world has changed almost beyond recognition.

--- Later in debate ---

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

It is a pleasure to be able to speak briefly at the conclusion of our proceedings on the Bill. I have followed it with interest throughout all its stages, and I had the pleasure of sitting on the Public Bill Committee. I echo what has been said about the fine contributions made by Members on both sides of the House at all stages, and I thought that the Committee was extraordinarily well conducted. I particular enjoyed my light-hearted sparring with the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne), and the people at BBC Radio Essex will have been delighted that they got a disproportionate amount of airtime as a result.

This is a good Bill. Data protection is incredibly important—and increasingly so. The Bill has successfully navigated the choppy waters that are coming towards us, created by the need for the GDPR to be implemented in only about 14 days’ time. If I may say so, the Secretary of State and his entire team have navigated those waters with skill and elegance to ensure that we in the UK now have legislation that does what it needs to do as far as the GDPR is concerned, on which I congratulate them. The Government, the House and the other place have looked into this matter very carefully and rigorously, and they have arrived at what I think is a good package of measures that will do what it needs to do as far as data protection is concerned.

My interest has been in the amendments concerning press regulation, as Members on both sides of the House will remember. I believe that the House has reached the right decision on what started off as an amendment in the other place and what was set out in new clause 18 today. Not to go ahead with Leveson 2 is the right decision. However, I agree with the sentiment that we must keep the victims of what will undoubtedly still be a difficult press environment at the centre of our thinking. It is important that we have not lost the opportunity to do that, and I know the Secretary of State and his team will continue to do so, but I think we have got the balance right today.

I congratulate the whole ministerial team and all those who have taken part in these deliberations. I have followed with interest the arguments made by Members on both sides.

[Matt Hancock]

My hon. Friend mentioned some people he wanted to thank, and there is one other person I want to thank: my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford). She was involved with the development of the GDPR in the European Parliament right from the start, and I want to put on the record our thanks, and my personal thanks, for her guidance. She has lived with the Bill for far longer than anybody else in the Chamber.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

Yet another mention for Essex, where people will be absolutely delighted.

This is the Government getting on with business. We promised that we would do this in our manifesto, on which we were elected, and we have got on with and delivered it. I will be delighted to see the Bill reaching the statute book. This is the Government delivering what they need to deliver, and doing it in a very rigorous, elegant and clever way. This is a digital Bill for the digital age, and I am pleased to support it.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed, with amendments.

Deferred Divisions

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 41A(3)),

That, at this day’s sitting, Standing Order No. 41A (Deferred divisions) shall not apply to the Motion in the name of Jeremy Corbyn relating to Education (Student Support).—(Jo Churchill.)

Question agreed to.

Data Protection Bill [Lords] (Sixth sitting)

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 20th March 2018 Public Bill Committees

I hope that, having reflected on those harsh and serious words, the Minister will conclude that we have nothing to fear, nothing to hide and everything to gain from letting Sir Brian Leveson finish the job the Prime Minister said he would be allowed to finish.

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Streeter. I declare an interest: I was a journalist for many years—I am no longer practising—although not in the hard-copy newspaper industry. Given my background, I take a deep interest in these matters.

I have a great deal of sympathy for the reasons for the Scottish National party tabling amendments 137, 138 and 139, and I absolutely understand the need for the tidying up that needs to be done to the amendment that has come from the other place, which appears to be addled in relation to the legal situation with the Scottish Parliament’s devolved powers. I fully understand why the Scottish amendments have been tabled, and I have sympathy with the view that the Lords amendment needs tidying up. However, I cannot support the SNP amendments simply because I do not want the amendment from the other place, to which they would be attached, to be part of the Bill at all. I will go through some reasons to explain why, but I want to put on the record my sympathy for the reason for them being tabled.

The hon. Member for Argyll and Bute described the amendment from the other place as “lazy” because it does not take into account the Scottish devolved powers. That is one description of it. It is also, frankly, a bit mysterious. I find it a little hard to understand why we are discussing this issue at all in relation to the Bill. That amendment and the section 40 amendment, which we will discuss later, were attached to the Bill in the other place in much the same way as one attaches decorations to a Christmas tree. They are not part of what we should be discussing, although I am grateful that we have the opportunity so to do, because that allows the Government to put their case, as I am sure Ministers will do shortly, and as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State did in the House earlier.

As I set out in my speech on Second Reading, I believe strongly that we should reject the amendments that have come to us from the other place—in particular, the amendment relating to Leveson 2. I heard everything the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill said about the need for Leveson 2 and about victims needing their day in court. I am not putting words into his mouth—I do not think he used exactly that phrase, and I do not disagree—and there is indeed a difficulty in that, of course, there are still examples of reporters working for a variety of news organisations who are undertaking practices that are either immoral or illegal, or in some cases both.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Order. First, let me correct a possible misunderstanding. The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill mentioned that clauses 168 and 169 will be debated later. In fact, we are debating them as part of this group, as I tried to make clear when I introduced amendment 137.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

Thank you for that clarification, Mr Streeter.

There is nothing remarkable about what I said. Quite clearly, there is still malpractice going on in the journalism industry. Is the right hon. Gentleman honestly trying to say that that is a remarkable thing to say?

[Liam Byrne]

Yes.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

It is not remarkable at all. Of course it is going on, but establishing and carrying out Leveson 2 would do nothing to solve that problem and nothing to bring justice to the members of the public who have been done wrong by that small number of journalists who are acting in that way. I do not know why the right hon. Gentleman finds that a remarkable statement to make.

As for the statement that he made on Second Reading—that the Government’s position is to say, “Nothing to see here—absolutely nothing happening”—that is not what the Government are saying at all. The Government’s position is clear: Leveson 2 simply would not do what I think the right hon. Gentleman and probably everyone in this room would like it to do, which is to be some sort of cleansing disinfectant that solves all the problems. It simply will not do that.

[Liam Byrne]

As much as I respect the hon. Gentleman’s omniscience, how could he possibly know that?

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

It is a big gamble to spend potentially £50 million when we are not sure whether it will have the required outcome. That is the point. The Lords amendment would start the Leveson 2 process, which would cost at a very conservative estimate £50 million, potentially last for a huge amount of time and still not get to the answer that we want. There must be better solutions.

I had started to discuss the fact that the landscape has changed and that the very framework in which we work has changed markedly since the former Prime Minister made the commitment to go ahead with Leveson 2. There have been huge changes. Not only have we had the Leveson 1 inquiry, which in its own terms of reference touched on many of the issues that the proposed Leveson 2 inquiry would cover, but we have had any number of changes, improvements, and reforms in the way the police and indeed the media operate. We have had Operations Elveden, Tuleta and Weeting, which included Operation Golding, all of which have investigated a wide range of practices in the interaction between the police and members of the media and journalists. At a total cost, incidentally, of about £40 million for those operations, they have done good work and all of them have resulted in significant reform.

When I first joined the journalistic trade, way back in 1986, there was malpractice on a scale that we would not believe, and it was completely normal for journalists to pick up the phone to a friendly police contact and get whatever information they wanted to write their next report. That was absolutely normal. It is not normal now. I am sure it still happens, but it is now not the norm, which is good. That is why we do not want to turn the clock back and commit ourselves to a very long inquiry—a Leveson 2 inquiry—which would not do what we want it to do.

Where malpractice occurs in the media, where cases such as those raised by the right hon. Gentleman come to light, and where members of the public are treated in the most despicable way by journalists, I want people to be able to have the right to redress, to have their day in court, and to be able to say, “This is what has happened and it must change,” but Leveson 2 would not do that. It would not provide the means by which that happened. That is why the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport was absolutely right to make the decision and to say that Leveson 2 is not on the Government’s agenda, and nor should it go ahead. It is perhaps worth pointing out also that this Government were elected only nine months ago on a manifesto that specifically said that Leveson 2 would not go ahead. That was a manifesto commitment.

Mr Streeter, may I just seek absolute clarification from you? From your earlier instruction, are we now also talking about section 40?

[The Chair]

Yes. Clauses 168 and 169. Clause 168 refers to section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

Yes it does. May I go on to address that briefly as well at this point, if that is in order?

[The Chair]

I would be delighted if the hon. Gentleman did that.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

Thank you very much indeed.

I do not really have much to say. To be clear, we are considering the amendment made in the other place. It seeks to enact section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013, which this Government and the Secretary of State have said we will not do—indeed, they have said that we wish to repeal section 40.

It is very clear in my mind that we need to reject the amendment made in the other place. There is a very straightforward reason, which is that section 40 does one key thing: it seeks to persuade media organisations, specifically newspapers, that have not signed up to a recognised regulatory body to do so by providing a financial inducement of the most “blunt instrument” kind.

I have here a document from the House of Commons Library; for the record, I emphasise that the House of Commons Library is neutral. The document discusses why section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013 was introduced. The Library says that it was intended to

“coerce or incentivise publishers to become members of a recognised regulator”.

That is language that we should be worried about. The reason we should be more worried about what section 40 will do—it is pretty straightforward—is that if a member of the public brings a defamation action against a newspaper, it goes to court and the newspaper wins the case, that media organisation is still financially liable to pay the costs of both sides.

Quite simply, that will encourage a lot of entirely superfluous and vexatious legal actions to be brought by people who just have some kind of beef against the media and pockets bulging with cash that allows them to do so. When, as will inevitably happen, the media wins the case, because it was built on sand, the media organisations concerned will be put out of business by the requirement to pay the legal costs on both sides.

[Liam Byrne]

The Minister is cheering on the hon. Member, but will he for complete clarity remind the Committee who proposed this architecture in the first place? From memory, it was his right hon. Friends the Members for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin) and for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller).

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I was not in Parliament at the time. I have only been here for two and a half years. We go back to the point that I made in relation to the previous clause. The ground has shifted. We now know what the effect will be. The other place debated this in some detail; the arguments were put extremely strongly, and by a narrow majority their lordships, as is their right, passed the amendment and asked us to consider it. It is perfectly right that they are asking us to consider it. It is perfectly right that we say: “Up with this we will not put.” Section 40 will have precisely the opposite effect to what probably anyone listening would hope it to have. It will be an extraordinarily damaging measure for the future of the freedom of the press in this country. It will have the effect of preventing publication of material which is in the public interest and which is true, legitimate, and fair, because newspaper proprietors will not be able to afford the risk of going to a court case which they win but still have to pay the costs. It will be an incredible impediment to the free press in this country. For that reason more than any other we must reject the amendments that come from the other place.

[The Chair]

One or two colleagues have caught my eye because I was not clear enough in my introduction to this section. I invite Mr Liam Byrne to readdress the Committee in relation to these clauses.

Data Protection Bill [Lords]

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Monday 5th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

I start by declaring an interest, in that before I became embroiled in the world of politics, I was a journalist for 20 years, although not in the print media—I had the perfect face for radio, so it was the wireless that beckoned. As a former journalist, I take a close interest in two of the matters before us this evening, and I refer to two of the amendments that were made in the other place. I am a bit perturbed as to why we would be dealing with those two specific issues in a data protection Bill, because this Bill seems to be being used somewhat as a Christmas tree, on which all sorts of things can hang, and I am not sure that that is appropriate.

I am sure, however, that the Secretary of State was right to say in his statement last Thursday that the Government will not be accepting those two amendments. I refer, of course, to that on the implementation of section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013, which I shall come on to in a moment, and the amendment providing that we should proceed with Leveson 2. I was glad that he announced on Thursday that we would not be going ahead with that, because it is absolutely the right decision, for a number of reasons, not least because the manifesto on which we were elected nine months ago said that we would not be going ahead with it.

Putting politics aside for a little while, let me say that there are a number of reasons why it is it not necessary to go ahead with that. The main one is that the environment has changed dramatically since the first Leveson inquiry. It has changed dramatically since I was last working as a journalist, which was way back in 2006, but even since 2012 and Leveson 1, the landscape has changed dramatically.

[Chris Bryant]

That is neither here nor there, because the whole point of the Leveson inquiry was to establish what happened. Hundreds of individuals have had to go through the civil courts to try to establish what happened in their individual case. Many of them now know more than the country does about what happened at that time, but they are unable to say so because they have had to sign confidentiality agreements. The truth of the matter is that we still have never got to the bottom of what level of collusion there was between the Metropolitan police and the News of the World, and many newspapers have simply lied.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I was coming to some of the points that the hon. Gentleman mentions, but the issue is that if Leveson 2 had gone ahead, it would have been narrowly and tightly about the relationship between the media and the police.

I absolutely welcome Leveson 1: it did a job that needed to be done by shining a light into the dark corners of some media practices and, importantly, giving redress to people who had been wronged by the media—there were too many of those. There are people who feel that it did not go far enough, and some still feel that they did not get their confirmed right of reply, but the fact is that Leveson 1 has happened, and it happened some little time ago.

Leveson 2 would have had the fairly narrow remit of the relationship between the police and the media. The argument I was coming to was that since Leveson 2 was mooted, so much has changed in the regulation of the press, as we have already been discussing. The new regulatory regime is now under way—I might come to some of its drawbacks in a moment—and, furthermore, the practices of the police have changed a lot.

Leveson shined a light on the problems. I take the point made by the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) that the relationship between some officers and some journalists was shown by Leveson 1 to be absolutely inappropriate. I do not believe that we need a costly, lengthy, long-drawn-out second phase of the Leveson process, which probably would not do the job we would be hoping of it anyway.

[Chris Bryant]

The point is that the investigation is sort of happening now through the civil courts, except that it is individual members of the public who have to fork out £350,000 or £450,000 in legal fees to get to the truth. In Leveson 1, Brian Leveson was expressly not able to look at anything for which there might have been any criminal charges. The fact that the Daily Mirror has now admitted—in the civil courts, but not to Leveson—that it did engage in phone hacking is one of the matters that still has not come to the public.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

However, Leveson 2 would not necessarily put any of that right.

[Chris Bryant]

Yes it would!

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

Well, we do not know that. The difficulty is that a lengthy, costly process that in the end might not even achieve what was hoped for is not the answer. The answer, as the Secretary of State rightly said in his statement on Thursday, is to ensure that we shine a light through proper regulation on the practices that have done wrong to a number of people in the country.

I accept the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for North Herefordshire (Bill Wiggin). We should absolutely focus on the rights of people in this country—people who cannot afford the voice to stand up for themselves—but Leveson 2 was never going to solve that issue. It was going to be a long-winded inquiry that would not have got there, and the Secretary of State made that point convincingly on Thursday.

[Christine Jardine]

Does the hon. Gentleman not agree with me, a fellow former journalist, that one of the things that has most undermined the reputation of the media in this country in general has been the behaviour of our newspapers, which have seemed to the public to be beyond regulation? Self-regulation has failed and undermined the image of the media. The Press Complaints Commission failed, as the Press Council did. We had an opportunity to put that right, but it has been lost.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

The hon. Lady is right that the Press Complaints Commission did fail, which is why it is rightly no longer there and we now have a new framework. While we are talking in general about regulation, I should say that I have some sympathy with the question marks raised over the regulation of my former employer, the BBC. We got that wrong for many years. There was the bizarre situation in which the BBC board—later, the BBC Trust—was acting as both poacher and gamekeeper, marking its own homework. The Government have rightly sought to put that right and we have moved a long way towards doing so.

I do not believe that the answer to the wrongs that still exist in the regulatory regime for newspapers lies in the amendments that have come our way from the other end of the Palace of Westminster. I do not believe that they would do the job that, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Herefordshire rightly said, the people outside this place want us to do: to make sure that they have a fair right of reply when something wrong is done to them by newspapers.

[Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who is being characteristically courteous in giving way to so many Members. Can he point to another area of public policy in which as many suspicions have been aroused, but that has been improved by our collectively deciding to just move on and leave things in the dark?

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

No one is suggesting just moving on and leaving things in the dark. That is not at all what the Government intend to do. If we look carefully at the words the Secretary of State used on Thursday, we see that there is no question of our moving on and saying, “There’s nothing to see here.” We are saying that the mechanism suggested in the amendments from the other place is not the right way to proceed. I agree with the position taken by the Secretary of State.

[Liam Byrne]

With the greatest of respect, regulations are forward looking, but the inquiry that we are seeking goes into past malpractice for the simple reason that we would like justice to be done.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I do not believe that the inquiry that the other place seeks, through its amendment, to impose on the Bill would do the job that the right hon. Gentleman wants done. The position that the Secretary of State laid out on Thursday is the right way to proceed. Leveson 2 would simply not do the job that many Members on both sides of the House want it to do.

I am going to move on, as I am thinking about Mr Deputy Speaker’s strictures about timing.

[Matt Warman (Boston and Skegness) (Con)]

rose—

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

However, I will give way to my hon. Friend.

[Matt Warman]

For the sake of novelty, my hon. Friend is taking an intervention from the Government side.

The one point that my hon. Friend has not yet mentioned is that IPSO is a fundamentally very different regulator—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) might not like it, but low-cost mediation is a crucial feature that allows exactly the redress that he wants.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I had a lot to say about IPSO and IMPRESS along the lines that my hon. Friend has laid out, but I am aware of Mr Deputy Speaker’s strictures. I have tried to take as many interventions as I can, and page 2 of my remarks will be put down on this green Bench very shortly.

I move on to the second issue that I wanted to raise: the second amendment sent to us by the other place saying that we should commence section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013. That would not be the right way to proceed, and I am grateful that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State made that point so clearly on Thursday. Many local papers in North Devon have written to me on numerous occasions expressing deep concerns about the impact that section 40 would have. I mention just three: the North Devon Journal, the North Devon Gazette and the South Molton & District News, which is, incidentally, one of the few papers to have signed up to IMPRESS, the new press regulator.

Freedom of the press is absolutely essential in a democracy. Let us think carefully about what section 40 says: if a paper not under the auspices of a Press Recognition Panel regulator is sued for defamation, for instance, it has to pay the legal costs of both sides, even if it wins the case. How can that be sensible? We might argue that that is a pretty blunt instrument with the intention of coercing newspapers to sign up to one of the approved regulators, but 90% of the national press have not done so, so the blunt instrument is clearly not being effective. The biggest danger, however, is that many small, local media companies, such as those in my constituency that I have mentioned, would simply not be able to run a viable business if section 40 were enacted. Financially, the court costs would cripple them. Individuals could make vexatious claims in the knowledge that there was no chance of their ever having to pay costs, whatever the outcome. That is simply something up with which we will not put.

The local press in North Devon and many other parts of the country is still extraordinarily important. The two main papers I mentioned are still read widely today and help to maintain our sense of community. We cannot face a situation in which such papers are threatened by what could be a series of vexatious claims, encouraged by the fact that there would be no risk to the person making that claim.

[Andy Slaughter]

rose—

[Christine Jardine]

rose—

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

If hon. Members do not mind, I am coming to the end of my remarks.

In my 20 years as a journalist at the BBC, I was passionate about freedom of speech and a right of reply, because that is the desperately important foundation on which our newspaper industry is based. I am also desperately passionate about ensuring that people who are wronged in some way by the media are given an effective response mechanism. Neither amendment that has come our way from the other place would achieve that. I am grateful to hear that the Opposition will support the Bill’s Second Reading, and I hope that we will not accept those two amendments and that we will pass the Bill as it was drafted.

TV Licence Fee

Peter Heaton-Jones Excerpts

Monday 20th November 2017 Westminster Hall

[Peter Heaton-Jones (North Devon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Moon, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones) on leading this debate and the Petitions Committee on organising it.

This debate is on an extraordinarily important issue that we need to discuss, for the very reason that many tens of thousands of our constituents have signed these two petitions, which is as good a reason as any to debate it.

Before I go any further, I must declare an interest, as many colleagues have done in the past. I worked for the BBC for 17 years, so I probably hold the record among colleagues here for longest service with the BBC. That was from 1986 to 1997, and then from 2000 to 2006. There was a gap, and I shall come on to that gap in a minute, because it feeds into what I want to say about one of the alternative methods of funding the BBC as opposed to the licence fee. That was where I worked at the time.

Having said that, it is vital that we discuss what the petitioners say in the two petitions. I will just look at the wording of a couple of the sentences. Petition 170931 says that the BBC licence fee should be abolished, and states:

“It should be included through your provider for free.”

The difficulty with that phrase is that it completely misses the point that someone has to pay for the BBC. What it seems to suggest is that the petitioners believe that their provider—whether Sky, BT or Virgin—should somehow pay the licence fee, even though the petitioners still want to watch BBC services. Those services have to be paid for; I do not think that anyone will find a model that works whereby Sky, BT or Virgin will pay the BBC licence fee.

Petition 200239 says of the licence fee:

“It is unfair that one should hold one to watch Freeview channels.”

However, the Freeview channels include BBC1, BBC2, BBC3, BBC4, CBBC, CBeebies, the BBC News channel and the BBC Parliament channel which, of course, is worth the entire licence fee on its own.

How do people believe that those BBC Freeview channels will be paid for? They still seem to want to watch them but without thinking that we need to fund them. I have scratched my head for some time; I am not the brightest guy in the world, but I cannot see how that would work.

The two petitions are our starting point; I believe that there are two very important issues that we need to consider: first, how the BBC is funded and, secondly, what the BBC spends its money on. The hon. Member for Warrington North quite rightly began to look at alternative models around the world for how public service broadcasters are financed. I have looked into those models. I have worked for one of them; that is where the mystery three-year gap comes in, which I am sure the Chamber is agog to discover more about. In my view, there is not another model of public service broadcast funding around the world that works as well as the BBC licence fee. In Germany, as has been mentioned, there is a broadcasting levy on every household. It is an incredibly blunt instrument and incredibly regressive. In Finland, the model is funded through personal taxation, and the same could be said of it.

However, I want to discuss the Australian model, which is where I worked for those missing three years; I worked for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, in both Sydney and Melbourne. The system under which the ABC is funded in Australia is something that we must avoid at all costs. The funding comes out of direct taxation, then every three years the ABC goes cap in hand to the Government and says, “Can we have some money, please?” To me, that seems to be a one-way route to bias, and to too much political interference and meddling with the output of a public service broadcasting organisation.

I worked for the ABC when we had to do that cap-in-hand exercise. It is not a pretty thing to watch. They say there are two things that people should not know how they are made—laws and sausages. The funding of the ABC is the third thing; nobody wants to be involved with that. We talk about political interference, which brings me to the issue of bias, because petition 200239 specifically mentions the question of bias. In fact, it says that there should be alternative methods of funding the BBC

“particularly as it is commonly felt there is a high level of bias.”

I start to twitch rather nervously at the conflation of those two concepts—how the BBC is funded and the issue of whether or not it is biased. I do so for this reason: the BBC should not be biased, however it is funded. We should not question a method of funding just because we believe that the BBC might or might not be biased. The BBC, as a public service broadcaster, should not be biased.

Let me give hon. Members, looking at the clock, “The Six Minutes Past Six News”. The headline is, “Having worked as a journalist at the BBC for 17 years, I know that the BBC is not biased.” It is not institutionally biased and it does not deliberately set out to give one editorial line over another. I know that for two reasons. First, in all the years I worked at the BBC—first, as a junior journalist—not once did a senior editorial manager put any pressure on me to take a particular line in a news story, to include a particular guest on an interview programme or to write a news story in a particular way. Not once did any of those things happen. Secondly, years later I had moved up the greasy pole, and I am living proof of the BBC axiom that someone always gets promoted to just beyond the level of their ability. When I was at that level, not once did I dream of saying to any of the reporters working for me, “I want you to cover this story in a particular way”.

There is no bias institutionally in the BBC. I have sympathy for the view that has been expressed here that there is perhaps a cultural problem with the slightly narrow pool from which the BBC recruits its talent and its journalists. The BBC absolutely needs to be more diverse, and to look far more closely at where it recruits its journalists, reporters and editors, as they are from a slightly elite group. It is getting better, but it is not good enough.

There is another reason—I say this only slightly tongue in cheek—why I am sure that the BBC is not institutionally biased and does not deliberately set out to give a party line. That would suggest the BBC is capable of a level of organisation that, in my experience, it is not. I can tell Members from personal experience that it is nigh-on impossible to get one programme in the news department to talk to another, even on the simplest of issues, let alone, as a large corporation that puts out hundreds of hours of news broadcasting daily, be capable of organising itself to put out a particular editorial line. Oh no, it is not; of course not.

I have a story for you, Mrs Moon. When I was in charge of a programme at Radio 5 Live, I needed a particular piece of music to illustrate a news story. I was told by the BBC’s internal systems that it would take three days and cost my programme budget £15 to borrow that CD from the BBC’s gramophone library. I sent a reporter to the HMV store on Oxford Street and we bought the CD for £9.99. That is not an organisation that is able to arrange institutional bias. It does not do that. When people, like the petitioners, accuse the BBC of bias, what they have seen is a politician they agree with being given a hard time or a politician they disagree with merely being given the right to reply. That is not bias. There is another word for it: journalism. That is what the BBC does extraordinarily well. It does journalism, and we need to protect it, because that costs money. As has been said by other right hon. and hon. Members, the BBC gets an awful lot of that money—£3.78 billion this year—from the licence fee. If we add to that this year’s commercial revenue of about £1.16 billion—do the maths—that is nearly—

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Nearly £5 billion.

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

I thank the hon. Gentleman—he did do the maths. That is a lot of money, and the BBC needs to be held to account for it. I do not, for one minute, stand here and say that everything about the BBC is perfect. We absolutely need more transparency and more accountability, and the hon. Member for East Londonderry (Mr Campbell) made that point extraordinarily well. It frustrates me that the BBC seems to show an extraordinarily defensive attitude whenever complaints are made about it. Whenever a member of the public or, indeed, a Member of this House, raises a perfectly reasonable concern about something the BBC has done—how it has covered a story or how it has spent public money, for example—its first thought is defence: “Fold the arms and try to pretend it didn’t happen”.

[Julian Knight]

Does my hon. Friend think that the BBC sometimes co-opts its talent in its defence, so to speak? Is that really the right way to go about things, rather than with the openness and transparency he rightly talks about?

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

There is sometimes a tendency, I think, for BBC managers not to be front and centre or, when they are, if they appear on a programme like “Feedback” or “Points of View”, the defensive attitude is the one that comes to the fore. What we need sometimes, just sometimes, is for the BBC to say, “We got this wrong. We didn’t do it right and we’re gonna do it differently next time”. I do not see enough of that.

When I worked for the BBC as an editor, and then again as a programme presenter, my manager would come to me once a week with a spreadsheet of the complaints I had received. He used to say, “As long as I’m getting about equal numbers of complaints, Peter, from either side in politics, you’re probably getting it about right.” That is probably as good a yardstick as any. The BBC does get stick from all sides.

The BBC is an organisation that gets a lot of our money and we need more analysis of how it chooses to spend it. There is one particular area of the BBC that I know best, and that is radio, particularly local radio, as that is where I worked. After all, I have the perfect face for radio. As has been mentioned, regional telly and local radio—in my area, BBC Radio Devon and “Spotlight”—do a fantastic job of covering news, which no other broadcaster would be able to do without that public service funding input. That is why I welcome the recent announcements by the BBC director-general at the Gillard awards, which celebrate local radio broadcasting. The first of the two main decisions he announced was that the £10 million of funding cuts he had asked the BBC to find from local radio will not now have to happen. He has found that funding from other sources, and I welcome that. Secondly, the national shared evening programme that local radio has had to have for three years now will be scrapped and local services restored. That is an example of the BBC listening, doing the right thing and saying, “We understand we have all this money and that we’ve got to spend it in a way that benefits the majority of licence fee payers”.

The alternatives do not stack up. Subscription or advertising would be extraordinarily retrograde steps. If we allow the BBC to take advertising, not only do we immediately raise questions about impartiality and neutrality but, frankly, come midnight most nights we will have a live roulette wheel, which is exactly what we have on ITV most nights.

On subscription services, I have been undertaking a text conversation with a constituent of mine in North Devon ever since I said I would be taking part in this debate. He said, “Netflix costs me half as much as the BBC and has five times the content”. Here is what Netflix does not have: radio, regional broadcasting, news and current affairs, and huge educational programmes. It does not put computers into schools or cover live sport. It does not have the huge community events that bring the country together, like Children in Need, which raised £50 million last Friday. That is what Netflix does not give us.

[Damian Collins]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. On advertising revenue, does he agree that, as brands have a finite amount of money to spend, if the BBC were fully commercial and accepted advertising it would be the biggest commercial hammer blow to independent television and radio in this country?

[Peter Heaton-Jones]

That is another perfectly good reason why we should not move to, or even consider, an advertising model for the funding of the BBC.

I will conclude with the animated conversation I was having with my constituent. Two programmes in particular have been mentioned in the debate—“The Blue Planet” and “Peaky Blinders”—and my constituent said he could watch them both on Netflix. Yes, but someone has to make them in the first place and, in my opinion, the only way they will ever be made is through a public service broadcaster being funded in the way the BBC is.

We are in a position where there is quite rightly debate about the funding of the BBC. It is right that we are having that discussion but, I believe, having worked for the organisation for 17 years and having looked closely at some of the alternatives, that the licence fee is the least worst option. That phrase was used earlier and it is absolutely right. If we try to move beyond that, we find ourselves opening up a hornet’s nest that could lead, as my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe said, to advertising or subscription, to a model that will not be the one we want the BBC to be.

I will say a couple of things in conclusion. I pay tribute to the Government and to the arrangement they have reached with the BBC for its charter renewal settlement. It is absolutely right that the BBC has been given a guarantee of income, and that it will rise with inflation. That is good and positive. The Government need to look further, as I know they are doing, at ways in which those who find it hard to pay the licence fee are able to do so, and I look forward to their working with the BBC on that. I have a great deal of sympathy with the concern that has been raised about some of the tactics used by those who collect the licence fee, about some of the letters that are far too threatening in the first instance. If someone does not have a television, that is their right, and they should not get threatening letters through the post because of it.

The licence fee and the BBC are, however, intrinsically linked and there is no viable funding alternative for our public service broadcaster. The BBC is a brilliant organisation but it has to be paid for and the licence fee is, in my estimation, the best way to do that. The BBC is known colloquially as Auntie. We have to hug Auntie close. She may be slightly eccentric but she needs to be fed. If we do not feed her, we will soon regret it, and we will miss her when she has gone.