BBC (Proposed Cuts)

Valerie Vaz Excerpts

Thursday 1st December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Valerie Vaz (Walsall South) (Lab)]

I begin by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby (Austin Mitchell) for introducing this timely debate. It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers).

The motion says it all. I call on the BBC to reconsider some of its short-term responses to the problem of relieving pressure on its budget, and I hope to set out why. So many times in the Chamber recently I have had to express my concern about our national institutions, which are the envy of the world. The BBC is a well loved service, and one that is respected for factual output, drama and music. It is now leading the debate on science and bringing its beauty and wonder to the masses.

I shall focus on the national position, what is happening locally in the west midlands and what will happen in future. As my hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby said, for just £12 a month, the nation can enjoy new drama, science and current affairs programmes. In my view, the BBC is hamstrung, because although the licence fee settlement is guaranteed until 2017, the licence fee is frozen. As he said, the BBC will also have new funding responsibilities for, among other things, the World Service and S4C, and must make savings of 20%.

The whole point of a public broadcaster is that it need not have an eye to the shareholder, so it can commission new and innovative programmes. The BBC is accountable to viewers, who will always tell it what they like and do not like, but people must have space and time to hone their craft. Creativity cannot be measured as a unit of expenditure.

[Steve McCabe]

Is it fair that viewers in the west midlands should have to pay the same licence fee as viewers in Cardiff, Bristol or Salford when the former get such a limited return for their investment compared with the latter?

[Valerie Vaz]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention, but I shall come to what is happening to BBC West Midlands.

A drama can have a greater impact and provide greater understanding of a topic; one has only to watch “Later…with Jools Holland” to see this country’s tremendous musical creativity; and in both television and radio, exploring the boundaries of our world and helping us to make sense of it is one of the cornerstones of what the BBC does.

What concerns me most as a west midlands MP is the proposed decimation of BBC West Midlands, which has a unique 90-year history of both factual and drama programme making. It is home to some of the most excellent programmes, such as “Countryfile”, “Coast” and “Gardeners’ World”. A long time ago, I made a programme that came from Pebble Mill—“Network East”—and I remember the expertise of the staff. They edited a piece on the Chelsea flower show at 7.50 pm for transmission at 8.00 pm. One can find such professionalism and dedication to the job across the whole of the BBC. As many hon. Members from the west midlands will know, when we go on the “Politics Show”, a remarkable woman—is there not always a remarkable woman?—does our make-up, acts as floor manager and provides the hospitality at the end of the programme. I am not sure what else she can include in her job. Perhaps the BBC will expect her to be a camera operator as well. That is the nature of her commitment and the commitment of the other people who work there.

The £15 million that is spent on the region is worth £28 million to the local economy, not to mention that Birmingham is the country’s second city and the geographical heart of England. That as well as skilled jobs such as journalists, researchers, engineers and producers could be lost. The pitch is that 150 skilled jobs in the area could be lost.

[Tracey Crouch (Chatham and Aylesford) (Con)]

If the west midlands is the heart of England, Kent is the garden of England. Is the hon. Lady aware that Radio Kent, which provides many of my constituents with an excellent service, has longer listening hours throughout the week than any other BBC radio station? That is why it is vital to retain top-quality programmes and stations for our constituents.

[Valerie Vaz]

The hon. Lady serves her constituents well by making such an important point and I hope that the BBC is listening to her. It is not only the skilled jobs that will go; the local news dimension and the cutting edge digital production will be lost. Once lost, such skills will never be regained.

The west midlands is one of the most diverse areas. When BBC operations moved from Pebble Mill to the Mailbox, Mark Thompson said that great cities such as Birmingham were central to his vision of the BBC. None the less, it is the future on which I wish to focus. In the midlands, there is a different a pool of talent from that in London. Broadcasting there offers opportunities for a first step in the media. Outreach work is carried out across the midlands and includes projects such as BBC News School Report, the International School and the university of Birmingham sports partnership in which, hopefully, it will be recognised that women can play sport and that there is a gender balance to be achieved.

[Yvonne Fovargue (Makerfield) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend share my concern that these cuts are having an effect on regional sports? For example, there are fears that the cuts, particularly those in London, will take away 95% of the coverage of rugby league, which is hugely popular in my constituency.

--- Later in debate ---

[Valerie Vaz]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, and I absolutely agree with her. I should also like to flag up my concern that after the move to Bristol, S4C may be made to broadcast from there to save costs rather than from Wales.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

I am startled by the claim that S4C could be broadcast from Bristol. Is the hon. Lady telling me that that is official Labour party policy?

[Valerie Vaz]

Oh dear. I thought that the hon. Gentleman was listening. I was voicing not official party policy, but my concerns. I tend to look at the future and worry about things. The hon. Gentleman should be aware that such a move is a possibility. It is not one with which I agree. People have actually starved to secure the channel S4C, and it should remain in Wales, which is the most wonderful country. Let me press on now.

Each generation has seen the BBC achieving new successes. Programmes such as “Doctor Who” have been reworked and old legends such as “Merlin” have been broadcast. Savings can be found by curbing the excessive salaries of the so-called stars.

[Steve McCabe]

Jeremy Clarkson.

[Valerie Vaz]

Yes, Jeremy Clarkson. As I mentioned earlier, all this output costs £12 a month. If we match some of the savings with a slight increase in the licence fee—7p a day would mean a £2 increase a month—which my hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby mentioned, we could stop all these cuts. We cannot have a situation in which we buy in other people’s words and pictures rather than have news reporting on the ground. I have written about this matter to Mark Thompson and the chairman, Chris Patten. The reply, which I received today, does not reassure me that any of these cuts are necessary. I urge the BBC to think again. Operating a camera, directing and editing are different skills. Mistakes are made when there is no time for research and facts are not checked. The BBC is not a throwaway institution, but an institution that nurtures new talent while celebrating the wisdom of the long-standing people who work there. The world is getting more complex; the BBC needs to expand and not contract. The message from this House must be that it has to think again.

--- Later in debate ---

[Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)]

Thank you for inviting me to speak, Madam Deputy Speaker, in this debate on a subject that is hugely important for the people of Wales—possibly temporarily, before the whole thing is moved to Bristol.

I love the BBC. I love it as one might love a cantankerous auntie or some other relation. I enjoy complaining about the BBC, in much the same way as the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Austin Mitchell), who introduced this debate, might enjoy complaining about the weather. I enjoy complaining about the left-wing bias and the ridiculous obsession with wind farms. In fact, about three weeks ago I even wrote a letter of complaint to the BBC—the first I have written in my life, I think. I wrote to “EastEnders”, because there was a line in it where someone said that somebody had died as a result of a bee sting. I was approached by all the apiarists in my constituency, who were outraged at the damage that that would do to beekeeping throughout Britain. I wrote to the BBC asking it to make it clear that dying from a bee sting is an incredibly rare event. When the BBC does such things on “EastEnders”, there should be a high-profile rebuttal of the idea that such events happen regularly. I am therefore taking advantage of this debate to make that rebuttal, because I do not think that the BBC issued one.

The BBC is hugely important in Wales; indeed, it is probably more important to Wales than to any other part of the country. I know that we all think that, but Wales is a proud nation, and the BBC not only delivers the same thing to Wales as to the rest of Britain, but actually underpins the culture of Wales. The BBC in Wales has its own orchestra. The BBC is absolutely part of Welsh culture. It does a terrific amount of work for our unique language—Welsh, the language of heaven. It is not just S4C that has been involved in that, but the BBC, which has played such an important part in developing the language. Indeed, it is one of the success stories when it comes to the world’s minority languages, and we have to recognise the role the BBC has played in that.

The BBC, through its coverage of the National Assembly for Wales, is also playing a huge part in the development of the political identity of Wales. I am unashamedly Welsh through and through, and I have been incredibly proud of the work the BBC has done to make Wales an identifiable nation since devolution became a reality in 1999. I am also proud of the work it is continuing to do, and I do not want to see it stop.

The truth is, however, that the BBC had to reduce its costs. The reduction in the licence fee—what we call BBC cuts—is an entirely reasonable expectation. The Government obviously have an influence on the licence fee in its discussion with the BBC, and vulnerable people must be protected. The BBC licence fee is a regressive tax, which impacts more on the poorer in society than on the wealthy. At a time when the whole nation faces difficult economic and financial circumstances—we cannot be sure how long they will last—it would be completely wrong for the BBC not to make a contribution through the licence fee. I am fully supportive of the reduction in the level of the licence fee.

I want to make three points; the first is about S4C. One of the BBC cuts is for S4C funding to the tune of a little less than £80 million a year. This is the first chance I have had to speak on this since serving on the Committee considering the Public Bodies Bill, which was effectively taken over by the issue for a significant part of its work. It helped all of us to understand the impact of the BBC in Wales. I received 1,100 e-mails about the proposed changes in the Public Bodies Bill, which people feared would give the BBC excessive influence over S4C. I sought assurances from the Minister and was very encouraged by those I received. What we found in the end is that the result has been a terrific score. I thus wanted in this Chamber to say a huge thank you to those who delivered the agreement between the BBC and S4C, which has produced what is as close to an operationally independent S4C in Wales as could be hoped for. We feared that that would not happen, but the matter has been laid to rest. I also want to mention the BBC National Trustee for Wales, Elan Closs Stephens, who played a terrific part in bringing about that agreement, which needs to be publicly recognised.

My second point is about English language broadcasting in Wales—an issue also raised by the former controller of BBC Wales in a recent high-profile speech. Many Wales MPs have been so focused on the future operational independence of S4C that we have perhaps not argued as strongly as we should have for Wales to have its fair share of English language production. It hurt me a little when I read in the report of the former controller of BBC Wales that Welsh politicians did not fight remotely as hard for English language broadcasting in their country as the Scots did. I thought that that was a challenge to us. One reason I wanted to speak in today’s debate was to try to make it certain that Welsh politicians started fighting for their share of English language broadcasting in Wales. It is not just a matter of S4C; it is about English language broadcasting as well.

The hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) suggested looking at the issue like an accountant to see whether BBC broadcasting in Wales could be transferred to Bristol. I can see that making a lot of sense from an accountant’s point of view, but my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Alun Cairns) and other hon. Friends leapt to our feet like startled rabbits when we heard that. That is how we felt. I could not believe that anybody could possibly make such a suggestion—even in jest. It struck me that at that stage not a single Member from Wales from any party other than the Conservatives must have heard it. I would have thought that Opposition Members, including the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Nick Smith) who was not in his place at that stage, would have leapt to their feet, too.

[Valerie Vaz]

The hon. Gentleman is being slightly unfair or failing to understand the point I was making. It was a simple one. I meant that if it was a question of costs, then there was such a possibility. It is not on anybody’s agenda, but I thought that, just by saying it, perhaps the situation could be saved.

[Glyn Davies]

I thank the hon. Lady. When she made that suggestion, it was the first time that I had ever heard it. Perhaps this is the quickest ever way to save a situation—three quarters of an hour after what the hon. Lady said. That seems promising, but the suggestion itself is so unreasonable and outrageous that one cannot even contemplate it. My own view is that if changes have to be made, perhaps we could move Bristol to Cardiff.