Final say on media transactions for Ofcom, not Culture Secretary

• Report: Media plurality (PDF)
• Report: Media plurality (HTML)
• Evidence: Media plurality
• Inquiry: Media plurality
• Select Committee on Communications

Issues surrounding media plurality have come under the policy spotlight during the present Parliament, after concerns were raised about the proposed (and subsequently abandoned) purchase of BSkyB by News Corporation.  We have also seen Ofcom’s reports on Measuring Media Plurality, the Leveson report and, most recently, the Government’s own consultation on media ownership and plurality.

Taken together, these have raised a number of ways in which the policy and regulatory framework currently surrounding plurality needs updating. A wide range of different ideas have been put forward, but somehow, after all this, nothing firm has emerged. We hope to enter this debate with a set of recommendations which will stimulate greater consensus and greater action towards reform than appears to have been possible.

Chairman

Chairman of the Committee, Lord Inglewood, said:

“Our proposal is for a framework of two key elements. The first, which is new, is the undertaking of a plurality review on a predictable periodic basis, which should set the context for the second: a modification of the existing arrangements for a review of specific transactions which occur in the interval between one periodic review and the next. We would expect the latter to happen infrequently.

“There are a number of important reforms in our proposal, as we have tried to reshape the role of Government, Parliament, regulator and competition authorities when it comes to the way in which media mergers are assessed, who has the final say and how they should be able to intervene."

Recommendations

Key recommendations:

• Ofcom should conduct periodic plurality reviews, providing an assessment of the sufficiency of plurality at the time.
• The Secretary of State should have a role in giving political authority to the conclusions of these reviews and as such they can be seen to offer a way of providing clear guidance and clarity to media enterprises about the prospects for consolidation in the interval between these reviews.
• Between periodic reviews, there should be a crystal clear distinction between competition and plurality policy, with transactions assessed on both grounds where relevant in a way which keeps competition and plurality considerations apart.
• Responsibility for reconciling plurality and competition assessments of transactions and for reaching a final decision should then rest with the Ofcom board, not the Secretary of State.
• While interventions in the interest of plurality should, generally speaking, only be imposed in connection with specific transactions, there must also be provision for intervening at the time of a periodic review if organic market change has caused immediate and pressing concerns. However there must be a high bar to intervention at the time of a periodic review.

Other recommendations:

• the BBC should be included in any assessment of media plurality, but it should not be subject to any control measures imposed from outwith its own regulatory framework as a result of that assessment;
• the Government and the BBC, in negotiating Charter Renewal, should consider whether the BBC might be given a more explicit responsibility – with respect to its online offer for news and current affairs content – to stimulate consumption of diverse viewpoints from different external sources; and that
• the BBC Charter Review process should make clear what licence fee funding is for and the Government should support the view that the licence fee should be for the BBC alone, though that is not to say that funding to S4C should now be removed.  

Further information

• About Parliament: Select Committees
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