The Communications and Digital Committee has written to the Secretary of State at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, setting out its view on key proposals for the next BBC Charter ahead of publication of the Government’s White Paper.
- Letter from Baroness Keeley, Chair of the Communications and Digital Committee to Rt Hon Lisa Nandy MP, Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport
- Inquiry: BBC Charter Renewal
- Communications and Digital Committee
The Committee says this is not a “routine” Charter review and that the 2028 Charter must equip the BBC to navigate dramatic changes in how public service media is distributed, discovered and consumed.
The Committee examined a number of proposals in the Government’s BBC Charter Review Green Paper. It found that:
- The BBC is already under significant financial pressure. Therefore, any new or expanded responsibilities in the next Charter—in areas such as promoting regional growth, technological innovation or media literacy—must be matched by adequate funding or a clear acknowledgement that the BBC will have to do less in other areas. The Committee says the Government should be “bold, confident and unapologetic” in ensuring the BBC has the financial sustainability it needs to deliver any obligations set out in the new Charter.
- There is no obvious benefit in giving the BBC a broad new public purpose to drive economic growth across the UK, as the Government has proposed. The BBC already contributes £6.7 billion to the UK economy and there is a risk that such a change could distort commissioning priorities and distract the BBC from its core public service objectives. Instead, the Committee says the new Charter should retain the spirit of the BBC’s current fourth purpose, which puts public value first, while articulating more clearly the BBC’s vital contribution to developing the UK creative economy.
- In 2015, broadcast television reached 92% of people in the UK each week on average, compared to just 54% last year. To uphold the principle of universality in a changing market, the BBC will increasingly need to distribute content through third-party platforms such as YouTube. However, this comes at the expense of control over how content is presented, access to audience data and the BBC’s direct relationship with audiences. The new Charter should support both strong BBC-owned services and flexible third-party distribution.
- Simply making content available on a platform does not guarantee that audiences will find it, and evidence to the Committee highlighted the need for stronger safeguards on prominence, data access, platform accountability and fair value. The Committee says the Government should set clear minimum expectations for agreements between public service media providers and video-sharing platforms, backed by new legislation if voluntary agreements prove insufficient.
- Greater collaboration will become increasingly important if public service media providers are to overcome shared challenges and compete with global platforms at sufficient scale. The Committee welcomes discussions between the BBC and Channel 4 about an expanded iPlayer, but says any arrangement must be a genuine, mutually beneficial partnership that respects the different brands and funding models of participating organisations, while maintaining plurality and competition. If the Government also decides to give the BBC a new or strengthened duty for technology and R&D in the next Charter, this should be framed around innovation in the public interest and clearly linked to the broadcaster’s mission and public purposes.
Baroness Keeley, Chair of the Communications and Digital Committee, said: “The upcoming BBC Charter Review is fundamental for the future of public service media in the UK.
“It comes as national public broadcasters face ever greater competition for viewers from streaming platforms and international technology giants, and so cannot be designed in isolation from the Government’s wider digital and media policy.
“The Government should use the BBC Charter Review White Paper to set out a coherent and ambitious strategy for public service media over the next decade. It must also be realistic about what can be asked of the BBC as it grapples with significant financial pressures.
“We can see no obvious benefit in a specific requirement for the BBC to drive economic growth across the UK. It already makes a massive contribution to the UK’s creative economy. Including an explicit economic growth public purpose in the new Charter risks both mission drift and skewing commissioning towards more generic, more exportable content.”
