Sustainable independent and impartial news; in the Nations, locally and in the regions is a 12 week public consultation document published by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport that "seeks views on the proposal for a contained, contestable element to be introduced to the next licence fee settlement."
The WriteToReply republication of the original consultation document allows interested members of the public to comment on the consultation document at a paragraph level.
Comment on the consultation at http://writetoreply.org/pluralnews/
The consultation closes on 22 September 2009
Do you agree that securing plural sources of impartial news for the Nations, locally and in the regions should be a key priority?
The consultation document suggests:
10. The market continues to offer to various degrees original and innovative content and there are many websites offering local news and community information. But the provision of impartial and accurate news sources is not guaranteed in the marketplace and there is increasing evidence that changes as a result of audience fragmentation and shift in commercial revenues is having an impact on commercially provided news in the Nations, locally and in the regions. At the same time, some forecasts are suggesting that the press advertising market could shrink by between £700m and £1.6bn by 2019 with the regional
press worst hit.[2] Television broadcasters of news in the Nations, locally and in the regions are also facing considerable pressure as is local news on commercial radio. Taken together, these changes all reflect the diminution of the traditional offline advertising surplus, which funded court reporting, investigative journalism, considered and impartial coverage of the devolved institutions and much else in the fabric of our democracy in its widest sense. The
bulk of this evidence has been explored in the public service broadcasting reviews which Ofcom has carried out under the statutory duty entrusted to it by Parliament (section 264 of
Communications Act 2003) to consider periodically how to maintain and strengthen public service TV broadcasting. The scope of this statutory review is currently limited to television, but we have acknowledged in the Digital Britain White Paper that this may need to change to allow a review of the wider delivery of public service content.
11. These pressures across the market place mean that news provided in the Nations, locally and in the regions is diminishing or risks significant decrease. The Government does not consider this would be in the public interest and proposes therefore that, as news at the national and international level is delivered through a range of providers, so too should news in the Nations, locally and at the regional level.
The consultation document suggests:
10. The market continues to offer to various degrees original and innovative content and there are many websites offering local news and community information. But the provision of impartial and accurate news sources is not guaranteed in the marketplace and there is increasing evidence that changes as a result of audience fragmentation and shift in commercial revenues is having an impact on commercially provided news in the Nations, locally and in the regions. At the same time, some forecasts are suggesting that the press advertising market could shrink by between £700m and £1.6bn by 2019 with the regional
press worst hit.[2] Television broadcasters of news in the Nations, locally and in the regions are also facing considerable pressure as is local news on commercial radio. Taken together, these changes all reflect the diminution of the traditional offline advertising surplus, which funded court reporting, investigative journalism, considered and impartial coverage of the devolved institutions and much else in the fabric of our democracy in its widest sense. The
bulk of this evidence has been explored in the public service broadcasting reviews which Ofcom has carried out under the statutory duty entrusted to it by Parliament (section 264 of
Communications Act 2003) to consider periodically how to maintain and strengthen public service TV broadcasting. The scope of this statutory review is currently limited to television, but we have acknowledged in the Digital Britain White Paper that this may need to change to allow a review of the wider delivery of public service content.
11. These pressures across the market place mean that news provided in the Nations, locally and in the regions is diminishing or risks significant decrease. The Government does not consider this would be in the public interest and proposes therefore that, as news at the national and international level is delivered through a range of providers, so too should news in the Nations, locally and at the regional level.
Do you agree that sustainable, impartial news in the Nations, locally and in the regions is likely to require some top-up public funding?
The consultation document suggests:
15. We expect IFNCs [independently funded news consortia] to be run commercially. But the concept recognises the market reality that commercial funding might not necessarily be able to support all the costs of sustainable independent news in the Nations, locally and in the regions; nor yet commercial provision supplemented by wholesale access to the BBC’s news facilities building on the welcome
partnership proposals which the Corporation has developed. A key aim of the pilots will be to test the level of “top-up” public funding required to provide high-quality news provision. At UK-wide level, the BBC, Sky News, ITN, and news aggregators such as PA and Reuters all provide key benchmarks of quality of impartial and accurate news that the Government wishes to see replicated sustainably at the level of the Nations, locally and regionally.
Estimates of the costs of required top-up public funding vary considerably. In their statutory review, Ofcom place the cost at between £65m and £100m a year. The cost of the BBC’s (fully-publicly funded) television news for the Nations and English regions is at the top end of this range and significantly more if radio and online/ multi-media news provision is included. These are useful indicators in the public policy debate. Pilot projects would help refine this figure. But for pilots to work, those participating need to have some certainty at the beginning oinvestment.
The consultation document suggests:
15. We expect IFNCs [independently funded news consortia] to be run commercially. But the concept recognises the market reality that commercial funding might not necessarily be able to support all the costs of sustainable independent news in the Nations, locally and in the regions; nor yet commercial provision supplemented by wholesale access to the BBC’s news facilities building on the welcome
partnership proposals which the Corporation has developed. A key aim of the pilots will be to test the level of “top-up” public funding required to provide high-quality news provision. At UK-wide level, the BBC, Sky News, ITN, and news aggregators such as PA and Reuters all provide key benchmarks of quality of impartial and accurate news that the Government wishes to see replicated sustainably at the level of the Nations, locally and regionally.
Estimates of the costs of required top-up public funding vary considerably. In their statutory review, Ofcom place the cost at between £65m and £100m a year. The cost of the BBC’s (fully-publicly funded) television news for the Nations and English regions is at the top end of this range and significantly more if radio and online/ multi-media news provision is included. These are useful indicators in the public policy debate. Pilot projects would help refine this figure. But for pilots to work, those participating need to have some certainty at the beginning oinvestment.
netvibes
RSS