BECTU contribution to Ofcom review of public service television broadcasting

7 January 2004
  1. BECTU welcomes the opportunity to contribute to the Review and understands that this is the first phase in a longer project of consultations and reports. While noting the range of questions which the review will seek to address, we wish at this stage to focus on our priorities in this area - which will overlap with some but not all of the questions raised.

    2. Definition of public service broadcasting (PSB)

  2. While there is no single, legally valid definition of PSB, we believe all of its key aspects can be clearly itemised. The Communications Act, in Section 264, lists the necessary criteria for the fulfilment of the public service remit for television, including:
    • provision of high quality and wide-ranging programming (including a list of necessary programme genres as specified in the various subsections)
    • a service providing information, education and entertainment diverse programming aimed at different audience types
    • fair, well-informed and authoritative news coverage
    • promotion of social values, including (as identified by Ofcom), cultural identity (in all its diversity), informed democracy, and educated citizens (including a commitment to educational, children's and factual programming)
    • a commitment to programme production throughout the nations and regions of the UK
  3. These criteria are underpinned by what, in our view, are necessary elements of any PSB system.
    • universality of provision ie services that are universally available to the entire UK audience and free at the point of use
    • a consequent commitment to a significant amount of programming for a mass audience (rather than the residual supply - as arguably, in the case of America PBS - of what the market fails to deliver).
    • an application of PSB principles of fairness and diversity to the broadcasters' own practices in terms of employment, equal opportunities and training.
  4. We believe that all of these elements have been at the heart of the UK's successful PSB system and should remain so in the future. We further believe this approach has informed the development of the EU approach to PSB, as expressed, for example, in the Amsterdam Protocol. Its value is also born out internationally by the success of British programme sales abroad and by peer recognition in terms of prestigious international awards.
  5. We take these elements of a definition of PSB to apply to all our terrestrial PSB channels ie BBC1, BBC2, ITV, Channel Four and Channel Five. We look to Ofcom to rigorously apply PSB regulations and to enforce the implementation of companies' statements of programme policy wherever appropriate. We particularly look to Ofcom to uphold PSB regulations in relation to the commercial PSB broadcasters, where it has sometimes appeared that difficulties in the commercial climate have been accepted all to easily as a justification for relaxing regulations and diluting programme promises.
  6. At this stage in the debate we wish to highlight some of our own priorities within the general review of PSB. These are set out below.

    7. The importance of original production and of in-house production

  7. In order to be able to deliver the programmes of the range, quality and diversity required by the PSB remit outlined above, it is essential that our UK broadcasting system retains a high level of capacity for original programme production. High domestic programme investment underpins our broadcasters' ability to produce a range of high quality programming and prevents any tendency to over-reliance on repeats or on (relatively) cheap imports, especially from the US.
  8. A strong commitment to original programme production by PSB broadcasters also sets a benchmark against which all broadcasters can and should be judged. Relative to resources, the lack of original programme production by BSkyB sets that company in stark contrast to our PSB broadcasters and underlines the value of strong PSB regulations. It remains our view that BSkyB, given its enormous financial strength, is subject to too light a level of regulatory expectations.
  9. More particularly, we believe our broadcasters' ability to produce high quality broad-ranging programming also rests on their retaining a critical mass of in-house programme-making capacity. While we are supportive of original UK independent production - a sector in which many of our freelance members obtain work - we believe very strongly that our PSB broadcasters must continue to be producers rather than merely publishers or commissioners of programming.
  10. A permanently employed broadcasting workforce covering the full range of creative and technical skills is the best long-term guarantor of our broadcasters' ability to fulfil a strong PSB remit. In-house expertise, together with room to develop and to innovate are essential components of a PSB broadcasters' ability to deliver high quality and wide-ranging programmes. Commissioned productions can complement this but never adequately replace it. We therefore look to Ofcom to regard broadcasters' in-house production capacity as a key component of PSB and to reject any trend to a fragmented publisher-broadcaster model.

    11. Regional production

  11. One of our priorities in lobbying on the Communications Bill was to seek the strongest possible regulatory commitment to regional production (in the sense not just of programming for regional audiences but particularly of programmes produced in the regions for a national audience). We therefore place due emphasis on the Communications Act's requirements in this area - both in terms of Sections 286 and 287 on regional programme-making/regional programmes and of the reference to 'programmes made outside the M25 area' in Section 264(6)(j) on the public service remit.
  12. By regional production - which should of course be taken to signify programmes produced throughout the nations and regions of the UK - we mean the following key elements:
    • a wide range of high quality programmes across a broad spread of programme genres
    • the use of regionally based staff, freelances and production facilities
    • significant managerial autonomy outside London
    • the avoidance of further studio closures
  13. We are concerned that the Granada/Carlton merger is already resulting in regional cutbacks (eg at Meridian) - with no apparent concern on the part of regulators to question this.
  14. We believe that above and beyond the cultural and economic benefits of regional television production (which have been demonstrated in a number of independent studies and reports by both regulators and academic sources), the regional dimension is in itself a key component of PSB. No PSB system can be truly 'public' unless it both draws from and reflects the full range of regional and national identities within the UK. In our view, Ofcom therefore has a significant role in promoting regional television production as an essential element of PSB.

    15. Training, equal opportunities and creators' rights

  15. We have already indicted above our view that PSB is underpinned by the application of PSB principles of fairness and diversity to broadcasters' own practices. We are therefore pleased to note the requirements on training and on equal opportunities incorporated in the Communications Act in Sections 27 and 337.
  16. We hope that Ofcom will continue to promote good practice in this respect and to work constructively with Skillset and other relevant industry bodies to achieve this.
  17. It is a point of note that best practice in training and equal opportunities is usually best achieved in a context of permanent employment rather than a fragmented and casualised freelance labour market. It is also relevant that the possibilities for introducing new voices and innovations may best be found within the space provided by a solid framework of permanent employment. We therefore hope that Ofcom will pay serious attention to these elements which contribute to the skill and talent base underpinning our PSB system.
  18. One further aspect of PSB broadcasters' (and independents') relationship to their workforce is in respect of creators' rights. We hope that Ofcom will seek to ensure that a fair approach is taken to the rights of individual creators (specifically including their right, where appropriate, to secondary payments). We find it ironic that enormous effort has been and is being taken to improve the rights position of independent producers vis a vis the broadcasters - but very little attention is apparently paid to the practices adopted by independents towards individual creators. Complaints by independents about their exploitation by broadcasters are sometimes matched by their own practices towards individuals. We hope that Ofcom will require consistency rather than hypocrisy in this area.

    19. Feature films

  19. We note that one of the elements of the PSB remit set out in the Communications Act is the promotion of cultural activity in the UK by the inclusion of feature films in PSB services. This appears to us to be a clear requirement to encourage the greater promotion of British feature films, which reflect and support cultural activity in the UK. British broadcasters have not, in the past, consistently invested in British films. We hope this clarification of the PSB remit encourages a more constructive engagement in the future with the British film production sector.

    20. Funding systems

  20. We do not, in this context, wish to engage in a full-scale argument on PSB funding. It is, however, difficult to ignore this issue completely, especially in the context of BBC Charter Renewal.
  21. Our overall view, in summary, is that stable and separate funding mechanisms for the BBC and for commercial PSB companies has been a key feature of our successful broadcasting system since its inception, and should remain so. We would wish to see the retention of the licence fee as the primary source of BBC funding, with the BBC having full and exclusive use of licence fee income rather than diverting any licence funding to other broadcasters.
  22. 'Top-slicing' the licence fee (ie diverting a proportion to a possible Arts Council of the Air, to which commercial broadcasters could bid for revenue for PSB programming) appears to us to have all the disadvantages of rail privatisation: weakening a valuable public service, diverting scarce public resources to private profit, introducing a new layer of chaotic competition and, as a final consequence, producing an inferior service for viewers. We therefore hope that the principle of separate funding streams for the BBC and for commercial PSB companies will be retained - especially as all recent evidence (from Oliver & Ohlbaum Associates and others) indicates that diverting resources from the BBC to commercial PSB will result in a net reduction in original UK production.

    23. Conclusion

  23. We regard this as a preliminary indication of our priorities within any general debate on PSB. We hope that Ofcom will take note of our views and will keep us fully informed of and involved in the further progress of the Review.
Last updated 19 March 2004