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03|11|04

Ofcom invites detailed responses on Public Service Publisher

Ofcom’s ongoing Review of Public Service Broadcasting has identified an emerging deficit in the provision of public service broadcasting as television moves to digital, audiences for terrestrial analogue commercial television continue to decline and the value of analogue licences – which include substantial public service broadcasting obligations – therefore continues to diminish.

Ofcom's conclusion in its Phase 2 report – that the current model for public service broadcasting would not survive the transition to a fully digital future – found broad agreement across the sector.

In response to those findings, Ofcom has proposed the combination of a public service broadcasting-focused BBC, appropriately governed and regulated; a free-to-air ITV with core public service broadcasting obligations; Five to invest more in original programming with more flexible public service broadcasting obligations; and Channel Four to remain not-for-profit, with sharper focus on its public service broadcasting obligations and greater scale through alliances, joint ventures and partnerships.

However, Ofcom has also concluded that this combination alone would not be sufficient to achieve the task asked of it by Parliament in Section 264 of the Communications Act; namely to maintain and strengthen the quality of public service broadcasting in the UK.

Ofcom has therefore also proposed the establishment of a new entity, provisionally called a Public Service Publisher, to ensure that the necessary level of competition for quality in public service broadcasting continues through the transition to digital.

Public Service Publisher

Since the proposals were published on 30 September, a number of organisations and individuals have expressed interest in the idea of a Public Service Publisher and have sought further clarity over what form this would take, when it would begin operating and how it would function.

In response to those requests, Ofcom is today issuing a hypothetical tender document for the potential PSP. This is deliberately exploratory in nature; its intention is to ascertain, through wide debate, the potential merits of – and possible opportunities presented by – the suggested new entity.

Ofcom invites all parties who have expressed an interest in the PSP, as well as others, to contribute their views; there will be further discussion of the potential options identified through the hypothetical tender exercise at an industry seminar on 2 December.

Those contributions, together with the input of other ongoing consultation activity and research, will inform Ofcom's firm recommendations on public service broadcasting in general – and the PSP specifically – in early 2005, ahead of the Government’s Green Paper on the BBC Charter Review.

Ofcom Chief Executive Stephen Carter said: “Many have agreed with our diagnosis of the problem – that the status quo will not survive the move to digital.”

He added: "There appears to be significant interest in the idea of a Public Service Publisher. This hypothetical tender will hopefully help us and others ascertain whether the idea has real practical and operational merit."

Ends.

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