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Mr. Alton: I agree with the hon. Lady. Is she aware of the story of Malcom Muggeridge, when he was a broadcaster covering the Biafran war? He was filming an execution that was about to take place when the batteries on the camera ran low. The execution was stopped so that the batteries could be recharged in order to film the execution. Is it not the case that the medium itself often becomes more important than the events going on around us? We must therefore exercise responsibility when we discharge our functions, whether as broadcasters, parents or Government.
Ms Eagle: People should act not only responsibly, but with integrity, and it is up to the journalist to exercise that quality.
Had we not seen some of the shocking scenes of the famine in Ethiopia, we might not have been able to react as we did. We must admit that the broadcasting media are powerful, but we must be much more subtle in our response to their images, especially if they depict real events rather than fictional ones. When we talk about the quantity of violence on television, it is our absolute duty in a democracy to draw that distinction.
The second key distinction is that between fictional violence which is realistic and that which is clearly fantastic. What is its context? Some of it will be more damaging than others. I do not believe that it is acceptable to say that we must stop the portrayal of violence in all circumstances in a film or a play on television. We must take account of that.
New clause 7, which talks about the quantity of violence, makes no distinction between the context in which it is shown or how it is shown. Many people think that the
"Tom and Jerry" cartoons are appallingly violent, but most children can draw a distinction between cartoon-portrayed violence and the violence in "Rambo III".
Another emotive issue is the depiction of rape. Again, that depends on the context. The depiction of rape in "Straw Dogs" is far more offensive and potentially dangerous because of how was it was depicted than the depiction of rape in "The Accused". We must make some of these distinctions; we cannot talk about quantity in a gross way without appreciating the context in which these scenes are depicted.
We must also draw a distinction between adults and children. Children obviously need protection, especially when they are young; adults less so. New clause 7 takes little account of that. I shall not remind the House of the many valid criticisms of, and questions about, the V-chip's suitability. The main problem is that, even if we could get the V-chip into the 36 million existing television sets, it would give broadcasters a chance to say, "You have that system of classification, so we can produce what we want, and it is up to consumers to decide whether to watch it."
The results of introducing the V-chip on that scale, even if it were possible, would be the reverse of what those who are pushing the idea intend. It would be difficult to argue that it was necessary to have the V-chip and a series of extra systems of censorship. We either let people choose or we try collectively, as we are doing in this country with our very good regulation systems and classification systems, to control the problem as it should be controlled--with the maximum consensus.
We have talked a lot about children. It is incumbent on us, as a national Parliament, to mention the millions of households without children, which may want to have access to adult entertainment of a sort that we would not want children to watch. We must take account of the views and interests of those households.
New clause 11 is much more onerous than the hon. Member for Mossley Hill suggested, because all our deliberations on the Bill have been against the background that we are on the threshold of a massive extension of channels. We shall have 50 or 100 channels in the not too distant future. Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that all those should be classified, however large their audience, for everything they do, including advertisements and live programmes? I have already mentioned the problems in trying to classify live output.
We must be pretty clear in our minds that the V-chip is not the way forward. We must support the institutions we have introduced, which on the whole do a pretty good job. I do not always agree with every decision by the British Board of Film Classification, but it does a pretty good job, as do all the other institutions that we have created to try to recognise the importance of the broadcasting media and of influencing people, and to establish a reasonable, consensual way through some of those difficult problems.
I oppose all the new clauses, because they add nothing to the institutions as they have developed, but threaten to undermine them.
Sir Patrick Cormack (South Staffordshire):
I agree with the hon. Member for Wallasey (Ms Eagle) up to a
The hon. Member for Wallasey talks about society and television. Television is a central aspect of our society, and there is a real feeling among many thinking people in this country that, in the past decade or more, we have witnessed the progressive erosion of childhood innocence, largely at the hands of television.
It is pointless to talk at length about books and television. We choose books to buy to read, to take down from the shelves. Television is there in almost every home in the land, is watched indiscriminately in many homes, and does a great deal of damage--for a simple reason. The aim of everyone who utters, as I am seeking to utter now, is to influence. Why do people write books? Why do they write plays? Why do they produce television programmes? The answer is: to influence people.
The implicit message of this Bill is that television is set to proliferate--the advent of digital, the arrival of more and more channels, and so on. More, in my view, will not mean better, however. It will mean a proliferation of the tawdry--if we are not careful.
I do not for a moment impugn my right hon. Friend's sincerity or motives when she says that she takes these issues seriously--I am sure she does--but she must take them with more seriousness. She said that she would be talking to the new chairman of the BBC and others. I urge her to have them in very soon after we have completed our deliberations on this Bill. She must tell them that, although they are doing their best, it is not good enough. There is too much gratuitous violence on our televisions, and there will be more.
I do not like new clause 7, because it makes the Secretary of State into the grand censor. I believe that censorship is necessary, but that it should be done by the new standards body, the BSC. I want it to behave with a robustness that has been singularly lacking hitherto in those whose duty it is to examine and control. It should not be afraid of controlling.
In a way, there is no worse crime against humanity than the destruction of childhood innocence. It must be stopped. I believe that the depiction of violence in news broadcasting can be a positive good when it shows evil men doing terrible things to others. I remember, as a small child, being in a cinema when the first newsreel of Belsen was shown. My mother's instinctive reaction was to put her hands over my eyes, but my father said, "No, let him see it." I have never forgotten it, just as the young children
who saw the terrible scenes from Bosnia will never forget them. Nor should they. The evil that man can do to man is terrible, and we should know about it.
What we are really discussing today, however, is fictional, gratuitous violence without a moral. The hon. Member for Wallasey talked of the famous photograph from Vietnam, and said that it was very influential. I agree; but why? Because people saw something evil and terrible happening, and reacted against it.
So I accept my right hon. Friend's sincerity of purpose, but I want a greater firmness of purpose. I want her to give an unequivocal message to those with this enormous power over our lives--those who produce and control the production of our programmes. It is the very future of our nation that is in their hands, because they have the chance to ensure that our children see what is good, and know the difference between what is good and what is evil.
Ms Lynne:
We are not saying that our new clauses will be the panacea for all ills. It was interesting that not one hon. Member who spoke in the debate said that there was not too much violence on television. We are proposing minor measures--they are small measures. The Secretary of State said that she is looking into research about the V-chip--that is all we are asking for; that is all new clause 10 asks for. We are not saying that the V-chip should be put into all television sets and that everyone has to use it--we are saying that parents should have the choice to use the V-chip or not to use the V-chip.
As far as classification is concerned, the 9 o'clock watershed already exists. The producers already have to classify, so it would not cause a great deal more work. The right hon. and learned Member for Putney (Mr. Mellor) said that he spoke about this 12 years ago. What has happened? We are still seeing violence--the diet of violence is getting worse and worse on our television screens and in films.
Many years ago, when I first started acting, we did not have this sort of violence or this portrayal of violence--the skills and the techniques were not there. As in Shakespeare, a messenger would come on to say that someone had been killed, and there might have been a little bit of violence. We did not have the technical skills that we have today.
The hon. Member for Wallasey (Ms Eagle) referred to live television. Few producers of drama programmes will produce live drama programmes: their joy is in the editing of the programmes--that is where we get gratuitous violence, where we get the cutaway shots, where we see a head come off a body or where we see someone have their arms or legs cut off. That is the sort of gratuitous violence we see on television at the moment.
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