SUBMISSION 52
Supplementary Memorandum submitted by
Mr Alan Yentob, BBC
I write to clarify the BBC's position on the
matter of tax relief for British feature films, clearly a central
issue in your inquiry into the British film industry.
I feel that the issue of the continuation, or
replacement of Section 48 tax relief has risen up the agenda since
the BBC submitted its written evidence in March. Since we did
not have time to cover the ground in our oral evidence session
before the Committee, I thought it would be helpful for the Committee's
deliberations to know the BBC's position on this aspect of the
inquiry.
It is BBC Film's and my experience that the
present tax relief is absolutely vital to the indigenous film
production industry. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that
few, if any, of the films we have supported in recent years would
have been made without production tax relief.
Many witnesses before the Committee have emphasised
the importance of distribution, we agree. However, whilst supporting
the idea of some additional systems for supporting distribution,
we believe it cannot be at the expense of production tax relief.
The effect would be to cannibalise one part of the industry to
aid another and this would have an overall negative impact on
the UK film industry.
I hope this will be of interest to the Committee
as it considers its report into this important part of British
cultural life.
22 July 2003
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