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Chris Bryant : And gardening magazines.
Mr. Foster: They may also fall into that category.
I agree with what has been said about the BBC's earlier use of independent producers. We certainly need to change what is going on, and we shall all need to look carefully at the BBC's proposals for a window of creative opportunity. At least that is an example of its moving in the direction that many of us favour, but as has been pointed out by the Producers Alliance for Cinema and Television—usually known as PACT—many questions remain to be answered about how that window of opportunity will continue to exist.
Issues that desperately need examination do not seem to have been covered by any of the reports that I have mentioned. The hon. Member for Cardiff, West (Kevin Brennan) spoke of the vital importance of the BBC in Wales. It is surprising that there has been no debate anywhere about the relationship between the BBC and S4C. As Members know, the BBC is currently required to provide 10 hours of Welsh language programming for S4C to show. I find it strange that the nature of that relationship has never been challenged. Surely if it is to receive the BBC's material, S4C ought to have far more editorial control over its content.
Mr. Foster: I assure the hon. Gentleman that that is not the view of people at S4C. We should also try to agree on the current value of those 10 hours of programming, and then agree to enable S4C to negotiate with the BBC on how the money can best be spent, rather than being tied to a fixed number of hours.
As I said on the day the Green Paper was announced, I broadly agree with a great deal of it. Unlike the hon. Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford, I believe that many of its proposals deserve support. I especially welcome the Government's agreement to continue the licence fee and not to allow top-slicing. As the Select Committee said, the licence fee is not perfect; it might be better described as the least worst of the options currently available. If we reflect on the alternatives, we see why that is so.
In fact, there are only two key alternatives. One is direct funding by the Government of the day. In Australia, a 25 per cent. reduction in the funding of public service broadcasting has been accompanied by increased Government interference. If we want an independent BBC that is well and securely funded, that is not the route we should take. The other option is subscription, advertising or pay-to-view, but all those would lead to the BBC's rejoining the ratings war to secure the maximum number of viewers to boost advertising and the number of pay-per-view clients.
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If we do not choose any of those options, as I hope we will not, we shall be left with the licence fee as—with all its faults—the least worst option. As I have said, I am delighted that the Government have agreed to retain it and also to retain the charter for 10 years. That is a crucial decision.
I welcome the Green Paper's proposals to define the BBC's service remit more tightly—although it is fair to say that the BBC has already been moving in that direction, with the help of Michael Grade and Mark Thompson, both of whom deserve the praise heaped on them by the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton. The Government have added to the original five proposals a sixth relating to the BBC's responsibility for helping to drive forward the switchover to digital. As I said to the Secretary of State—I did not receive an answer on that occasion—I hope that we do not expect the BBC to take all the responsibility, because that is a job for the Government. I also hope that we do not expect it to write a blank cheque. The Secretary of State should give us some idea of how much money the BBC can reasonably expect to receive. She said earlier that that would be specified in documents still to be produced, and I hope that it will.
My one significant disagreement with the Government and the Green Paper concerns the governance of the BBC. I think the whole House accepts that we cannot continue the current arrangements, with the BBC both flag-waver for itself and its own regulator. Under its new chairman, the BBC has already embarked on a bid to separate the governors from the rest of the corporation, but they are still part of the BBC, and the proposals in the Green Paper would perpetuate that. I do not see how the trustees can be truly independent of the BBC. At the very least we need an independent governance working alongside Ofcom to regulate the BBC, but I would go further: I would prefer a totally independent regulator with responsibility for all public service broadcasters, ensuring that they all met their individual remits.
Mr. Wyatt: Given the development of broadband television—not just HomeChoice, but IPTV—there is no doubt that the trend will continue. In the public sector, how would that be regulated under the scheme favoured by the hon. Gentleman?
Mr. Foster: As the hon. Gentleman knows only too well, Ofcom is working on the definition of public service broadcasting. We already have approved public service broadcasters alongside the BBC: ITV and Channels 4 and 5. I do not doubt that in due course other companies will bid for listings to gain the benefits, although they may have to meet the requirements as well.
If there is to be a deal allowing a broadcasting organisation to define itself as a public service broadcaster, in return it must fulfil a remit. That remit will differ from organisation to organisation—just as ITV's remit differs from the BBC's, and Channel 4's differs from Channel 5's—but I believe that a single regulator could deal with all broadcasters that are defined as, and get the benefits of being, public service broadcasters.
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Despite that significant area of disagreement with the Green Paper, we broadly support many of its recommendations. We believe that overall, it will protect the BBC and ensure that it continues to be strong, independent and well and securely funded. This country has had such a BBC in the past, and we have seen enormous benefits as a result. It should continue in the very different future that we will see in the next 10 to 15 years.
2.40 pm
Mr. John Grogan (Selby) (Lab): It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Foster), who spoke with typical energy and enthusiasm, although I disagreed with him on a couple of points. For example, so long as the hon. Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford (Mr. Whittingdale) occupies his current position, I doubt whether the Elstein report is necessarily dead. We should not underestimate the hon. Gentleman's intellectual vigour and power.
I want to start by briefly quoting The Observer:
"many of the BBC's present popular programmes would have been condemned by the BBC itself five years ago as intolerably shoddy . . . What has happened to the . . . BBC ideal that the invention of television would make it possible to reunite our splintered modern society by giving a common cultural background?"
That was written in 1960, which is before I was born, although admittedly not long before. As many Members have pointed out, many things have changed in broadcasting since that time. For example, let us consider the point that the hon. Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford made earlier concerning popular good programming. I think it was Sir Hugh Carlton Greene who said that the BBC's mission is to make the good popular and the popular good, and far more people now watch the BBC's quality output, such as the programme on Auschwitz and "Blue Planet". Those programmes have audiences of between 4 million and 5 million, but in the old days of the 1970s, which some people regard as a golden age, perhaps as few as 1 million people watched programmes such as "Civilisation". So in many ways, the BBC has renewed its mission in recent years.
It is a pity that my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman), who has been a distinguished Chairman of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, has left the Chamber. I have made two or three attempts to become a member of that Committee in the past eight years, and because I failed, I was not invited to the tremendous dinner that took place the other night. My right hon. Friend was perhaps a little harsh in his assessment of Greg Dyke, the former director-general of the BBC. Everyone has their ups and downs and their pros and cons. My right hon. Friend described BBC4 as his favourite, but that was very much part of the Dyke agenda. Moreover, it is unlikely that Freeview would have been driven through quite so energetically without Greg Dyke's entrepreneurial skill.
Various Members have mentioned sports coverage, and I agree that there is a great deal of competition in that regard these days. Sky Sports does a tremendous job and Channel 4 has made a marvellous contribution, but Greg Dyke revived BBC Sport. There is tremendous pleasure—is there not?—in watching the greatest
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national and international sporting events without the interruption of adverts. So there is something to be said for Greg Dyke.
In an intervention on my neighbour the hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway), the BBC's digital future was mentioned, as was the question of whether it is advertising its own services too much. The BBC cannot win on this one. The Government have given it the job, at least in part, of getting us to the digital future and of encouraging people to buy Freeview boxes and, hopefully, services such as Freesat. It is true that some BBC digital services have been very successful. For example, the two children's channels are a big driver of such services. Many parents are getting Freeview boxes precisely because they provide children's channels that do not run adverts, and which are of a reasonably high quality in most cases. So in a sense, the BBC has a duty to let licence-fee payers know that such services exist.
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