Supplementary memorandum from the Director
of Public Affairs, BT
Thank you for the opportunity for BT to provide
oral evidence this morning to the Committee's inquiry into New
media and the creative industries.
As Dan Marks discussed with you briefly afterwards,
we would like to add a little to the answer we gave to your question
about periods for holdback by public broadcasters, in order to
put on record our full position.
There is a clear need to balance the public
interest in access to programming which has been funded from the
public purse with the effect that "free" programming
has on the commercial market—and on the development of a
thriving and creative new media industry. The BBC, as the biggest
UK programme maker, can stimulate the growth of new media to distribute
content by allowing reasonable and fair access to its programming.
This will have resultant benefits for the creation and delivery
of new audiovisual content and consumer choice, flexibility and
control.
BT believes that the BBC should be allowed to
offer programmes "free" for three days after initial
broadcast, and that it should not be able to "stack"
series (ie keep series available throughout the run of the series
and for a time thereafter).
6 June 2006
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