Letter from Chris Mullin MP
SECOND CALL FOR EVIDENCE
Further to your recent call for evidence, please
find enclosed a short submission which I would be grateful if
you would circulate to members of the Select Committee. As you
will see, it relates only to one specific issue, arising from
the second paragraph of your terms of reference—the functioning
of section 58 of the Enterprise Act 2002.
I also enclose a copy of my Media Diversity
Bill and the speech I made introducing it. Although more than
10 years old, the issues raised do seem to resonate with your
present inquiry.
If it is of interest to your committee, I should
be pleased to expand on this.
As a matter of courtesy, I am copying this to
the editor of The Standard.
19 December 2007
THE STANDARD
I wish only to address one issue: the ownership—since
1980—by Associated Newspapers Ltd of the London Evening
Standard. You may wish to consider as part of your inquiry into
whether S 58 of the Enterprise Act 2000 is strong enough to protect
a diverse media.
The "Standard", which circulates widely
in London and the Home Counties, is for all practical purposes
a monopoly. The only direct competition is two freesheets, one
of which is owned by the same company. The result is that, in
effect, we now have a lunch time version of the Daily Mail. Like
its sister papers, The Mail and the Mail on Sunday, it is brilliantly
produced, highly readable and utterly partial. It has influence
far beyond its immediate circulation area, often setting the news
agenda for the next day on both the written and broadcast media.
On matters political The "Standard" makes no pretence
at any sort of balanced reportage. More often than not it is a
combatant rather than a source of information. I believe this
is a gross abuse of its near monopoly position.
The solution, were the government parliament
to muster the necessary political will, is for Associated Newspapers
to be obliged to disgorge the Standard, perhaps with a view to
its being sold to a trust which, in view of the fact of effective
competition, had obligations to observe a degree of impartiality.
I tale the view that the near monopoly position of the Standard
and the flagrant way in which it has been abused distinguishes
it from all other newspapers justifies treating as being in a
category of its own.
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