Examination of Witnesses (Questions 2180
- 2199)
WEDNESDAY 19 MARCH 2008
Mr Richard Hooper CBE
Q2180 Baroness Eccles of Moulton:
Mr Hooper, I would like to ask you about whether there might be
any reforms that could make it possible for the Content Board
to perform its functions more effectively, but before getting
onto that question could we just return to Jerry Springer for
a minute? You said it was the programme that gave rise to the
greatest number of complaints. Did Ofcom know about BBC's decision
to show that programme?
Mr Hooper: Yes, we were aware of it but we have
no pre-transmission powers. That is a terribly important point.
The IBA in the old days had pre-transmission rights; they were
the publisher, they were the broadcaster and so they were able
to pull programmes and the board would occasionally see programmes.
However, we are post-transmission regulators; that is a very important
issue.
Q2181 Baroness Eccles of Moulton:
That was something I was interested in. So there is absolutely
no influence on what goes out.
Mr Hooper: That is correct. Mr Suter and I would
not encourage broadcasters to say, "Would you have a look
at this programme and see if it is any good". No, we would
not. What we would do is say, "We are happy to walk you through
the code of practice and explain it to you". This comes back
to the question about policy, we have very clear views on what
we mean by fairness and privacy, what constitutes unfairness.
We are not going to do it specific to the programmes. I think
that is actually terribly important because one of the advantages
of the regulatory system that you put in place with Ofcom was
that there was responsibility for the broadcaster and we used
to encourage them to say, "In the end, if you decide to run
Celebrity Big Brother that is your decision, it is not
the regulator's decision". However, we will look at it afterwards
and we will make up our views."
Q2182 Baroness Eccles of Moulton:
How does the Content Board then deal with the huge number of complaints
that come in?
Mr Hooper: The answer is a huge workload for
a relatively small number of people. Chris Banatvala, who was
one of the lead figures, deserves much honour in the land for
his sheer tenacity of dealing with very large numbers of complaints
and taking them seriously and trying to get at the issues of whether
this was a sort of lobby group or whether this was a real complaint;
if it was a lobby group it might still be a real complaint, and
so on. I think there are experienced staff. In my time one of
the members of staff, a key person, went to the BBC Trust and
was doing similar work there because, as you will remember, Ofcom
does not regulate the BBC on accuracy and impartiality.
Q2183 Chairman:
Speaking as a citizen?
Mr Hooper: Speaking as a citizen I think it
is a mistake. I know it is not a view shared by the BBC. The BBC
argument is that accuracy and impartiality are central to public
service broadcasting. Speaking as an individual, if you re-ran
Hutton I think it would have been a different outcome if there
had been a complaints process and an independent regulator, and
the personality issues would have, to a certain extent, diminished.
Q2184 Chairman:
Can you take us through that, it is a rather important point?
Mr Hooper: The fundamental issue that led to
Hutton was the famous broadcast by Gilligan at six o'clock in
the morning which allegedly contained inaccuracies. If that had
been ITV that would have come to Ofcom as a complaint. Indeed,
the Government were the complaining body in this particular case
and they would have been required to say, "We are making
a complaint" which in itself is an interesting mechanism
because if you do not make a complaint, you do not make a complaint,
if you do make a complaint, you do make a complaint. So there
would have been a requirement for a complaint to have been lodged.
Then immediately some of the chemistry and some of the chemical
tension get a little bit lost and we get into looking at that
programme, looking at the evidence around it and so on.
Q2185 Chairman:
Had that been a broadcast on Channel 4 News or something
of that kind you are saying that the relationships would have
been different.
Mr Hooper: It would still have been a serious
issue. I know the BBC disagrees with this position, but I think
if I were sitting there as the BBC with an accuracy issue or an
impartiality issue there is a danger of them saying, "Of
course it's accurate, of course it's impartial" but you are
coming from the same organisation. With the Trust it is different;
the Trust is further away from the BBC so the Trust structure
is much more like an independent regulatory structure so it is
different. In those days the governors were both the management
of the BBC and the regulators of the BBC and therefore if the
governors are saying, "This is fine, this is accurate, this
is impartial" does that have as much weight as if an independent
body has looked at the evidence? I think that is the question.
Q2186 Chairman:
Would you exclude Alistair Campbell still coming down the telephone
wires trying to actually influence producers' and editors' comments
on that?
Mr Hooper: I would not know about it and I would
not comment on it. Again that seems to me a very important point.
Ofcom is an on-screen regulator; we do not regulate, for example,
websites. It is what is actually on the screen that we regulate.
Q2187 Baroness Eccles of Moulton:
Coming back to my question, are there any reforms that might enable
it to perform its functions more effectively so maybe one of the
answers to that is to have some formal role with regards to the
BBC.
Mr Hooper: I do not think that would make the
Content Board more or less effective. I think it is a BBC matter;
I think it is a very important matter. As I said, with the BBC
Trust—with Michael Lyons as Chairman—I think there
is now blue water between the Executive Board chaired by Mark
Thompson and the Trust where actually you do have a greater separation.
I think it is less of an issue. You asked me a very direct question
and I gave you a direct answer.
Q2188 Baroness Eccles of Moulton:
This is something we could pursue, this question of the relationship
between the Trust and the Executive Board of the BBC but that
is not a path I am going down.
Mr Hooper: Just to be clear, on harm and offence
and on fairness and privacy—which are the other four horsemen
of the Apocalypse—Ofcom does regulate these, so there is
a regulatory relationship and I think it works pretty well.
Q2189 Baroness Eccles of Moulton:
Putting the BBC to one side for a minute, are there other reforms?
Mr Hooper: I will not comment on my successor,
but during my time at Ofcom I think the Content Board worked well;
it was able to fulfil the issues. There are concerns about citizenship.
I think it was a good structure and I think the deputy chairman
point worked well and I do not see major tinkering with it.
Q2190 Lord Hastings of Scarisbrick:
You say you do not see major tinkering, but could I ask you just
to think about tinkering with it and I wonder if you might think
it better if the Content Board were established as an independent
board, independently financed? There is a perception from some
consumer interest organisations like the VLV that the way in which
the differential between those two organisations works shows the
Content Board to be less important.
Mr Hooper: Certainly during my time there I
actually think that by being plugged into the power structure
of Ofcom in the sense of it being a sub-committee of the main
board with two members from the Content Board being on the main
board, that gave us significant influence in a way that had we
been outside the body of church we might have had less influence
on these very, very difficult issues. What it meant was that we
were there when that balancing act between consumer and citizen
was played out. The Consumer Advisory Committee which sat outside
the structure was of course also there with their reports, but
I think in the case of the citizenship issue—which is, as
I said before, less well-defined—being plugged into the
power structure, the structure of the organisation, was itself
a great benefit. I would not put it outside. There are a lot of
citizen bodies outside and we were very willing to meet; we had
many seminars together and we were very careful to consult them
and other bodies, MediaWatch for example.
Q2191 Lord Hastings of Scarisbrick:
How much independence did you have? Did you have your own independent
budget? Did you have your own research commissioning authority?
Going back to the earlier question, comparing complaints and defining
what your position is, the perception for many citizenship interest
organisations is that the Content Board lacked that authority.
Mr Hooper: Absolutely not on Tier 1 complaints.
That is an incorrect view because the main board did not get involved;
the main board did not even get involved with Jerry Springer.
Jerry Springer was probably the biggest number while I was there
and it did not get involved with that. We had a Content team of
colleagues sitting behind the board, it was not just a board.
In my case we had Mr Suter and Mr Banatvala and a very strong
team who were colleagues of Ofcom. We were able to ask for research
and policy if we wished. We were not in a position of saying that
we could not do our own research.
Q2192 Lord Hastings of Scarisbrick:
Do you accept the imbalance between the two, between the consumer
panel and the Content Board in terms of its resourcing, its independence
and its public voice?
Mr Hooper: It probably had less public voice
in the sense that it was unusual for the chairman of the Content
Board to be on a public platform, but it was not unusual for Mr
Suter to be on a public platform and I would occasionally be with
him. I think in terms of real influence on real decisions affecting
citizens I was extremely pleased with the level of attention that
was paid by Ofcom. It was not just an economic regulator. I know
that that was the fear, that this will just be an economic regulator
but that was not true in my time and I do not feel I was in any
way constrained by that.
Q2193 Baroness Howe of Idlicote:
To follow up on that, one of the comments was of course that the
consumer panel published what it was saying and feeling and that
had some influence as far as public awareness of the issues that
were being discussed. I know the situation is not quite the same,
but is there any reason why the whole of the doings of the Content
Board should not be published as such so that everybody could
see the process that you have all gone through and, indeed, at
a later stage, what happened when you went to the whole of the
Ofcom main board?
Mr Hooper: First of all, certainly in my time
there was publication of notes of the Content Board and of the
main board, so that was there.
Q2194 Baroness Howe of Idlicote:
I am talking about in the public domain.
Mr Hooper: Yes, in the public domain. Also,
very importantly, we published all of our adjudications on Tier
1 complaints. There is a level of transparency about the way in
which meetings worked and so on.
Q2195 Baroness Howe of Idlicote:
Would you object, as it were, to reporters coming in and taking
a note of what was said at the Content Board?
Mr Hooper: That is a very interesting question.
There was a side to me which would have said that the Content
Board could have open meetings and that was vigorously debated
and I lost. I did not get my way and there are some very good
reasons why I did not get my way, commercial confidentiality being
one of them. There were sensitive issues but we definitely tried
to be as open and transparent as we were because they were issues
that were part of the public debate.
Q2196 Lord Grocott:
What were the numbers of complaints which you were processing?
Mr Hooper: I cannot remember but large numbers,
very large numbers.
Q2197 Lord Grocott:
Can you not give me a clearer idea than that?
Mr Hooper: It is two years ago.
Q2198 Lord Grocott:
Even two years ago because it is quite important to get a picture.
Mr Hooper: I can ask Mr Suter who is sitting
behind me. It is around ten thousand.
Q2199 Lord Grocott:
Would that include petitions and things of that sort? I am always
slightly surprised about how relatively few there are. The average
member of the public spends 25 hours a week watching television;
that is a pretty big consumer base.
Mr Hooper: I would turn that around and say
that that is quite an encouraging testament to the quality of
a lot of British broadcasting. On the whole I think it has a lot
of quality in it. I think the Code of Practice has driven quality
into it and I think broadcasters are, relatively speaking, careful
about their responsibilities towards the Code of Practice and
do see it very much as something that they believe in as well.
I think you could turn it around.
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