Memorandum by Peter Lowe, Assistant Editor,
Sky News
The House of Lords has been in the vanguard
of the slow-but-sure evolution of television in Parliament, being
the first of the two Houses to be televised and the subject of
experiments for a wider range of shots in the chamber. So in that
sense it has not been behind the times in the context of the UK
Parliament. But the times—and communications—are now
changing rapidly and moving at a much quicker pace than the House
of Lords is keeping up, despite its foray into YouTube and Twitter.
To many members of the public it still feels like a cloistered,
arcane place they don't understand. So trying to relate better
to the public is a laudable aim.
In trying to make people more aware of the work
and the value of the House of Lords, there are real problems in
trying to achieve that through the lenses of the cameras filming
the Lords' Chamber. As a 24 hour news channel, we are driven
by news events. Sky News will broadcast what's happening in the
House of Lords if it's newsworthy. We are not here to provide
a didactic service reflecting the work of the Lords, but to include
it only where it's relevant to the news agenda.
In that sense, the Lords is at a disadvantage
to the House of Commons because of the theatre of PMQs, the fact
that the Prime Minister and most members of the Cabinet will make
their statements to the Commons, the fact that most—but
not all—of the really important votes on legislation happen
in the Commons and that members of the electorate may relate more
easily to people who represent the area where they live as a result
of an electoral process. Given these reasons, and the House of
Lords' role as the scrutinising chamber, it is a fact of life
that it will be very hard to drive more coverage of proceedings
in the chamber on to news channels.
So what else can be done? On the Lords' own
website, its role is summed up like this: "The House of Lords
makes laws, holds the Government to account, provides a forum
of independent expertise and is the highest court in the land."
It's that area of expertise which may be an untapped resource
in the challenge to reach out to people.
At Sky News, we do use members of the House
of Lords to appear on television to talk about their areas of
expertise where they relate to current news events—Lord
Robert Winston on medical matters, Lord Tim Bell on media/communications
and so on—but I'm sure there are large numbers of members
who rarely or never appear in the media who would add to viewers'
understanding of news stories and current events. And each time
this happens, it perhaps helps to underline the feeling that the
Lords is the home of experience, expertise and wisdom—not
a bad image for a House that's supposed to scrutinise our legislation.
To this end, I suggest that the House of Lords
should be pro-active in setting up a list of Peers and their areas
of expertise who are prepared to use their background knowledge
in interviews on TV and radio. It doesn't mean that we would suddenly
plaster the output with Peers of the Realm, but it does mean we
would use them more often.
Having suggested that there's unlikely to be
an exponential rise in the amount of coverage of the actual chamber,
I believe strongly that the House of Lords should open its doors
much more readily to news cameras in the rest of building. What
is the reason not to allow news crews to be able to film interviews,
and more, in most parts of the House, rather than only at the
current nominated position in the Lords' Lobby? If the Lords wants
to engage with people and appear more modern, why not do even
more to show people that work is being done on the inside of the
southern end of the Palace Westminster—by people with the
expertise to know what they're talking about?
May 2009
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