UK Culture Secretary Outlines Vision for Local Media and News Coverage
In a recent speech to the Royal Television Society, the UK Culture Secretary Of State Jeremy Hunt has outlined the UK Government’s commitment to decentralise broadcasting and increase localisation. With political power increasingly being devolved to locally elected politicians, it makes sense, he says, for a network of local media stations to evolve in order to reflect the strong desire for locally focused coverage.
Mr Hunt outlined a vision of a network of local, cross-platform multimedia TV services which would broadcast for as little as an hour a day, be free to affiliate with each other to bring down costs, be able to offer nationwide deals to advertisers, piggyback on existing national networks, including broadband infrastructure, and exploit new technologies such as Canvas, YouView and mobile TV.
According to Mr Hunt, the UK Government will encourage the development of this new local landscape by removing local cross-media ownership rules, redefining ‘public service broadcasting’ to emphasise local content, legislating to clarify which public service broadcasters should be listed on the front page of electronic programme guides and their online equivalents, and by working with the BBC to encourage partnership with local media providers.
Mr Hunt has asked Nicholas Shott, Head of UK Investment Banking at Lazard, to review this policy in terms of commercial viability. Mr Shott, in his preliminary findings, has urged caution by saying that "it is difficult to see a clear path to commercial viability of local TV" as local channels would not be sustainable on advertising revenue alone and more practical solutions towards local services may need to be explored. Mr Shott's preliminary proposals include providing local content by a variety of means, including broadband. The UK Government's full local media action plan is due to be published before the end of 2010, alongside Mr Shott's final report. Television and media stakeholders will be awaiting publication of both with interest.
A link to Jeremy Hunt's speech can be found here.
