Serving up the media on a
LIT •
THE
BAN
Thatcher's deregulation is not about press freedom but about profitability Thatcher's controversial Broadcasting Bill is back in Parliament again in May. Here, MICK GOSLING, of the Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom, explains what is at stake for the labour movement. Seating arrangements at private dinner are not normally subject 1o socialist analysis. But for those who wish to understand the driving forces behind the government's Broadcasting Bill, the bottom-parking at Mrs. Thatcher's Chequers lunch to celebrate ten years in power was instructive.
There were no fewer than 60 guests, seated it ten tables, Alongside Thatcher at the top table were Lords Whitelaw, Carrington, Forte and Thomeyeroft - and one commoner, Rupert Murdoch.
Murdoch's pupers have served Thatcher well. They have also consistently promoted the commercial broadcasting interests of Murdoch's News International. For both, the Broadcasting Bill is a marriage made, if not in heaven, at least in the sky.
The Bill applies a free market slodgcham met to public service broadeasting; the con-
FEATURES
CENSORSHP
plate
cept that all broadcan media should inform educate and entertain and provide a balanced range of programmes The Bill's key proposals - the auctioning of commercial TV and radio franchises, the lifling of positive programming requirements and the dismantling of controls over ownership - Temain Intact after three months of debate in Committee in the House of Commons.
Commercially funded cable, satellite and other electronic media services will be allowed to expand to whatever the market will take rather than a staged growth within a carefully developed public service framework:
With limited advertising revenue being spread between morc ouleis and media multinationals throwing franchises at the expense of programmemaking, qualily, diversity and minority interests will all suffer. Far from expanding consumer choice, viewers face the prospect of more of the same, with cheap soaps and game shows predominant.
In readiness for this decline, the public service broadcasting remit of TTV stations, which it was the duty of the Independent Broadcasting Authority to oversee under Section 2(2) of the 1981 Broadcasting Act, is removed from the new Channel 3 services:
In place of regulation comes restricion Alongside the Broadcasting Complaints Com mission there will now be an Independent
TECT
Television Commission (Chair: George Russell) with disciplinary powers over commercial stations. Thatcher's "no sex and violence' quango, the Broadcasting Standards Council (Chair: Lord Rees-Mogg), will be placed on a statutory footing with powers to lay down guidelines for programme makers.
The government intends to keep appointments lo all these bodies, and the Radio Authority (Chair: Lord Chalfont) within its powers of patronage. It will also vet appointments to the Channel 4 Board. Channel 4 will he further hampered by having to raise its own advertising revenue rather then relying on a Jevy From the ITV stations,
If that's not enough, with a nod from a magistrate, police will now be able to seize copies of scripts, tapes and working noics under provisions of the Public Order Act and the Obscene Publications Act, which 15 cxtended to broadcasting for the first time. Similar powers under Section 9 of the 1984 Police and Criminal Evidence Act which, again for the first time laid down specific legal procedures by which the police could seize film, have most recently been used against TV and newspapers to obtain footage and photos of the Poll Tax disturbances. The free market needs a strong state.
The Broadcasting Bill claims to put some limits on cross ownership and control by nonEuropean Commimity nationals, The really 15
You thought she was selling the "Tuffo' socks she is wearing: but the ad is for camera equipment!
that the media empire of Murdoch is lell untouched while the Secretary of State retains reserve powers to alter ownerwill ship ship regulations at without even a cursory reference to the Monopolies and
Mergers Commission.
The BBC hardly rates a mention in the Bill: It will of course, be the next target of direct government interven-
It is already being
Lion.
starved of cash through the decoupling of the license fee rom inflation. And in the run up to 1996, when the BBC
Charter is doe for renewal, it will come under sustained political attack and demands.
for:
privatisation from the kame people whe led the cam.
paign for deregulation of commercial TV and radio,
The technicalities of the
Bmadcasting Bill, running to
167
Clauses and
Schedules, are complex, hul its economic and political purpose is clear: to use market forces to restructure broadcasting in the interests of the media multinationals.
This is why issucs of training within the industry, squality of opportunity and repre kentation are not addressed. Where unbridled market forces have boon unleashed, as in the
USA and Italy, issues of representation and posiive employment practices have been pushed into the background, Equal appor tunity policies, barely in place in this country.
will be undermined by the new fimancial constraints and decreased level of puhlic account-
Not surprisingly. the intense com petitive pressures being produced by the government's media policy have in leashed a whirlwind of artacks om the workers in the industry. 1,800 gobs at the BBC have been lost in the past two years, with six to nine thousand more threatened hy the BBC's policy of privatising services and the recommendations af the Phillips Contitlee.
The ITV companies abandoned rational agrcements with the umions in 1988 and 1989 und started down the road of employer dominated and, if necessary, employer-im poscd agreements. A lock out of its members by TVam led to the de recognition of the As sociation of Cmematograph Television and
Allied Technicians (ACTT) in 198H, More recently Thanes was only narrowly thwarled from withdrawing recognition from the Broadcasting and Entertainment Trades Alliance
(BETA) in respect of clerical staff. Last October pay talks al Tyne Tees opened, in management's words, with a 'unique offer of
FEATURES
The favourite joke in Manchester media circles is that the damage at Strangeways wasn't caused by prisoners trying to get out but by Granada staff trying te get in hecause conditions were hetter. Granada suff were recently given the option of personal contracts
These alacks will increase ax in-house production is eroded and independent productians are increased, under the terms of the Bill. a minimum of 25рет cont of Charinel 3 broadcasting time. With this will go the erosion of standard conditions of service, casualisation and the weakening of trade union organisation. It could also lead to a "The BBC will, of course, be the next target of direct government intervention. It is already being starved of cash through the de-coupling of the license fee from inflation" frontal assault on the principle of union recog nition itself, as is happening in the print and magazine sector at the moment
The broadcast unions are alert to the threat they face. The ACTT and BETA are currently deciding on amaigamation, mirroring process in the print hetween the NGA and SOGAT. The National Union of Journalists is also looking for a partner:
And workers in broadcasting retain imporLant hargaining powers. The Industry, in spite of technological developpient, remains jahour intensive requiring a labour force with disparate bur indispensable skills. You cannot produce radio or television programmes without the cooperation of a skilled, vocal, well informed and responsible workforce - a workforce which will not only want proper material rewards but a say in the future of their industry. Collective bargaining remains the only way to achieve that
For workers outside: the industry and others campagning tor genuine choice, frecdom and diversity in the modia with access for the many and not just the privileged few, the strength of the broadcasting unions will be decisive in preventing a headlong rush Into tabloid TV.
As Tony Hear, General Sccretary of BETA, told the rocent Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom conference on Broadcasting in the 90s; The Democratic Alterna
"Our values include commitment lo the public good rather than to private profit, concern for the weak and underprivileged, opposition to the abuse and manipulation of the media by government and employers, a belief in widening access to broadcasting and in the accountability of those who control it, care for the quality of the product made by our members as well as the quality of life to which broadcasting contributes. We are against the corruption of the standards of public life, the debauching of the political vocabulary, the trivialisation of the media, the nakod appeal to individual interest and the suhstitution of price for valuc. These are matLers on which we will not compromise.*
The Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom can be contacted at 9 Pond Street, London, WIV 3DG (01 437 2795). Individual membership is E10 per annum, organisations from £15 per annum depending on siDe.
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK no 24, May 1990