Sir John Whittingdale
MP for Maldon · Conservative · United Kingdom
“I strongly welcome the Secretary of State’s confirmation of our continuing support for Ukraine. He has set out the sustained threat from Russia facing not just Ukraine, but this country and the whole of Europe, yet for too many people, it is still business as usual.”
“That is perhaps even more relevant to the second prong of the Government’s proposals, which is about social media. I will come to that point, but before I finish talking about local media, I want to mention that another of the Government’s flagship policies is devolution.”
“The hon. Member is completely right that this issue must be addressed before we proceed. There is also the question of cost, raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wetherby and Easingwold (Sir Alec Shelbrooke). There are people who probably do have access to broadband, if they choose to pay for it, but they cannot afford to do so.”
“I was the Minister responsible for the passage of the Media Act 2024, during the previous Parliament. It is a great delight to see some familiar faces with whom I have worked with in the past on the officials’ Bench.”
“Member for Hazel Grove (Lisa Smart) that young people are turning more and more to social media, but I do not think that this policy is the answer, because it looks to me like a very dangerous extension of Government interference in the freedom of the press and the right to free speech.”
“My right hon. Friend asks a perfectly valid question, and I want to acknowledge that there are concerns. We had a debate in Westminster Hall not that long ago, and a number of my colleagues—particularly from Scotland—turned up to express concern about the fact that the quality of reception via broadband in their constituencies is very poo…”
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“I strongly welcome the Secretary of State’s confirmation of our continuing support for Ukraine. He has set out the sustained threat from Russia facing not just Ukraine, but this country and the whole of Europe, yet for too many people, it is still business as usual. First, will he consider a public awareness campaign to raise awareness of the threat, like those in Finland and the Baltic states? Secondly, what message does he have for the companies that continue to trade in Russia and, in doing so, both undermine sanctions and provide funds for Russia’s war machine?”
“The third reason I welcome it is that it opens up an option on the other big issue, which is the subject of a different Green Paper and is perhaps the elephant in the room: the future of the BBC. The biggest argument against moving towards an element of subscription, at least, in the BBC is that that cannot be done while the BBC is subject to digital terrestrial transmission.”
“I will try to keep my speech brief, because quite a few Members have made the effort to attend. I will focus on two issues that are perhaps the most controversial in the Green Paper. On the first—the suggestion that in 2034 we should move towards wholly internet protocol TV and discontinue digital terrestrial transition—I am generally supportive of the Government. There are clear benefits to doing so. It will represent a considerable cost saving to the broadcasters, as outlined in the Green Paper. Secondly, it will free up spectrum, for which there could be any number of alternative uses, and that will undoubtedly provide additional value to consumers.”
“I beg to move, That this House has considered the Media Green Paper. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Allin-Khan. I am grateful for this opportunity to debate the media Green Paper, a hugely consequential document that has profound implications for all our broadcasters, news publishers and technology companies. I welcome a lot that is contained within it. Nevertheless, it contains some extremely controversial proposals, and I regret that Parliament has not really had an opportunity to debate them since its publication. The consultation period has now come to an end, so I hope that the Minister will still take account of my contribution and those of other Members when considering the way forward. It is also regrettable that we have only an hour.”
“My right hon. Friend asks a perfectly valid question, and I want to acknowledge that there are concerns. We had a debate in Westminster Hall not that long ago, and a number of my colleagues—particularly from Scotland—turned up to express concern about the fact that the quality of reception via broadband in their constituencies is very poor and that the consequence of switching off DTT might be to prevent them from receiving television at all. That is clearly unacceptable. The proposal can go ahead only if we reach the position to which the Labour and Conservative Governments have aspired: universal access to high-speed broadband of sufficient quality to allow IPTV to be received.”
“I strongly agree, and that is the point that I was coming to next. A lot of the towers in the transmission network, which broadcasts digital terrestrial transmission, are owned by Arqiva, and they also carry the transmitters for commercial radio. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that if we turn off the television transmission, all the costs get loaded on to the remaining broadcasters—that is, the commercial radio stations. I therefore hope that the Minister will at least address that too, because the estimate that I saw is that it will potentially result in an increase in costs of more than 50% a year for commercial radio stations.”
“The best counter to disinformation is accurate, sourced, objective journalistic content, of the kind that public service broadcasters provide. Nevertheless, YouTube, the main video-sharing platform under discussion, was never intended as the vehicle for the big broadcasters. It is all about user-generated content. There is real concern that if the main broadcasters are pushed into greater prominence, some people will get less prominence. Those are the creators, start-ups and user-generated content. That undermines one of the original purposes of YouTube.”
“I was the Minister responsible for the passage of the Media Act 2024, during the previous Parliament. It is a great delight to see some familiar faces with whom I have worked with in the past on the officials’ Bench. The Media Act was all about ensuring that our public service broadcasters were still highly visible in a world where people are getting smart, connected TVs. It simply maintained the prominence requirements, which was important, as all the broadcasters agreed. It is now suggested that the same prominence should be extended to video-sharing platforms. I recognise and agree with the Government’s concern about the prominence of disinformation. I sit on the Foreign Affairs Committee, which did a big inquiry into disinformation.”
“The hon. Member is completely right that this issue must be addressed before we proceed. There is also the question of cost, raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wetherby and Easingwold (Sir Alec Shelbrooke). There are people who probably do have access to broadband, if they choose to pay for it, but they cannot afford to do so. They, too, would be severely affected if they were suddenly unable to receive television by that means. I support the ambition to reach a point in 2034 when we will be able to switch off DTT, but serious questions need to be addressed before we reach that point. I will turn to the other major issue of twofold concern, because the Government are advancing two parallel policies on the question of prominence.”
“As one of the originators of the local democracy reporting service, of course I agree with my hon. Friend. It is incredibly important to have a thriving local media sector, and the BBC plays an important role in maintaining that. Anything that promotes BBC content would, I hope, equally promote local content, which has not had the same degree of attention that it deserves.”
“The Competition and Markets Authority could be doing much more to require the platforms to make public the algorithms they use to promote content. Before we go down that road, which carries real jeopardy, I hope that we will look instead to use some other measures that have already been put in place to ensure that reputable news providers get the position that they deserve in search terms and search, and also the rewards attached to them.”
“Member for Hazel Grove (Lisa Smart) that young people are turning more and more to social media, but I do not think that this policy is the answer, because it looks to me like a very dangerous extension of Government interference in the freedom of the press and the right to free speech. I would like the Minister’s assurance that there is no linkage intended to any form of regulation. The idea that perhaps news providers might be given prominence if they accept a regulatory structure that the Government want would be equally dangerous. In some ways, I think that this problem is better addressed by the measures that we have already put in place. We have the digital markets competition regime, which is only just coming into effect.”
“Secondly, what does “prominence” mean for a social media platform on which people access a personalised feed based on their previous content choices? There are practical difficulties with that. I know the Government have already put in place the concept of recognised news publishers under the Online Safety Act 2023, but that had a very different purpose. The problem I have is with the idea that a Government agency of some kind will be saying, “This is a trusted news provider, and therefore this is not,” and deciding, or at least seeking to influence, where those providers appear in people’s feeds. I take the point from the hon.”
“That is perhaps even more relevant to the second prong of the Government’s proposals, which is about social media. I will come to that point, but before I finish talking about local media, I want to mention that another of the Government’s flagship policies is devolution. If we are to have more power given to local authorities, mayors and unitary authorities, people need to know what they are doing, and the absence of local media is a real problem in that respect. It will become ever more important to promote local media. Lastly, I want to come to the second prong, which is about the prominence or promotion of trusted news providers on social media. I have to say that this policy gives me some considerable concern. There are lots of problems around definition. First, what is news?”
“I thank all hon. Members who have participated in the debate. The number of Members present indicates that this is a subject that deserved more than an hour; I welcome the Minister’s recognition of that point and his suggestion that there may be further opportunities to come. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to put on the record some points about which I have concerns. I look forward to the Government’s coming forward with further proposals once the consultation has been considered. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered the Media Green Paper.”
“The UK’s success in liberating the Falklands in 1982 was achieved when we had considerably greater naval resources, but it also could not have been achieved without the support of the Reagan Administration. Does the Minister not agree that that shows why it is extremely important to maintain close relations with the United States and not do anything to put those in jeopardy?”
“My constituents never asked for local government reorganisation. They do not support local government reorganisation, which they see as leading to decisions being taken by a more remote, more expensive and less accountable authority. Will the Secretary of State confirm that maintaining the status quo is at least an option as a part of her review, and will she also say whether the intention is still to go ahead with the mayoral election in Essex in 2028?”
“Within a few days of the Prime Minister taking office, he announced business rates relief for pubs, clubs and live music venues, but I have spent the summer talking to businesses like hair salons, post offices and booksellers, all of which are just as important in the high street as those that have already been given help. Will he now commit to give business rates relief to all high street businesses and to get rid of this cost, which is destroying jobs?”
“What I am opposed to is the abuse of lawsuits with the deliberate intent of suppressing information that is clearly in the public interest. It is that definition that we will seek to explore how best to set out in legislation. I look forward to further meetings with the Minister. I welcome this as perhaps the first opportunity to debate what I believe is a very important issue for the freedom of speech and journalism in this country.”
“Member for Leeds Central and Headingley is right that Baroness Stowell has introduced a private Member’s Bill in the other place. Her Bill has been published. There is some debate as to the mechanism that is most effective; there were concerns that the attempt in Wayne David’s Bill to set out lengthy definitions might make it more complex, and there is an argument for trying to make the test of a SLAPP simpler. Those are details that we will want to continue to discuss with the Minister and her officials. For my part, I very much hope that we can find an agreement that all of us are happy with and that will achieve the objective we all share. I should say that I am not opposed to people having the right to bring defamation actions or other suits where they feel that they have been wrongly accused of something—that is a fundamental right.”
“In the previous Parliament, Wayne David sought to extend its provisions to cover a far wider range of actions, but sadly his private Member’s Bill did not complete its passage due to the calling of the general election. My intention is to try to complete the work that Wayne David started with his Bill. As the Minister will be very much aware, at the beginning of this year, 120 editors—including the editors of every major publication not just in the UK, but across the world—called on the Government to act. I know that the Government were committed to taking action, but unfortunately could not find a slot to do so. I am extremely grateful to the Minister for the discussions that we have already had about how we might work together to bring that legislation on to the statute book. The hon.”
“I am not going to go into a number of cases; we will perhaps have more opportunity to do so when the private Member’s Bill comes forward. However, I am particularly grateful to the Anti-SLAPP Coalition for its help in taking forward this campaign. Progress has been made: the Defamation Act 2013 sought to address some of the worst aspects of libel tourism, and the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act 2023 focused specifically on those who are alleging economic crime, and it put in place some protection. However, the problem is that some of the worst cases—I go back to the work of both Catherine Belton and Tom Burgis—were not allegations of economic crime, but were more serious than that. Clearly, the provisions in that Act would not have been sufficient.”
“When I chaired the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, now 15 years ago, we looked at the advent of libel tourism—the fact that the UK courts were specifically being used by people with very little connection with the UK to bring libel suits, because we were seen to be sympathetic to the idea of libel actions, in order to suppress information. Since then, Russian oligarchs in particular have queued up to come and use the British courts. As the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley said, we have talked to and met some of the brave people who have sought to expose those oligarchs’ actions and have been subjected to SLAPP cases—people like Catherine Belton, the author of “Putin’s People”, and Tom Burgis, the author of “Kleptopia”. It continues today.”
“I spent part of my summer in my deckchair, reading an excellent book by David Hooper that recounts the history of SLAPPs, starting with James Goldsmith and his war on Private Eye , followed by Robert Maxwell, who took on Aurum Press and the biography written about him, and then, perhaps most notoriously, Mohamed al-Fayed, whose appalling actions in abusing young employees at Harrods were known about and reported on, but then suppressed as a result of the lawsuits that he sprayed around liberally, using very expensive lawyers. It is generally the case that SLAPPs are used by rich people seeking to suppress information that is clearly in the public interest.”
“We actually set up the Media Freedom Coalition in 2019, and I am delighted that under the outgoing Foreign Secretary, the right hon. Member for Pontefract, Castleford and Knottingley (Yvette Cooper), the UK has taken back the co-chair position with Finland. The UK’s position on media freedom is one that we can be proud of. We have gone up in the world press freedom index ranking—we are now 18th—but in its commentary on the UK, RSF said “lawsuits aimed at gagging journalists” are one reason why we are not in a higher position. SLAPPs are not new; they have been around for a long time.”
“I congratulate the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel) on obtaining this debate. It is a subject that we have discussed in this place a number of times over the years, and each time the need for action becomes even greater. Indeed, the hon. Member picked up the baton from the hon. Member for Bolton West (Phil Brickell), who was initially going to hold this debate before he was elevated to high office. I speak in my capacity as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on media freedom, and also, as the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley said, as the sponsor of a private Member’s Bill, which I shall introduce in November. SLAPPs have been a stain on this country’s reputation as a defender of media freedom for too long.”
“The Minister has confirmed that under this Government the number of police officers has fallen. It is now proposed that in Essex they will become part of a regional force that will be more remote and less accountable to the people that they serve. How does that increase public confidence in policing?”
“Indeed. Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Can Minister state what assessment he has made of the grades of steel that are simply not produced in this country? What is his message to companies such as C&M Precision Ltd in my constituency, and all those mentioned this afternoon, that face an immediate increase in their costs, because they have absolutely no alternative except to import their steel?”
“I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on his appointment and welcome the action in the channel. He will be aware that last night saw one of the biggest attacks yet on civilian buildings and people in Kyiv, and included damage to the historic cathedral there. He will also be aware that dual-use technology is still arriving in Russia via third countries. We heard today from the Ukrainian Speaker about washing machine microcircuits that were supposedly going to Kazakhstan being found in Russian missiles falling on Kyiv. Will the Secretary of State look again, with his colleagues, at what further action we can take to stop this technology being used to kill more people in Ukraine?”
“The alternative is that the hall could revert to having exclusive performances only to the number permitted under the existing constitution. That probably means losing around 40 exclusive lettings in a year out of perhaps 150. The Bill is necessary to allow the existing practice to continue, to the benefit of the hall. If the Bill does not pass, the chief executive has calculated that it is likely to cost the Royal Albert Hall around £1.8 million.”
“However, there has been a suggestion of legal challenge from a very small number who do not like the fact that a majority of the seat holders have voted accordingly to give up the right, so there is now legal uncertainty and a risk as to whether the Hall can continue to offer as many tickets as it does to what are called exclusives, where all the tickets are available for use by the hall. That legal uncertainty has resulted in several options for the hall, none of which is particularly palatable. It could continue to operate on the present basis, but it risks defeat in the courts, should that legal challenge be sustained. Indeed, failure to pass this Bill may encourage those seeking to challenge the current situation.”
“By giving up that right, the hall therefore has the tickets available either to offer to the promoter or to use for its own purposes. By doing so, it can attract higher artists, so it is of considerable financial benefit to the hall that the seat holders behave in that way. The practice of agreeing to forgo the right of using a seat is not covered expressly by the constitution of the hall; it is voted on and agreed by the members that they should do that.”
“Those seat holders are members of the corporation, and in some cases those seats have been passed down through families across generations. Others have been bought by charities, companies and individuals when they have come up for sale. Ownership of a seat brings with it the right to attend certain performances—but not all—and the members elect from their ranks 18 out of the 23 trustees who run the hall. They also make a significant financial contribution each year through what is called the seat rate, which is currently around £2,250. That is an ongoing commitment of the seat holders to the continuation and the costs of the hall. On top of that, it has always been the case that seat holders agree to forgo their tickets for events held in the hall on just over 100 days each year.”
“The hall has operated successfully for 150 years, and to explain why this Bill is necessary, it is important to appreciate its history and the model on which it is based. The hall was the idea of Prince Albert. Sadly, he died before he could see it completed, but the corporation was set up in 1867 in his memory, and the hall was built and opened by Queen Victoria less than four years later. The initial funding for the building of the hall came from the commissioners of the Great Exhibition, but it was insufficient, so the remainder—the gap that needed to be filled—was met by payment in return for seats in the hall. It is perhaps a unique model of public-private partnership. The hall has around 5,500 seats, of which around 1,250—just under a quarter—are privately owned.”
“The Royal Albert Hall is one of our most important cultural institutions. There can be few people in this Chamber, or indeed the country, who have not enjoyed performances at the hall—either live or broadcast—including the last night of the Proms, the Festival of Remembrance, Cirque du Soleil and, tonight, Elvis Costello. I should declare that I served as a trustee of the Royal Albert Hall, appointed by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, from 2018 to 2020. I was one of five independent trustees, and I also sat on the conflicts committee, which is an extremely important part of the management of the hall, and to which I will return. As a result, I gained a good understanding of the way in which the hall operates, and I saw how the council works to fulfil the charitable purposes of the hall.”
“I am pleased to support the revival motion before the House today. It is about 11 months since I moved Second Reading of the Bill last year. At that stage, it had already completed its passage through the House of Lords, and it was given a Second Reading without opposition. It then went into the Committee on unopposed private Bills, and the panel met in March this year under the chairmanship of the Chairman of Ways and Means. The Committee approved the Bill subject to an undertaking given by the Royal Albert Hall, which I will come back to. I do not want to repeat all of the speech I made on Second Reading, but I do want to set out again why the Bill is so necessary and beneficial, and not just to the Royal Albert Hall but to the many people who enjoy performances there.”
“This Bill is about one question alone: the ability of the hall to go on with the present practice, whereby seat holders go above and beyond the number of events or days where they agree to give up their rights and put more into the pot to the benefit of the hall and the public. If the Bill does not pass, there is a real risk that the entire model on which the hall operates will be undermined.”
“It is the legal right of the seat holder to decide whether to use the seat himself or herself, to pass it to somebody else, or to sell it. It is a fundamental property right. To meet the concerns that were expressed, and the amendment that was made in the House of Lords, the hall offered an alternative undertaking, which is that each year those trustees who are seat holders and had sold tickets during the course of the year would have the amount of money that they obtained as a result made public. Through that, there would be greater transparency, with anyone able to see that those seat holders who become trustees are not exploiting their position in that way. That undertaking was accepted by the panel of the Committee on unopposed Bills, and hence that undertaking is now being given by the hall in place of the amendment.”
“Friend is right that concerns have been voiced about how the hall operates. When the Bill went through the House of Lords recently, an amendment was passed relating to the resale of tickets, which is the other issue that some Members have raised. It was suggested that seat holders, if they wished to sell their seats, should be required to do so through the hall’s own ticket resale mechanism. Many do choose to do that, but the problem with that is twofold. The first is how the resale mechanism works. It pools the takings and redistributes them among all seat holders. If not all seats are sold, that could end up costing seat holders money. The second problem, which is more fundamental, is that these are property rights.”
“I will make a couple of points to my hon. Friend. As I have said, I not only served as a trustee, but sat on what is called the conflicts committee. The conflicts committee has a majority of independent members—not of seat holders—and it is there to ensure that any decisions taken are done properly. While it may be the case that conflicts exist, that in itself is not a problem, so long as there are proper mechanisms in place to ensure that the current situation is not abused. Certainly no evidence has ever been suggested, as far as I am aware, of seat holders seeking to take decisions for their own benefit, rather than for the good of the hall. If they did do that, the Charity Commission would come down on them rapidly, so there is an existing control around that issue. My hon.”
“I am aware of the concerns that the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) is about to express. Let us have a continuing dialogue with the hall about those concerns, but the Bill is only about sustaining the present mechanism, which is clearly of benefit to the hall, to everyone who goes there, and to the country. I hope very much that it will be allowed to be revived and to pass into law.”
“Apart from that covid loan, there has been no cost to the public purse at all, and it remains the case that, unlike so many others, it does not receive a grant. If this Bill does not pass, a model that has been so successful for 150 years is at risk of being undermined. If the consequence is that the hall has to withdraw from a lot of its charitable activities—reaching out to put on events for young people and for communities—and becomes solely focused on having to raise money, the communities will lose out. There must be a real risk that ultimately, if that model is no longer sustainable, it will be the taxpayer who is asked to step in in place of it. Let me say this to Members on both sides of the House. When we come to consider the Bill, it will have undergone scrutiny, and can continue to undergo scrutiny.”
“I was a Minister in the Department of Culture, Media and Sport during covid. The cultural recovery fund amounted to £1.5 billion. If that had not been put in place, the entire cultural landscape of this country would have collapsed. In the vast majority of cases, the funding was grants. Cultural institutions—theatres, museums, galleries and music venues—were given grants by the Government, ranging from the Royal Opera House through to the Hot Box in Chelmsford, which I occasionally attend to see up-and-coming bands. All of them were beneficiaries, but the difference was that in the case of the Royal Albert Hall, it was not a grant, but a loan, and it is repaying that loan. The great thing about the Royal Albert Hall is that for 150 years it has provided one of our greatest cultural assets, and at almost no cost to the public purse.”
“We are talking about very few events where tickets are sold at a much greater price than their face value. There will be some. The problem with what the hon. Gentleman suggests is that, at the end of the day, we are talking about somebody’s right as a legal owner of a property to decide what to do with it. The seat holders have been extremely generous in the level to which they agree to support the hall. [ Interruption. ] The right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) and I agree with each other on many other occasions—we sit next to each other on the Foreign Affairs Committee—but on this we are on opposing sides. She has suggested, for instance, that the hall has benefited unfairly from the Government and the taxpayer because it received a loan of around £20 million during the covid pandemic.”
“I should add that while the Government gave the hall £20 million as a loan, as it gave loans to so many institutions across the country, the seat holders—the members of the Royal Albert Hall —put in £2 million above and beyond what they had to provide under the arrangements normally, as support. The seat holders have been extraordinarily generous, and it is not the case that they have somehow exploited the Government. They put in their own money to the tune of £2 million to get the hall past covid.”
“I think the hall’s representatives would be only too happy to talk to the hon. Gentleman and the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry); indeed, they have asked to speak to her several times, without success. As has been pointed out, this is a very narrow Bill—it has a very restrictive title—and it is essential if the hall is to continue. We should continue to talk to the hall, but we should not stand in the way of this Bill, which is absolutely vital if the hall is to continue.”
“While I welcome the Government’s belated intention to act in this area, does the Minister agree that there would be no need to wait for legislation if the social media companies actually started to enforce their existing age requirements for participating online? Many children under the age of 13 are able to create accounts and interact, despite the fact that that is completely against the terms of the platforms.”
“(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs if she will make a statement on the recent deliberate attacks by Russia on civilian infrastructure, including residential apartment buildings and other non-military targets.”
“Can she confirm that records are being kept of the attacks carried out by Russia that constitute war crimes, and that Russia will be held to account for them, through the establishment of a special tribunal to prosecute Russia for the crime of aggression? Can she confirm that Russia will be made to pay for reconstruction of the damage, through the use of frozen assets? Finally, will she now look at formally designating Russia a terrorist state?”
“I thank the Minister for her reply. She will be aware that on Tuesday night, one of the largest aerial attacks so far during this war took place against Kyiv and other cities. It left 22 dead, including two children, and 130 injured. In Dnipro, there was the use of cluster munitions and, indeed, a so-called double-tap attack against one of the civilian protection units. Ukraine has developed some of the best technology in the world against the use of drones, but Russia is stepping up its use of ballistic missiles and cruise missiles. Can she say what the Government will do to try to boost Ukraine’s air defences, particularly through the supply of Patriot anti-missile defences?”