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…”
The complete record
Every one of 4,278 lines we hold for Sir John Whittingdale, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 76 of 86.
“There is no…evidence that advertising restrictions can have a major impact on obesity, and academic research has concluded that advertising has modest direct effects of maybe 2 per cent.” We cannot go ahead with a measure that will have such a dramatic effect on the commercial television sector, when there is very little evidence that it will achieve its objectives.”
“If I thought that bringing in a pre-9 pm ban would remove the problem of obesity and save the nation £49 billion, I would be first in the queue to support the Bill, but I simply do not believe that it would have that effect. It is easy to say that the opposition to the Bill comes from multinational food producers such as McDonald’s and Nestlé. I draw the House’s attention to a letter sent to Members on behalf of ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, Sky and Virgin Media Television. It states: “Such a ban would have a major and dramatic impact on our companies’ ability to fund programming and invest in original UK production—without achieving significant health benefits.”
“There are differences, but the hon. Lady raises an interesting point. It is worth considering whether it is right in a free society to say that certain products are legal and people have the right to choose to consume them if they wish to do so, but to ban completely any advertising of them.”
“My hon. Friend makes a strong point. As I had the honour of representing the Opposition during the passage of the relevant Bill, I can remember expressing some concern at the time. Whether one chooses to smoke is a matter of freedom of choice, and I certainly do not favour banning cigarettes. Indeed, I opposed the smoking ban, but I accept that the evidence is overwhelming that smoking even one cigarette is bad for people and they risk damaging health consequences. That is not the case for eating a McDonald’s. If people eat one McDonald’s, it will not shorten their life. It is a question of proportion and the extent to which people overeat McDonald’s or live on nothing but McDonald’s. Therefore, there is a big difference between so-called unhealthy foods and products such as cigarettes, where even one is probably bad for one’s health.”
“We are now getting video on demand, which means that we can call down programmes at a time of our own choosing. Focusing on the 9 o’clock watershed as somehow protecting children from exposure to late-night programmes is increasingly becoming irrelevant and ineffectual. For that reason, I believe that the Bill will not achieve the objectives that its promoter seeks.”
“It is an extremely good programme that resonates with teenagers. It is made for them—perhaps for teenagers slightly older than my son—and appeals greatly to 13 and 14-year-olds, yet it is broadcast at 11 o’clock at night. I can tell the hon. Member for Edinburgh, South that I am not quite such a negligent parent as to allow my son to watch television at midnight, but, like a growing number of households in this country, mine has a personal video recorder, so my son watches the programme on the PVR. He sets it and can then watch it any time. The ability to do that is increasingly destroying the meaning of the 9 o’clock watershed. We are now in the age of PVRs, which make time shifting so simple that we no longer have to pore over the Radio Times and punch in numbers; we can time shift with one button.”
“Again, gambling is a different issue, but I wish to address the issue of the 9 pm watershed. The Bill picks out the 9 pm watershed as the appropriate time to draw the line—everything banned before 9 pm and complete freedom afterwards. However, the 9 pm watershed is becoming meaningless. It was created in the days when viewers had a choice of two or three channels and, yes, most children probably were in bed by 9 pm. Several things have changed since then. I wish that my children were in bed by 9 pm, but time and again they are not. I have a 14-year-old son— [ Interruption. ] I have previously revealed some of his tastes in films and music, probably not endearing myself to him in the process, but I can say that one of his favourite programmes—and this is a confession—is “Skins”.”
“A functioning free market depends completely on advertising, because only through advertising are consumers given the knowledge they need to reach judgments about which products they want to buy. Advertising has a very important part to play in a market, which is why we need to be extremely careful before adopting measures to restrict it.”
“The question is a little premature. Gambling advertising has only just been permitted on television, so there is not much evidence as yet. Children are not allowed in gambling establishments anyway and they are prevented from online gambling because they have no access to credit cards—and those are much more effective measures. I entirely accept that it is important to protect children from gambling, but we can already take effective measures to achieve that without preventing advertising, which is intended to inform adults and allow them to take rational decisions based on the information they receive. It is important to stress that advertising is not brainwashing. There is a great tendency for people to demonise advertisements by claiming that they force people to buy things that they really do not want to buy, but that is not the case.”
“That will have huge financial consequences for those broadcasters, some of which we are already seeing, with Channel 4 telling the Government that it might not be able to sustain its business model without future financial help. ITV has asked the Government about withdrawing from some of its regional programming commitment and ceasing to commission UK-produced children’s programming. The Select Committee thus believed that there was a case for Government intervention to sustain public service programming.”
“Public service programmes—the news, current affairs, documentaries, children’s programming, regional programming—should also be available on the commercial channels, but we have to recognise that those channels are under pressure to an extent that they have never been before. A revolution is taking place in this country’s broadcasting, which I welcome, as it will result in a huge increase in viewer choice. The Government are the catalyst as a result of their courageous decision to proceed with the switch-off of analogue broadcasting, but digital switchover will result in the fragmentation of audiences and an inevitable decline in the market share of every single broadcaster.”
“I am not sure that I would agree that it is necessarily very damaging. I would have to confess my almost complete ignorance—obviously unlike my hon. Friend!—of the different types of cannabis; but strong advocate of advertising as I am, I am not sure that we should be making that information widely available. Let me conclude by returning to the main theme. The Select Committee conducted an inquiry at the end of last year into the future of public service broadcasting—a very serious issue. I believe that it is extremely important for the healthy functioning of democracy that there should be plurality, so public service programming should not be monopoly of the BBC.”
“My hon. Friend is right, and I am sure that he will want to expand on that point in his own speech. In countries where restrictions have been imposed, there is no certainly evidence that they have led to a sudden reduction in obesity. In fact, the levels have normally tended to increase. Such evidence and research as there is actually goes to show that advertising restrictions have extremely little, if any, impact on obesity.”
“My hon. Friend is showing alarming interventionist tendencies for a Tory! I have to say that that is unlike him; he is usually a great believer in freedom and libertarianism. I agree with him, however, that one of the key solutions in this area is the exercise of parental responsibility; it is parents who should be determining what their children eat and, equally, how much television they watch. I do not believe that that role is appropriate for the Government, but if my hon. Friend is suggesting that parents should restrict the amount of TV that their children can watch, I certainly agree with him.”
“Member for Cheltenham, if I thought that the Bill would result in a dramatic improvement in the health of our children or in a huge reduction in the level of obesity, I might accept that there was a case for it, but nothing in the speech of the hon. Member for Edinburgh, South persuaded me that there is any evidence to suggest that the Bill will achieve that.”
“Yes, we should do that. As I suggested earlier, we should also make available more facilities in the community so that children, rather than sitting on the sofa, participate in sporting activities. As I pointed out, many food manufacturers are contributing to that effort. Let me finish on the point I was making before we got slightly side-tracked. This is a very difficult, as well as exciting, time for television in this country, and it will result in huge pressures on the commercial sector. As Ofcom has determined, the measures in the Bill are likely to cost commercial television broadcasters £224 million. That would be a catastrophic loss of revenue at any time; at this particular time, it would be hugely damaging. As I said to the hon.”
“Perhaps my hon. Friend would like to reflect on some other examples, such as Gary Lineker’s promotion of Walkers crisps, which does not seem to have done him too much harm.”
“My hon. Friend is quite right to remind hon. Members of the valuable role that he has played on our Committee of raising the issue regularly with our witnesses, including this week, when he raised it with the chairman and the chief executive of Ofcom. The hon. Member for Edinburgh, South (Nigel Griffiths) said that he considered the measures in the Bill to be proportionate. I merely point out that Ofcom’s own document concluded that the measure that he has proposed is “disproportionate”.”
“All Committee members signed up to the report, with the exception of my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies), who will doubtless explain his position in due course. As I said, there are two viewpoints. The first is that the secondary ticketing market is a perfect example of the free market in operation.”
“I am pleased that we have the opportunity to debate the Select Committee report on ticket touting. It is one of the most interesting subjects that the Committee has considered, particularly as it provokes extremely strong views on both sides of the argument. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport has been wrestling with the problem for some time, and the Government have organised several summits on the topic. It is fair to say that they have so far failed to achieve a meeting of minds among the various competing interests, and it was with that objective that the Committee embarked on its inquiry. It was not only among our witnesses that we found a polarisation of views; different viewpoints were also represented in the Committee. I was sad that we were not quite able to achieve a unanimous report.”
“That is obviously my hon. Friend’s view. That market functions because it puts people who own a commodity that they are willing to sell together with others who wish to purchase it at an agreed price. In doing so, there is a maximisation of utility; and there is no loss to the original vendor of the tickets, as he has already achieved the price that he set. So, what is the problem?”
“In the sports world, it is obviously important to sustain the supporter base and to reward those who show consistent loyalty to teams. Equally, in the music world, people want to sustain a fan base. They want to ensure that fans who buy records are able to see their favourite performers give concerts, and they can made additional revenue, which might have been lost by not setting a market-clearing price, through the sale of merchandise and other associated products at concerts.”
“The secondary market exists only because the primary market does not operate as a market-clearing mechanism. It would be very easy to get rid of the secondary market; one would simply need to set a market-clearing price. As a result of doing so, all those who were willing to pay that sum would be able to obtain tickets; and those who were not so willing should not expect to be able to purchase tickets. However, concert promoters and sports bodies take the deliberate decision not to set the price of tickets at the market-clearing level. As a result of setting it below that level, demand inevitably outstrips supply. They do that for perfectly valid reasons—indeed, for admirable reasons. They explained to the Committee that they want live performances and games to remain within reach of the ordinary grass-roots fan.”
“The internet has also made it far easier for touts to snap up the majority of tickets, sometimes with no intention of using them but to sell them on, often within no more than 15 or 20 minutes of them first going on sale. Tickets can frequently be found for sale on sites such as eBay, or specific ticket sites like Seatwave or viagogo, within a very short time of their going on sale. I heard from one concert promoter a few weeks ago that tickets for a particular concert had sold out rapidly. On investigation, it was found that 2,000 separate purchases of tickets to that event had emanated from one IP address; one computer had been used for those transactions, although different credit cards had been used. The fact that such things are possible with the internet is clearly fuelling the secondary market.”
“I recall going to the Hammersmith Odeon as a youth and frequently taking advantage of touts to sell tickets that I did not need, and sometimes to buy tickets if I had been unable to do so earlier. That sort of activity has a slightly bad reputation. It conjures up a vision of rather shady individuals in mackintoshes lurking on street corners. However, the entire secondary ticketing market has been transformed by the advent of the internet, which has made it far easier for fans to obtain tickets for extremely popular events. It has resulted in greater equality; no longer does one have to queue outside a venue for hours before tickets go on sale, although that might be easier in London than elsewhere in the country. It is now a race as to who can press the website button first.”
“I sympathise with you, Mr. Weir, as I frequently have to reprimand the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Paul Farrelly) in Committee. The opposite view was expressed by Harvey Goldsmith, in his usual forceful manner, when he took me out to breakfast. Mr. Goldsmith takes the view that those running the secondary market are essentially parasites who feed off the creative efforts of artists and sporting organisations, make obscene profits, put nothing back into the industry, and prevent legitimate and genuine fans from being able to buy tickets. That view is held by a number of people in the sporting world and concert promoters. The Committee started its inquiry to find a solution that would go some way towards satisfying both viewpoints. There have been ticket touts for as long as events have been held for which tickets have been sold.”
“As I said, it is working to reach agreement with the organisers of charitable events, so that if tickets are resold on the site, the organiser of the event would benefit financially. Such a voluntary agreement is welcome. We have seen a lot of progress on the establishment of a code of practice. As I said, bodies such as Seatwave and viagogo offer consumer guarantees, but a system whereby all secondary agents offer such guarantees is desirable. The Association of Secondary Ticket Agents has established a code of practice, and it would be desirable to encourage all those in the secondary market to sign up to it.”
“Additionally, the promoter of a series of concerts to be given by Bryan Adams brought the matter to my attention a few weeks ago. Bryan Adams was going on tour to perform an acoustic set, which he had not done before, and the promoter decided that it was going to make tickets available free for the concerts, as an experiment to see how the fans reacted. The tickets were distributed to fans in each area. Even though the tickets did not really exist, they were appearing for sale in the secondary market. We felt strongly that free tickets should not be charged for in the secondary market. Secondly, the Committee felt that there should be agreement for restraint on tickets for events that are set up to raise funds for charity. It is welcome that eBay has accepted that since the report was published.”
“Almost everybody in the industry would accept that that is a wholly unacceptable practice that brings into disrepute legitimate secondary agencies, or those that offer consumer guarantees, such as Seatwave or viagogo. We felt that there were two other ways in which some agencies behaved in a fashion that should not be allowed and on which agreement was necessary, the first being the sale of tickets for free events. eBay agreed that it would not sell tickets to the Princess Diana concert, but the Minister’s predecessor, the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Central (Mr. Caborn), had a long argument with the site about Radio 1’s Big Weekend festival. Again, tickets for that were distributed free, but they reappeared on eBay at a considerable price.”
“Perhaps the most notorious example is an agency called Getmetickets that was closed down, but re-emerged shortly afterwards as the London Ticket Shop. That was in turn closed down only to re-emerge as London Ticket Express. All were operated by Mr. Michael Rangos, based in Hungary, who was selling tickets that he did not have. People who bought tickets actually never received them. Clearly, that was fraud, and the Department for Trade and Industry was correct to move swiftly to tackle the problem and to close him down, but that demonstrates that more needs to be done to stop such people simply starting up under a different name.”
“There is a refund mechanism for some events, and we welcome the fact that some of the sporting bodies are working with ticketing agencies to try to provide such mechanisms. The Committee concluded that even if such mechanisms were in place, the secondary market, in the main, provided benefit to consumers. It is interesting that other countries have legislated to prevent the secondary market from operating but, in the United States, a number of states are repealing what are known as anti-scalping laws, because they believe that a secondary market serves the consumer. The one matter on which there is almost complete agreement in the primary and secondary markets is that certain practices are quite clearly unacceptable or, indeed, fraudulent. To some extent, that blurs the bigger argument about the desirability of the secondary market.”
“The whole thing might prove to be a financial disaster because three quarters of tickets sold might be returned if the forecast was bad. Equally, it was put to us that providing a right to a refund would provide the touts with a one-way bet. They could buy up tickets in the hope that demand would exceed supply, which would mean that they would make large profits. However, they would also have the knowledge that if that did not happen, they could get their money back by returning the tickets. There are problems with a blanket refund policy, but the Committee believes that more should be done by the ticket vendors and organisers of concerts and sporting events to allow refunds for legitimate reasons.”
“I hope that there is now some possibility that we will soon achieve agreement between the OFT and the ticketing agencies on that point. We considered the possibility of instituting a blanket refund policy, but we fully recognise that there are several drawbacks. If, a week before a major event such as the Glastonbury or Reading festivals, the weather forecast showed that we were going to be hit by thunderstorms, it would be likely that a large number of people who had purchased tickets would decide that they wanted refunds. I remember going to the Reading festival and emerging covered in mud from head to toe, but many will not relish that prospect. A refund mechanism would make it difficult for a concert promoter organising such a major event to bear the risk, given the uncertainty of the British weather.”
“There is a view that a situation in which no legitimate refund mechanism is available for people who purchase tickets and, for perfectly legitimate reasons, find themselves unable to use them, breaches of the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999. There is a question mark against whether it is legal to attempt to ban the secondary market if people cannot obtain a refund through a mechanism that has been approved by the sporting body, for example. The Committee examined that and expressed disappointment that the precise state of the law had not been established and that there had not been a test case. The hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme felt strongly that what the Office of Fair Trading did to establish a clear legal position regarding the status of the banks could have been done equally for the secondary market.”
“The hon. Gentleman is undoubtedly right. That is another valuable opportunity for sporting bodies to demonstrate that volunteers who act out of love for the game can gain some benefit. Equally, sports bodies often allocate blocks of tickets for particular clubs as a reward for their efforts. It is all the more regrettable, in their eyes at least, when clubs that receive tickets decide not to use them, but to sell them on the internet. To address the problem of the secondary market, as they see it, sporting bodies and concert promoters have tried to impose conditions on the sale of tickets—most tickets say “not for resale” on the back. Clearly, that has proved singularly ineffective in preventing the secondary market from operating, but there is also a question mark over its legality.”
“We are much further forward. There has been an exchange between the Association of Secondary Ticket Agents and the OFT to try to reach an agreement on an acceptable code of conduct. The Minister may have more information.”
“Would the proposal include any major event where the artist can command a vast audience and the demand for tickets far outstrips supply? How would it be done? One has visions of the Government introducing orders and secondary legislation to designate Robbie Williams as an icon of national importance that needs protection.”
“Although it might be reasonably easy to identify the kinds of sporting events to which such restrictions should apply, the Government suggest that they could also apply in the cultural field and to concerts and artistic events. There are one or two possibilities that I suppose are fairly obvious: the last night of the Proms, for instance, although one of the Minister’s colleagues might wish to impose other restrictions on the sale of tickets to that. There are also other events, such as the one-off concert given by Led Zeppelin for which the huge demand for tickets way outstripped supply. Will the Government suddenly decide that Led Zeppelin is a crown jewel? If so, should Robbie Williams become one? How far would we go?”
“I am not sure how many England fans put in for tickets for the rugby world cup final—they might have done so in a spirit of hope over realism—but as it turned out, despite all the predictions that we would be knocked out in the first round, England made it through to the final. As a result, a huge number of France and All Blacks fans held tickets that they no longer wanted, and lots of England fans wanted tickets. It seems completely wrong to say that a France fan should not be allowed to sell his ticket to an England fan. That applies not just to rugby but to other events. The proposal would also create a two-tier system. It would essentially amount to saying that people could not sell their tickets for certain events—probably the most popular ones—but that it would be fine to do so for any other event.”
“We are therefore talking about events such as the Wimbledon tennis tournament, tickets for which change hands at huge prices, the rugby league challenge cup final and the rugby world cup final. To some extent, the rugby world cup final seems to be a good illustration of one of the problems. A rugby fan might put in a long time ahead to buy tickets for the rugby world cup final. A France fan might do so in a spirit of patriotism and the belief that their team was going to play in the final. Equally, a supporter of the All Blacks might think that they had a very good chance.”
“The crown jewels consist of the Olympics, the football World cup final, the FA cup final, the Scottish FA cup final, the grand national, the Derby, the Wimbledon tennis finals, the European football championship finals, the rugby league challenge cup final and the rugby world cup final. Obviously, there are already restrictions on some of those events—for instance, the secondary market for tickets for the Olympics will be banned as part of the International Olympic Committee’s conditions for London’s hosting of the games, and there are restrictions on the sale of tickets for designated football matches, which include the vast majority of matches in which professional clubs play.”
“I hope that “very shortly” will actually prove to mean shortly. Up to this point, there has been general agreement in the conclusions reached by the Committee and the Government’s conclusions. However, when the Government recently published their response to the report, they suggested that there is a need to go further. Specifically, it referred to events that are unique and of national or international significance. It was proposed that they might well look similar to the events known colloquially as the crown jewels, the sale of broadcasting rights to which are restricted.”
“The Association of Secondary Ticket Agents supports it as well, or at least accepts the principle, so at least some members of each component part of the industry are willing to sign up to such an agreement. Since the Committee produced its report, there has been some movement. It appears that what was, in our view, an almost intractable problem when we set off on the inquiry might have a solution that everybody can support. We are optimistic that the voluntary arrangement that all of us want might be within reach, but I am not necessarily persuaded by the Government’s proposal that additional restrictions should be placed on the so-called crown jewels. I shall be interested to hear the Minister’s further comments on that in due course.”
“The rights have established a precedent that artists are entitled to some reward for their efforts not just the first time their work changes hands but on subsequent sales. Applying that precedent to secondary ticketing seems to have the same logic, and it is encouraging that the proposal is achieving widespread support. I understand that the proposal is supported by artist management organisations representing more than 300 artists, including Mr. Williams, whom I have mentioned, the Arctic Monkeys, Franz Ferdinand, Girls Aloud and a vast number of well-known artists. It is also supported by the Performing Right Society and the Concert Promoters Association.”
“It states that there should be an agreement that, where a ticket is sold for a large amount in the secondary market, the owner of the original intellectual property right—the performing artist or the sporting body organising the event—should get some benefit. It has certainly been a great cause of resentment that artists see tickets for their performances being sold for hundreds if not thousands of pounds and get absolutely no benefit from it. There is a precedent in artists’ resale rights, which were introduced a few years ago, mainly as a result of European Union intervention. Those rights require that, if a work of visual art is sold at auction, a payment should be made to the artist if they are still alive or to their estate if they died within the past 70 years.”
“It may be over-optimistic to think that agreement can be achieved. However, I share the Government’s wish. The Minister said in his evidence to us that, if possible, there should be voluntary agreement rather than Government intervention. For that reason, the Committee was particularly interested and encouraged by the development of a proposal, first introduced by the Music Managers Forum, for the establishment of a resale rights society. The idea has attracted support from a number of different parties in the industry, and it seems to offer at least the possibility of achieving the voluntary approach that both the Committee and the Minister think is the most desirable outcome. I think that everyone supports the first part of the proposals, which concerns the general need for a code of conduct, but I found the second part attractive.”
“That is interesting, because I do not think that the response quite says that. It says that “some aspects of ticket resale may restrict access to sport or major cultural events; especially where these events are unique, of national or international significance and meet public interest objectives.” If that means only cultural events to which tickets are free, that is drawing it more narrowly, but even if that is the Government’s view, the Government say rightly that they do not want to legislate and that they hope a solution can be achieved through agreement in the industry. I must say, however, that there is absolutely no sign that the secondary market will agree to it. Indeed, responses to the Government’s proposals from bodies such as Seatwave make it clear that they do not agree to them at all.”
“On a point of information, I had the privilege of attending the Led Zeppelin concert, and I should put on the record my thanks to News Corporation for inviting me. That concert was promoted by Harvey Goldsmith, who insisted that the tickets would not be available until 24 hours before the concert and only on production of the credit card used to purchase the ticket, so he attempted to block the secondary market in that way.”
“The Minister has spoken about the crown jewels in the broadcasting legislation, but they are all sporting events. The Government’s response talks about major cultural events, so will the Minister tell us what cultural events he has in mind?”
“It might help the Minister if I remind him that when Mr. Fingleton gave evidence to us in response to the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Paul Farrelly), he said that he expected to agree final terms with STAR by August last year. That deadline was eight months ago, but he is still talking about it happening very soon.”