Lord Borrie
Main Page: Lord Borrie (Labour - Life peer)
Baroness Rawlings
My Lords, I am very pleased that my noble friend, Lord Fowler, asks these questions. It gives me an opportunity to inform your Lordships’ House further, following the Statement.
I clarify yet again that this is not a final decision. The Secretary of State has announced that he is proposing to accept the undertakings offered by News Corporation. There will now be a consultation period, which will close on 21 March, after which the Secretary of State will decide whether to approve the merger. Ofcom’s report on the proposed merger stated, and the Secretary of State agreed, that:
“We consider that the revised proposed undertakings would address the plurality concerns identified in our report of 31 December 2010”.
On the question of who outside might bid for the shares, I am afraid I have absolutely no idea. No one has told me anything about who might buy. The figure quoted by the Secretary of State was that 65 per cent of Sky News’ income will come from Sky. We have no idea about the rest. The concentration of power will be less because the new Sky News will not have a Murdoch as chairman or on the board. The chairman and the board will be independently chosen.
Lord Borrie
I shall not repeat the excellent points made from the Front Bench by my noble friend Lady Jones, but I shall follow some of the things that the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, said. In particular, great emphasis has been put in the Statement on the independence of Sky News and of the chairman and the directors. Who is going to appoint them? Will the Murdoch family surely not want some say in how the independent chairman and directors are appointed? I would welcome an answer on that.
Bearing in mind some of the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, not only do we all recall, I am sure, the failure of the so-called independent directors of the Times, who were a somewhat useless set of people, but I remember, and I am sure many of us will, the so-called independent directors of the Observer, who were set up to put some kind of limit on the unreasonable power of the late Mr Tiny Rowland. The independent board is very much emphasised in this Statement, but I have not yet understood how it will be achieved, particularly if you have, as the Murdoch family will have, a 39.1 per cent share. Is the Murdoch family going to take no responsibility and want no power over the appointment of the independent directors?
Finally, how long is the arrangement to last? I understand the viability point about the 10 years. Perhaps I ought to have declared that some time ago I headed up the Office of Fair Trading for many years. I notice that it has usefully expressed some concern about the feasibility and viability of this arrangement and about whether it can last. We must all be concerned, as my noble friend Lady Jones indicated, about who may purchase. It might be some other undesirable person or group of persons whose viability and concern one would want to check.
Baroness Rawlings
The noble Lord, Lord Borrie, makes very valid points. He knows about independence and Ofcom from having been chairman of the OFT. We either have to believe in this country that we have independent appointments or we do not. The way in which this country is run means that many bodies have independent board members and independent chairmen; it is not government and the Murdoch family. Paragraph 3.3 of the paper states that the new chairman will be independent.
The noble Lord, Lord Borrie, mentioned 10 years. The Office of Fair Trading stated that the Sky News company, which was not part of News Corporation, will be viable for at least 10 years. That is a long time in this market, and I remind the noble Lord that it is difficult to predict with certainty what the media world and plurality will be like in that time.