Media Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 28th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, like everybody who has spoken, I welcome the Bill. It must be a joy to be on the Front Bench for the Department for Culture—unlike being on the Front Bench for the Home Office. I think we all wish that it could have come earlier, but the conundrum in this sector is that, whenever it comes along, it will almost certainly already be out of date. This sector is moving so quickly and in so many directions simultaneously that, whatever our best efforts, we will always be following, rather than leading—but better late than never.

I will speak briefly on three areas: first, the challenge of understanding, mapping, decoding and anticipating such dynamic sectors; secondly, the enormous cultural, financial and political advantages of being the creator and home of one of the world’s most highly regarded public sector broadcasters; and, thirdly, the need for consistency and clarity of approach on child protection, an issue that quite rightly took up an awful lot of our time last year when we discussed the Online Safety Bill.

First, so much of the online world, which is now the principal driver and flywheel of modern media, is being tweaked, transformed and disrupted by the propellant of technology. This will be amplified and accelerated in ways that we can scarcely imagine by the effects of artificial intelligence. I wonder how our successors in Parliament in 25 years’ time will view the framing, ambition and content of the Bill. I am broadly supportive, much to my surprise—I can feel the much-missed and lamented Lord Judge raising his eyebrows as I say this—of some of the Henry VIII powers in the Bill, since speed of response and action to adapt will be essential to this legislation remaining relevant and effective. Part of me wonders, however, whether we will be regarded as well-intentioned dinosaurs attempting to craft evolution as we would wish it to be, rather than as it will actually happen. We must have mechanisms to enable Parliament to have appropriate oversight in real time.

Others have spoken about the need to future-proof the Bill. It will never be perfect, but I think we need to spend much more time than perhaps the Government have anticipated in trying to think through the ramifications of the way that this world is evolving.

Other noble Lords have mentioned—indeed, the Labour Front Bench very kindly came to the Cross-Bench meeting today, and this was one issue we all agreed on—that we lack an overarching strategy and vision for media and communications in this country. Such a strategy and vision need to be completely apolitical but that we can all understand and sign up to. I thought that the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, spoke to great effect in that area.

Secondly, I suspect all of us have had the BBC, in its myriad forms, as a constant backdrop to our life. It permeates our individual and collective memories, marks key milestones and transition points, and is generally regarded, not just by us but, importantly, by citizens of other countries, as not just a national treasure but a benchmark for public sector broadcasting excellence and a tangible element in how they view our culture, politics and place in the world.

Like others who have spoken, particularly the noble Baronesses, Lady Kidron and Lady Foster, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leeds and the noble Viscount, Lord Colville, I am worried by the decision to narrow the public sector broadcasting remit across a range of genres. I acknowledge that to maintain standards and high-quality output across such a broad range of genres is challenging at the best of times, and now is certainly not the best of times, but it is the very breadth and accumulated knowledge and experience across these genres which make the BBC so much more than a news broadcaster with add-ons. They give it cultural heft and a rich history and are a key element in building the creative industries which are such a vital part of our economy. I put it to the Minister and those on the Benches behind him and in his party that if anything should be a poster child for levelling up, it is our public service broadcasting, which is effective right across the United Kingdom and outside.

I am not going to sing, but I think the singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell encapsulated what many of us feel when she wrote, I think in 1970,

“Don’t it always seem to go

That you don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone”.

I am sure that your Lordships will be diligent and persuasive in mapping and articulating the dangers in discarding and diluting so much of value: we can be rather profligate in taking things for granted and not acknowledging its true worth.

Thirdly, when it comes to child protection, I am uncomfortably aware that this generation of under-18s is the most technically savvy in history, and the generations ahead will be even more so. If they wish to gain access to content of almost any kind, they will invariably find ways that all the best efforts of legislators, regulators and platforms had not anticipated. Let us be realistic: that is the world we live in. How do we deal with this? We must acknowledge the reality that we are always going to be reactive rather than proactive. I think we need to find ways of involving young people very directly as we look at this world and understand it; they have a far better understanding of it than we do. We must work very closely with other international jurisdictions, platforms and regulators; working together, learning from one another and acknowledging, above all, that the online and media worlds which children inhabit are borderless. It is futile for any nation state to proudly declare that somehow we are going to build a Trump-like wall around us and everything within it will be wonderful. The world is not like that.

I look forward to our discussions and to working across the House with other noble Lords in trying to ensure greater parity of approach across child safety. I do not think that there is a silver bullet; we can and must do better, but I am concerned that, as we pile more and more responsibility on to Ofcom, we are perhaps being unrealistic in our expectations. We need to be careful not to delegate a lot of responsibility for what we are trying to do to a regulator that is going rapidly into territory in which it has not hitherto had much experience. Like most of us, it is unlikely to get everything right first time.