Sir John Whittingdale

I agree that children’s television is incredibly important, and it is a matter of real concern that fewer and fewer commercial channels are investing in children’s TV. It was for that reason that, at the time of the last charter review, we set up something called the young audiences content fund, funded by the licence fee, which allowed other broadcasters to bid for licence fee funding to supply children’s programming. It was very successful. Unfortunately, it did not survive the mid-term review, but it was created in recognition of how important that provision is. I would like to see a revival of the young audiences content fund, because I think it was very valuable. Every time a Government has looked the licence fee, they have come to the conclusion that it has many flaws but there is no real alternative. The Culture, Media and Sport Committee that I chaired did recommend an alternative; we looked at the possibility of a household levy. While that is not perfect, it has already been ruled out. That too is excluded by the Green Paper, which states of the licence fee that “we are not considering replacing it with alternative forms of public funding”. So all those particular options have been closed off. However, the licence fee is highly regressive and hard to enforce. Evidence shows that women on low incomes face prosecution more than other groups. There are a lot of things wrong with the licence fee. In terms of alternatives, the Green Paper suggests one or two options. It talks about the possibility of extending commercial activity, which I certainly welcome, as it already contributes quite a large amount to the BBC’s income.