In an exclusive interview with Joan Bakewell in the New Statesman this week, director-general of the BBC Mark Thompson issues a strong warning about the potential power of Rupert Murdoch if Jeremy Hunt allows the News Corp takeover of BSkyB:
Because of commercial decisions taken ten or 20 years ago, BSkyB is in an utterly commanding position and will have far more money than the BBC or any other media player in the UK to spend on content. . . We’re talking about a concentration of media power in the UK that’s unheard of in British history and unheard of anywhere else in Europe. The combination of that kind of power with ownership of a significant part of the newspapers people read, as well as an internet service provider – this is extraordinary power.
Thompson goes on to say that he has already called for the decision to be referred to the competition authorities in a letter to Vince Cable and his McTaggart lecture in Edinburgh last year.
In addition, he offers a challenge to the government in the wake of funding cuts to the BBC:
Given the shape of what’s happening – the relative decline of other sources of electronic news, the funding security of ITN, the ability of commercial radio to fund news, the difficulty newspapers are having in funding newsgathering – it is going to be more, not less, important that the BBC has sufficient resources to be able universally to deliver high-quality, strictly impartial news to the British public.
Despite his criticism of the media mogul, Thompson refuses to rule out working for Murdoch in the future.
Bakewell: Would you work for Murdoch?
Thompson: (Laughs) I’m fully, fully engaged doing what I’m doing at the moment.
Bakewell: It’s not a “no”?
Thompson: I wouldn’t regard it as a “yes”, either. It’s important to look at the shape and balance of our media sector, rather than trying to demonise anyone.
Read the full interview – which also covers BBC impartiality, ageism and executive pay – in this week’s New Statesman, out tomorrow.
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