LONDON: Michael Grade (pictured), executive chairman of Britain's largest commercial broadcaster ITV, yesterday ran his favourite bête noir up the flagpole to see if anyone in government (or its remote-controlled automaton Ofcom) saluted.
What Grade hates – really, really hates – is the broadcaster's public service broadcasting obligation, a burden factored into ITV's conditions of licence.
What, initially, was no more than a minor inconvenience, a quid pro quo for a "licence to print money", has transmuted over the years into a major financial drain, exacerbated by ITV's continuing decline in advertising income.
Addressing a Royal Television Society Patron Breakfast earlier this week, Grade stated that ITV would "prefer to remain a licensed PSB, if justified economically". Then came the "but …"
He floated a hypothesis in which ITV might relinquish its PSB commitments to become solely commercial operator – a decision that would sharply hike its licence fee.
Said Grade: "One option, for example, might be for news in the nations [England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland] and regions to be provided longer-term by a publicly funded third party, and carried by ITV by agreement.
"The issue is not who provides it, it is how it will be paid for," he added during a post-speech interrogation session. "We will do it for as long as we can.
"The issue [with PSB] is how it gets paid for so it can be guaranteed … We can't guarantee it. The word 'guarantee' is the key thing."
What Grade hates – really, really hates – is the broadcaster's public service broadcasting obligation, a burden factored into ITV's conditions of licence.
What, initially, was no more than a minor inconvenience, a quid pro quo for a "licence to print money", has transmuted over the years into a major financial drain, exacerbated by ITV's continuing decline in advertising income.
Addressing a Royal Television Society Patron Breakfast earlier this week, Grade stated that ITV would "prefer to remain a licensed PSB, if justified economically". Then came the "but …"
He floated a hypothesis in which ITV might relinquish its PSB commitments to become solely commercial operator – a decision that would sharply hike its licence fee.
Said Grade: "One option, for example, might be for news in the nations [England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland] and regions to be provided longer-term by a publicly funded third party, and carried by ITV by agreement.
"The issue is not who provides it, it is how it will be paid for," he added during a post-speech interrogation session. "We will do it for as long as we can.
"The issue [with PSB] is how it gets paid for so it can be guaranteed … We can't guarantee it. The word 'guarantee' is the key thing."
Data sourced from Guardian.co.uk; additional content by WARC staff
