It seems a good moment, with a clear election victor agreed far earlier than anyone had forecast, to predict the winners and losers of the media industry now that the Conservatives have returned to power. For the impact of this election on the sector at a critical juncture could be seismic.
Although David Cameron and George Osborne are likely to be kept far busier with new austerity measures, it is clearly the BBC which has most to worry about from the Conservative mandate. With the royal charter set to expire at the end of 2016, there are just 19 months to agree the future funding and structure of the corporation.
Of all the main parties, the Tories have shown signs of being the most hostile to the cost and expansion of the BBC. They were the only main party offering to freeze the £145.50 annual licence fee as a way of saving voters money, putting the pledge at the top of their manifesto’s media wishlist.
Admittedly, the pledge was hedged with the weaselly admission that they couldn’t do anything until after the new charter was agreed - ie, it simply confirmed the 19-month status quo – but as a sign of intent, it was pretty clear: the BBC’s spending and its ability to provide “value for money” will be at the heart of the charter renewal debate. That the Tories meant business was reflected in the manifesto also containing a pledge to continue “top-slicing” the licence fee to fund superfast broadband across the country, a charge taking £150m per annum out of the BBC’s £3.6bn funding pot.
As well as the manifesto focus, there is the fact that senior Tories continue to accuse the BBC of leftwing bias. Sajid Javid took time out as culture secretary in the run-up to the election to warn the BBC that the future charter renewal negotiations would include an analysis of any bias, after taking umbrage at a Today programme mini-debate. In an interview with the Daily Mail, he said: “There was a debate … they were all anti-Tory. It came across as very, very anti-Tory.”
A potentially more difficult challenge for the corporation will be BBC Scotland. Criticism of the BBC and its London-centric coverage heightened during the referendum debate. How much more difficult this will become given the entirely different nature of political control remains to be seen.
A new report by Loughborough University’s communication research unit to be published today shows how much more coverage Ukip garnered in national TV and newspapers than the SNP despite the latter going on to win 50 times more seats.
Almost double the amount of party leader quotes or story space was devoted to Ukip during the campaign period (until the campaign’s last week when negative stories of the Scottish “menace” proliferated). An SNP denied political power by a majority Tory government is likely to focus on any continued diminution of its status while the Conservatives will be in no mood to be generous during the forthcoming funding wrangles.
As for BBC governance, the BBC Trust has already been called a busted flush by a cross-party group of MPs. In bringing in figures such as Sir Roger Carr, Javid signalled that the party is keen to have pro-business leaders identifying a replacement. The other potential loser under a Tory government is likely to be civil liberties. Indeed, within 24 hours of polls closing on Thursday, home secretary Theresa May confirmed that the draft communications data bill, or so-called snoopers’ charter, was back on the agenda now the Liberal Democrats were no longer around to block it. Prior to the election Cameron said that there should be no communication that the government was unable to read.
On the plus side, newspapers will largely breathe a sigh of relief, both local newspapers promised rates relief and the nationals which feared more legislation to increase press regulation in the wake of Leveson. Martin Moore, director of the Media Standards Trust, said that the election result “removes this particular Sword of Damocles” as more legislation was unlikely.
Indeed, at the end of April Javid said his party would not back a Leveson-approved regulator as: “It interferes with the freedom of the press. It goes fundamentally against one of the Leveson principles, which is independent self-regulation.” Besides, press regulation was a job done.
Yet with nearly all major newspapers with the exception of the Guardian, Independent and Financial Times having signed five-year contracts with Ipso, the independent press standards body set up in the wake of the Leveson inquiry, it will be interesting to see whether any organisation considers breaking the contracts.
Media was the 15th most mentioned issue during the campaign, according to Loughborough research, above crime. It is unlikely to leave the political agenda any time soon.
