The chair of the UK’s all-party parliamentary group for media has said the conversation on what the BBC would be like under a subscription model has not yet been held.
Opening the DTG’s Future Vision conference Andy Carter said some of his colleagues were “obsessed” with the BBC because of the feedback they get from their constituents.
However, he said there was a lack of understanding of some of the technical issues involved. “The notion of decrimalisation [of the Licence Fee] is something we’re discussing at the moment. I’m not sure we’ve really understood the impact of taking from a criminal sanction to a civil penalty and how that will impact on consumers who choose not to pay for the BBC.
“We can’t just put a subscription model into place. And for someone who’s in their 70s and doesn’t have sufficient broadband, how are they going to go about receiving that subscription model? At the moment the Freeview boxes don’t let you do that.”
Mr Carter said discussions on a possible subscription model for the BBC and the direction for public broadcasting as a whole had to be held together.
Prior to being elected in the 2019 election, Andy Carter worked in media and was Group Managing Director of Manchester-based GMG Radio before the group was taken over by Global Radio in 2014.
He said so-called “policy wonks” were aware of the changes effecting the sector, but the challenge was to get them to engage with the sector.
