Channel 4 has told Ofcom that if the regulator goes ahead with proposals for changes to the licence obligations for London Live, it would “fundamentally alter” the nature of the service ESTV are providing and contradict what was initially agreed when the licence was awarded earlier this year.
ESTV, which runs the channel, reported losses of approximately £1.3 million in its first 13 months, and has since applied to Ofcom to cut the hours of peak-time local programmes from three and a half hours to one hour a day.
The application originally stated that London Live would seek to deliver 8 hours of first run local programming per day in the first year – rising to 10 hours by year three, while peak programming would rise to 3.5 hours.
Channel 4 has said that ESTV’s proposals to reduce the hours of content produced represent a “material shift in the nature of the service they provide.”
When Ofcom awarded the licence to ESTV in February 2013, it was granted public service broadcaster status, meaning that the channel would receive certain privileges received by other PSBs, as long as it agreed to fulfil specific licence obligations to provide a defined amout of local TV.
Channel 4 said that PSB status should not be given lightly, and that by significantly reducing public service obligations so soon after they were agreed, ESTV would set an “unwelcome precedent.”
“Channel 4 believes that such a move could devalue public service broadcasting by casting it as a burden instead of a privilege that can be diluted and dismissed so quickly after launch,” the broadcaster said.
Following reports of financial losses and flat audience viewing figures, Newsline columnist Raymond Snoddy asked whether it is time for Ofcom to pull the plug on London Live completely.
“Regulators find themselves in a difficult position when this sort of thing happens,” said Snoddy.
“They want to be flexible and reasonable in the hope that maybe with a little more time a financial corner can be turned. There is also the problem of being forced to admit that they screwed up when making their original decision.
“If London Live had gone to Ofcom proposing it planned to broadcast just one hour of local news in prime-time each night instead of three and a half hours and pad out the rest of the schedule with cheap buy-ins that could appear on any repeat channel anywhere, is there the slightest chance it would have won the licence?”
London Live is expected to begin replacing public service content with bought-in commercially focused content – including programming from Channel 4 – meaning that London Live would move away from being a local channel to one that focuses mainly on broadcasting commercial content.
Channel 4 concluded its statement by saying that going ahead with ESTV’s proposals would lead to a “significantly changed service that would be less likely to provide the benefits to viewers that the local TV system was designed and set up to deliver.”
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