Two days after going public with it’s contempt for Scottish football the over-reaching BBC is coming under more criticism.
Funded by the Television licence fee the BBC has stepped into the world of the internet to distort the market as it attempts to retain it’s out dated place at the centre of the news gathering network.
As numerous companies attempt to gain a digital foothold they face competition from the state funded ‘broadcaster’ as it chases into new markets as the share of television and radio audiences decline.
Britain’s independent film production industry has been a success story for decades, regardless of the economic climate or the colour of government.
Envious of that and seeking further ways to legitimise the outdated licence fee the BBC is planning to move into commercial film production- funded by every household in the country- to the detriment of independent, commercial producers.
PACT, the trade association of the production industry, are ready to take action against state funded competition, with their chief executive John McKay revealing their plans in an interview with The Telegraph.
He said: “It would completely distort the market and damage an independent sector that is recognised as a world leader if the BBC was allowed to use public money to compete against commercial producers.
“The BBC is already a huge state intervention in the broadcast market. If they are now allowed to enter the production market in the way they want to that would not be right under state aid rules.
“This is a huge shift they’re proposing. We and others are now looking very closely at the hurdles the will have to meet because it’s very important that the BBC Trust and the British Government do the same.”
Barbara Slater’s comment about working the ‘market dynamics’ could be very costly for a state funded organisation.
Their treatment of Scottish football can be justified as taking advantage of Neil Doncaster’s Armageddon negotiating stratety.
If the former Norwich chief is left out of the next round of negotiating, others like Ralph Topping and Ian Blair, will have the opportunity to walk the walk against an arrogant broadcaster that may be getting reigned in to it’s only purpose- public service rather than Slater’s bizarre world of ‘market dynamics’ through state funding.