Channel 4 – 2 wrongs don’t make a right

I was skim-reading news online the other day and registered the following isolated words from a Twitter extract: “insane”, “government consultation”, “ignored”, “travesty”.

I didn’t have to read any more to fill in the gaps and deduce that someone thought it was insane that a government consultation had ignored responses and was pressing ahead with whatever they had always intended to do, which was a travesty of democracy. Why was this news? I’ve never met a government or local authority consultation that was worthy of the name.

Nothing to see here. Move along please.

But then I saw who had Tweeted, and I was torn. I’d never read anything this bloke had ever written that I agreed with. That would mean that this particular consultation was actually kosher. Oh dear. If I don’t sort this out before lunch I’ll get indigestion.

I therefore read further. According to this bloke I don’t like (doesn’t narrow it down much), Fishy Rishi (who’s another bloke I don’t like, but that’s by the by) has promised that if he becomes PM he will press ahead with the Government’s decision to privatise Channel 4, despite “over 96%” of respondents to last year’s consultation saying they don’t want it to be privatised.

I really don’t care what happens to Channel 4. In my ‘umble opinion, watching it is not, on any level, a life-enriching experience and if I were in government, I’d want shot of it. There’s:

• Unreal reality (Big Brother)

• Yet another contrived variation on a culinary theme (The Great British Bake Off)

• The poorest of relations to Coronation Street (Hollyoaks)

• Anti-Boris bias (you know how that raises my hackles)

• One-sided documentaries (e.g. denying global warming) that not only falsified data but edited interviews so that the comments were misleading

• Gratuitous porn – they even tried to broadcast something called W*nk Week. How sick can you get!

• Shockingly researched, shoe-horned shockers for shocks’ sake (Jesus: The Evidence).

In fact, the only programmes worth watching are some comedy imports from America (Friends, Sex and the City, Will & Grace). Channel 4 is neither value for tax-payers’ money nor an intangible public benefit. Good riddance I say.

But that doesn’t justify a flawed consultation. So I had a look at it. The Government stated its position very clearly at the outset:

“It is our current view, to be tested through this consultation, that a new ownership model for Channel 4 would be the best means of ensuring its future success … Your response will form part of the evidence to inform the decision-making process on this topic”.

Translation: We’re going to privatise Channel 4 unless you come up with a jolly good reason not to and a better alternative.

All consultation questions requested “supporting evidence.”

Translation: This is not a referendum.

Earlier this month (July 2022) the Government published its analysis of the responses. There were a total of 56,293, including 40,411 from members of the public via the social campaigning organisation 38 Degrees. Of these 40,000, over 3,000 were duplicates. Note that I have nothing against 38 Degrees in principle, having signed a few of their petitions myself.

However, per the Government:

“The 38 Degrees campaign presented respondents with what it described as ‘translated’ versions of each of the consultation questions … It should be noted that the questions posed by 38 Degrees are an interpretation of the original questions, and therefore had different emphases and sometimes the sense of the original question was significantly altered by the 38 Degrees ‘translation’. 38 Degrees also provided potential respondents with suggested written answers."

For example, the first consultation question was:

“Do you agree that there are challenges in the current TV broadcasting market that present barriers to a sustainable Channel 4 in public ownership?” translated by 38 degrees as, “Do you think Channel 4 should be privatised?”

Come on, guys! Not even close.

In other words, the 38 Degrees petition was invalid and can be legitimately discounted. The other thing that has just struck me is, I can’t find who started the petition. (Please tell me if I’ve missed something.) It could have been a Channel 4 executive afraid of losing their job, or someone ideologically opposed to the concept of privatisation, or a usual-suspect anti-Government agitator agitating for agitating’s sake. 

Other than the above, there were 15,727 responses from individuals and 155 responses from organisations, campaign groups or sectoral stakeholders, including Channel 4 themselves who had commissioned a report from Ernst and Young.

Many of the (valid) responses were well-informed and fair. Often they were in sync with the Government’s assessment of the past and current state of play. Where they diverged was in forecasting how the industry might change and what was the best way to handle the scenarios. Let’s face it, who has a crystal ball?

I suppose the killer argument for me is that Channel 4’s best chance to continue thriving is with additional investment and greater flexibility within some sort of a public-benefit framework:

Q: Should the Government stump up more cash to facilitate this? 

A: I’d rather such funds were invested in our armed forces or social care. And there’s no guarantee such investment would earn an adequate rate of return (think HS2 but on a smaller scale).
 

Q: Should the Government delay a decision on privatisation until the future position looks clearer? 

A: That runs the risk of a lower achievable sale price, to the detriment of the public purse.

To summarise, the proposed privatisation chimes with me ideologically. It doesn’t with others. Some previous privatisations in / of other industries have worked better than others, about which I and the ideologically opposed could trade blows until the cows come home as to how well each has worked. It is and it will be the same with Channel 4. There is no smoking gun or crystal ball or back-and-forth time machine for testing different scenarios that can better inform us as to which solution is best.

We the people elected a Tory Government, that has a transparent belief in privatisation, to make policy decisions. This is a far more valid mandate than fewer than 16,000 people responding to a technical consultation, with 40,000 more being misled by the cynical manipulation of the questions.

The consultation clearly said that the Government would privatise Channel 4 unless they could be convinced otherwise. They were justifiably not convinced. The consultation was not a travesty; the decision is not insane.

Nothing to see here. Move along please.