Jay Hunt issues industry warning amid international challenges

BFI chair Jay Hunt has warned the film and TV industry against becoming complacent as a “challenging regulatory environment” looms in Europe and Donald Trump takes up office in the US.  

Discussing the issues facing the high-end television sector at a culture, media and sport select committee hearing, Hunt cited the UK’s £4.2bn production spend in 2024.  

Having spent almost 30 years in the sector, she said that her biggest concern is “that we get complacent about the high water mark we now find ourselves at”. 

“There’s a danger that we assume that this is where the industry will settle” she told the committee.

“However I look across the landscape at a challenging regulatory environment in Europe and immediately from the new US administration.”

She added that there has been ”some very protectionist language around Hollywood” from the new Trump government. 

Hunt added that it was crucial that the BFI drew attention to these challenges, urging the committee to continue to invest in HETV.  

“We need to make it crystal clear that this growth trajectory will not continue unless we invest and some of that is a benign tax environment” she said.  

Streamers fuelling the ecosystem  

Hunt was appearing at the committee in her BFI capacity, but she has held senior positions at the BBC, Channel 4 and Channel 5, as well as her current role as Apple TV+ creative director for Europe, Worldwide video. 

She challenged what she called “an emerging thesis that the only TV that speaks to British audiences is made by the PSBs”.  

Hunt said: “If you look at shows like Slow Horses (Apple TV) or Baby Reindeer (Netflix), or what Amazon has done in re-energising the unscripted service with shows like Clarkson’s Farm, there’s great British content being made beyond the PSBs” Hunt said. “That entire ecosystem continues to be fuelled because there’s a seamless transition between people working in that engine room of British creativity.”  

“We need to continue to support that eco system” she urged the committee, stating: “We are in a great place, but we will not continue to be in a great place if we don’t understand the complexity of that market and support people in navigating it.”  

Hunt was speaking alongside BFI chief executive Ben Roberts. The evidence session took place to allow MPs to raise questions regarding investment and tax relief options available for film and HETV ahead of a report from the committee that is expected to be published this spring.