Why I’m no longer talking to media execs about Channel 4 privatisation

Lack of diversity in the television industry is due to market failures. It is not due to a lack of good intentions or the actions of individual racists and bigots. Which is why so many people love Channel 4 and why we are fighting for it.

Channel 4 was set up to directly address market failures in terms of diversity of programming, diversity of talent, and diversity of suppliers. 

When it launched in 1982, Channel 4 operated under a remit that demanded that it serves the “tastes and interests not generally catered for” by other UK broadcasters and had a professed ”commitment to diversity”. 

More importantly it recognised that diversity without inclusion was meaningless. Which is why it realised it was not just about increasing the level of melanin when it came to ethnic diversity, but increasing the different voices from Black Asian and minority ethnic communities. It is why in the 1980s it directly funded the Black film collective Ceddo founded by the late Menelik Shabazz. 

It is why from 1985 to 1991 it broadcast the current affairs series The Bandung File, and employed Darcus Howe and Tariq Ali, both controversial figures. The former a prominent Black rights activist seen at one point as public enemy number one, and the latter an overtly political figure who campaigned against both US imperialism and Israeli imperialism. 

The question is would Channel 4 fund the equivalent of Ceddo now, and would it employ the equivalent of Darcus Howe and Tariq Ali now?

I will leave that for others to answer, but here are some potential indications of what that answer might be. 

The truth is for the last 15 to 20 years with some important notable exceptions, such as the Paralympics and the championing of under-represented talent like Michaela Coel (pictured top), Channel 4 has unfortunately been addressing the market failures it was set up to address less and less, and has not – at least not recently – led the charge in increasing diversity. 

“It has arguably been the BBC, not Channel 4, who has been at the forefront of increasing regional diversity and growing the regional indie sector”

Of the old triumvirate of BBC, ITV and Channel 4. Channel 4 is now the only broadcaster not to have a separate head of diversity on its executive committee - although it should be noted Channel 4’s chief marketing officer is also its director of inclusion and diversity, and does sit on the executive committee.

It has arguably been the BBC, not Channel 4, who has been at the forefront of increasing regional diversity and growing the regional indie sector. 

And, Caroline Hollick is the sole black representation on Channel 4’s CEO Committee, Executive Management Board and the different genre commissioning heads combined – (although happy to be corrected on that). 

So what happened over these 15 to 20 years - between Channel 4’s inception of being seen and being expected to be a radical catalyst for change to now, with this highly mixed and diluted record? 

The answer is simple; the 2003 Communications Act happened.

Now, before I continue, let me pause because I know I am here to discuss privatisation. And I genuinely want to discuss it. But here is the issue.

Fighting Channel 4’s privatisation may actually be the wrong battle. The call for Channel 4’s privatisation is a response to a symptom of a problem, and not the cause of the problem.

Let me explain, and why I’ve mentioned the 2003 Communications Act.

Over the period from 1982 to 2003, Channel 4 was highly regulated, or at least monitored and managed. The list of license requirements kept on growing in what is commonly referred to as Channel 4’s “remit”.

By 2001, Channel 4 was required to broadcast every week 4 hours of peak-time news, four hours of current affairs, seven hours of formal education, three hours of multi-cultural content and 1 hour of religion. Most of these quotas were comfortably exceeded (education by five hours a week): the obligation to supply 330 hours of schools programmes a year was over-subscribed by 235 hours. 

But then came the Communications Act, which brought in the creation of a new regulator - Ofcom - and with that began a period of a completely different regulatory environment for Channel 4 and all the other broadcasters. And let me be more specific, it was not just different. What I mean was – the environment became a more relaxed environment. Over the ensuing period, we saw the gradual reduction in license requirements.

And by 2016, Channel 4 had a very different version of “the remit”. Nearly all of the fixed quotas had disappeared: education, multicultural, religion and training just vanished. 

And where the quotas remained they were either enforced more loosely, for example the case of News and Current Affairs, or were massively reduced - as was the case for Schools programming.

This gradual shift in relaxation, led Farrukh Dhondy to write, and I quote; “a few weeks watching Channel 4 in 2016 leads inexorably to the conclusion that the ‘remit’ does not exist”.

So why do I bring this up? And what does this have to do with privatisation?

Well, I would argue that it is not Channel 4 that was special but the regulatory environment that it operated in that was special and Channel 4’s place in it.

The fact is, the idea of privatising Channel 4 is not new – there were headlines about doing so back to 2016. Why? Well, I would suggest that privatisation is in fact just the natural progression of the more relaxed regulatory environment it has been operating in since 2003.

And so you might ask; “why am I fighting against Channel 4 being privatised?”

And the answer is quite simple. Publicly owned bodies are far easier to regulate and are far more accountable to the public.

The fact is I want Channel 4 to return to its “remit” – its roots of addressing the industry market failure that is diversity and inclusion - in all its forms. And I believe the best way to do that is through better regulation, public ownership and accountability.

“I want a public Channel 4 and a new regulatory environment to formally introduce ring-fenced funds for diverse-led productions”

But to discuss Channel 4’s privatisation without addressing the regulatory failure over the last 20 years is doing a disservice to all the people whose interests the previous regulation sought to protect.

I want a public Channel 4 and a new regulatory environment to formally introduce ring-fenced funds for diverse-led productions.

I want Channel 4 to restructure its commissioning structure so that ethnic diversity is on par with regional diversity – the “Out of London” quota is one of the few areas where Ofcom has actually increased the channel’s license requirements over the last 20 years.

I am definitely behind the fight for Channel 4 not to be privatised - but not on any terms. We cannot maintain the status quo of the last 15 - 20 years. Yes, I expect privatisation could lead to even worse outcomes. But the bottom line is if the debate begins and ends with whether Channel 4 should be privatised it is a serious missed opportunity.

Together we need to avoid privatisation – but we also need to keep our eye on the real prize – which is to restore Channel 4 to the broadcaster with a “remit” that we all know and love.

This article has been republished from Marcus Ryder’s blog