My Free Televised Sport For All Bill

Here’s a good dinner party question. Imagine you are an MP. You put your name into the ballot to introduce a private member’s bill and, joy of joys, you have won! You get first shot at introducing a bill on a subject of your choice, and plenty of time to do it. This is a chance for you to make a difference! Even if your bill does not make it into law, it is still a chance to bring an important issue to public attention. What would you do?

 

This year’s ballot was won by James Wharton MP and he has decided to introduce a bill … on a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU! This is something which has been discussed ad infinitum, has been voted on, has been promised by the Prime Minister, and, frankly, an in-out referendum one day is inevitable. This strikes me as a waste of an opportunity. Many would argue it is an attempt to commit David Cameron so he can’t get out of it at a later date, but if Conservative MPs can’t trust their own leader, it does make it hard for others to do so. And surely there is a specific issue which is close to Mr Wharton's heart.

 

But I digress, the point of this entry is to imagine that I am in the Commons and I have won the ballot. This gives me the chance to introduce a bill on a topic which particularly annoys me – The Free Televised Sport For All Bill.

 

In this country we love our sport – we are keen followers of football, cricket, rugby, even darts and snooker. Our Olympics was a massive success.

 

But televised sport is dominated by the paid TV market, especially Sky, and you could find yourself having to fork out beyond £50 a month just to watch sport on TV.

 

For example, I learnt the rules of cricket by watching the test series between England and West Indies in 1976 on the BBC. But now a generation of children are growing up and, unless they have Sky, they will have no idea what cricket is - such is the dominance of Sky's hold on the game. By 2025, our test team will consist entirely of people who had Sky in their youth.

 

Let’s look at the facts. What do we have on free-to-view TV?

 

-No live Premiership football

-No live Football League or League Cup football

-Some (not all) England internationals, very few from Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland

-No domestic cricket, not even highlights

-Only highlights of England home cricket matches, nothing at all from overseas

-No boxing

-Only half of the Formula One Grand Prix shown live – shared with Sky

-Half of one major darts tournament – shared with ESPN

-Only one major golf tournament – The Open – with occasional highlights of others

 

BT Sport are launching a new channel soon – and much has been made of the fact that it is free with BT Broadband – but not everyone has computers.

 

To its credit, ITV is the only channel seeking to provide free-to-view sport. It has some FA Cup, some Champions League and Europa League games, French Open tennis and other bits and pieces. BBC have no interest in major sports (Sports Personality of the Year is often dominated by people who are never on the channel) and Channels 4 and 5 are too small.

 

There are some sports which are protected – Wimbledon, the Boat Race, the Grand National, the World Cup, the Olympics, the Six Nations – but can we really trust our politicians and TV companies not to hive these off at some future date?

 

So my Bill would not only protect our televised sport, but would expand it so that we can enjoy and support our top sportsmen and everyone can watch for free!

 

The rights for the following will only be sold to someone who commits to putting them on a free-to-view channel:

 

-At least one Premiership football package (presently 26 games live)

-Live coverage of all competitive matches by the Home Nations

-Live coverage of all England home cricket test matches

-Live coverage of domestic cricket one day finals

-Live coverage of all rugby internationals involving British teams (including the Lions)

-All world boxing title fights involving a British boxer

-The Ryder Cup

-Live coverage of all Formula One races

-Both the PDC and BDO World Darts Championships

 

That would be a start and would be under constant review.

 

These are the sort of things that were on when we only had three or four channels – in the era of multi-channel TV there would be plenty of room for all these. My Bill would not stop Sky, BT or anyone else bidding for these rights – but if they did so, they would have to make the event available on a free-to-air channel.

 

Of course, this Bill would have no chance of becoming law. Not by accident is Rupert Murdoch the most powerful man in British politics. The vested interests of Sky and others have huge influence over our MPs and they will be queuing up for favours to talk the Bill out. But it would bring to the surface the issue of British sport which is becoming more and more denied to the eyes of our people, unless they have deep pockets in tough times.

 

And the more people see sport, the more they will get behind our sports people, the more we will see encouragement and development of our younger sportsmen, and we will see the result in hopefully future British sporting success.

Why UKIP's Success Could Be Good For The Liberal Democrats

Throughout UKIP’s campaign in recent months, much has been said about the ‘ConLibLab’ consensus, and how they are aiming to break through. And there is no denying that UKIP have achieved spectacular results in this week’s county council elections.

 

But, as I argued in a previous article (‘The War of Two Coalitions’ – 8 July 2012), if there is a political ‘consensus’, surely it is the two-party coalition between the Conservatives and Labour which has existed since 1945 with the mutual desire of both parties to resist any genuine political change and reforms. Surely we too should aim at bringing this down?

 

True, at present, the Liberal Democrats are in a national coalition with the Conservatives, but this is a temporary five year deal. At the end of the day, the Conservatives will always side with Labour and vice versa, and resist Lib Dems, UKIP or anyone interfering with their game.

 

In what ways are the Liberal Democrats closer to those sharing our aim of breaking this consensus?

 

Voting reform: both the Conservatives and Labour parties have resisted any change to our voting system. In 1979, Labour went back on their promise of PR for European elections in return for the Lib-Lab pact. Granted, the Conservatives allowed a referendum for AV in 2011, but then used their vast resources to shoot it down. Ed Miliband’s support was half-hearted at best. Most of Labour will have remembered that Labour won a healthy majority in 2005 with only 35% of the votes.

 

On the other hand, both the Lib Dems and UKIP support a campaign for fair votes. Both parties support voting reform, albeit through different methods, they both favour the principle of a PR based system to make a fairer reflection of people’s votes.  Whereas the big two will defend First-Past-The-Post to the death.

 

Lords reform: Labour decided to backtrack on their previous promises and collude with Tory rebels to block any change to the Lords. Can we trust a future Labour government to reform this retirement home for politicians? Of course not. UKIP, on the other hand, have supported an 80-20 split, similar to previous plans.

 

Party funding: the Conservative party have vast unlimited resources. Labour, maybe not to the same extent, also has immense wealth. Lib Dems and UKIP, on the other hand, both raise money with car boot sales and quiz nights. I don’t know UKIP’s views on party political funding but I imagine they would be open to change.

 

Written constitution: both parties have floated the idea of a written constitution to establish the rights of the individual and the powers and limitations of the legislative and executive bodies. This is something which could be worked on.

 

Right to recall: both parties support the right to recall MPs for misconduct, for example, over expenses, something the big two have always resisted.

 

These are just a few examples, and a browse through UKIP’s constitutional policy document is interesting reading, but it is clear that, when it comes to changing the system, and the ‘political consensus’, the Liberal Democrats and UKIP are both in favour of drastic changes to the status quo, and have much more in common with each other than either do with the Conservatives or Labour.

 

But what about policies, I hear you say? Yes, it is true that on EU membership, immigration and the environment, the two parties are far apart – but there may be elements where we can work together – the basic tax rate for example where both support taking the minimum wage out of tax. We have proved we can work with the Conservatives, despite the large policy gaps that are there and still exist.

 

And we are not talking about a formal coalition or agreement. What I would like to see is the Liberal Democrats and UKIP working together on political and constitutional reform alongside liked-minded people from other parties to finally bring our politics into the 21st century (it has barely made it to the 20th).

 

The point is: both parties will remain on the long-term fringes of British politics unless we see genuine political change in this country.

 

Already some Conservatives are talking about Con-UKIP council administrations to 'bring UKIP back'. Many Conservatives see UKIP as a temporary group of ex-Tories all waiting to dash back home once we are out of the EU. Then, before we know it, we will be back to the world of Con-Lab majority governments – ‘back to normal’ as the media would have it.

 

It depends on whether UKIP genuinely want to become a long-term political party in their own right. And whether they would join those of us who cry out for modernisation and political reform.

 

But, for now, I cannot be sorry to see more votes go to UKIP and away from the Con-Labs. Every success for UKIP is a success for those of us who genuinely want to break down the ‘political consensus’ and, with that in mind, UKIP successes could be good for the Liberal Democrats - so perhaps we should wish them well.

An Important Point Leveson Didn't Cover

Here is the BBC News at Ten O’clock. The headlines are:

• Vote Conservative! That’s the message across the country for tomorrow’s general election – vote Conservative.
• Nick Robinson, our political editor, reports why a Conservative majority government is the best answer to the country’s problems.
• Our economics editor, Robert Peston, discusses the dangers to the economy of implementing policies promoted by the Labour party.
• Peter Snow uses his famous graphics to show the confusion and disarray of a hung parliament and how we can avoid it.
• David Dimbleby interviews Grant Shapps on the latest on the campaign.
• And, finally, sport. The England coach, Roy Hodgson, says that England’s bid to win the world cup would be strengthened by the return of a Conservative government.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

OK, you won’t be hearing these words on BBC News, or even ITV or Sky. This is because televised media are bound to give fair proportionate coverage to general election parties based on votes gained at the previous election.

Newspapers, on the other hand, have no such restrictions. They can give as much biased coverage as they desire. This would not normally be a problem if there was a balance – but the fact is there is a complete imbalance which has a major effect on our democracy.

Fact: Five of the country’s top selling seven national newspapers are staunch supporters of the Conservative party and right wing policies.

The Sun, The Daily Mail, The Times, The Daily Telegraph and The Daily Express will all disagree with the Tories from time to time – but when it counts they will put all their considerable united muscle into helping the Conservative election campaign.

In the recent Eastleigh campaign, the Mail and Telegraph happily jumped on the lead given by Channel 4 News and pumped the Lord Rennard allegations for all they were worth – the Mail totalled about 40 pages in the week up to the by-election while the Telegraph called on Eastleigh’s voters not to vote Lib Dem as 'punishment'. Since the by-election concluded, you will note that the Rennard story immediately vanished. Coincidence?

When Nick Clegg won the first leader’s debate, in 2010, Paddy Ashdown correctly said ‘they will come for us now.’ Sure enough, all the papers ran various and different smear stories about Clegg on the day of the second debate. Had David Cameron won that first discussion, would he have got that treatment? I think not.

One image that stands in my mind was in 1992 – which had been a close campaign, and the result of which was still uncertain to the end. I went to the supermarket on election day and saw all the front pages lined up next to each other. Almost unanimously, they had pictures of John Major and the word ‘trust’ – the exception being The Sun with its famous front cover of Neil Kinnock in a light bulb asking that if Kinnock wins, can the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights. The Sun later argued, perhaps with good justification, that the media’s support was the clincher for John Major's subsequent victory.

The most powerful man in British politics over the last thirty years has been Rupert Murdoch. It was no surprise that first Tony Blair and then David Cameron sought to court him. The subsequent switchings of the Murdoch allegiance are clearly seen as major events in recent British political history. Even today, the news of Nigel Farage having dinner with the Murdochs was enough to raise eyebrows.

Should this be so? Should it be the case that one person should have so much power over British politics?

The Leveson enquiry concentrated on press ethics, as was its brief, but I would like to see a future enquiry broaden out to concentrate on the overwhelming political bias in one direction of our major newspapers.

Obviously the rights of a free press should be foremost but maybe there is a case for implementing the same sort of restrictions that TV has to adhere by – that in the final weeks of an election campaign, national newspapers must show impartiality and equality of coverage to all concerned.

I am not sure how we can work on the details. And after Leveson, media relations are understandably touchy at present. But hopefully one day we can restore a balance of opinions and allow people to make their own decisions based on a wide range of advice and information. And that the election is not about which paper it was wot won it.

Channel Four News - the response to my complaint

Dear Mr Nevols,

Thank you for contacting Channel 4 Viewer Enquiries regarding CHANNEL 4 NEWS.

We are sorry to hear that you feel the timing of this report was ill-timed, we have passed your concerns onto our news editors. Please be assured your complaint has been logged and noted for the information of those responsible for our programming.

Thank you again for taking the time to contact us. We appreciate all feedback from our viewers; complimentary or otherwise.

Regards,
Steve Reynolds
Channel 4 Viewer Enquiries

A rather bland and standard response – I doubt my comments will have been ‘noted’ by anyone. However I won’t of course be taking the complaint any further.

Ironically, if it had been the intention of Channel 4 News to help the Conservative campaign in Eastleigh, it spectacularly backfired – the consequences fuelled the ‘anti-politician’ voters into the arms of UKIP and pushed the Tories into third place.

In my comments to various articles on the Conservative Home forum, I had speculated that the media would have a story on hold which will be carefully released at the right time to wrongfoot the Liberal Democrats. This proved to be the case. I felt it was disappointing that we had been so ill-prepared for this – if I could see it coming, why did no-one else? The lesson is that we need to brush up our technique for responding to such media explosions.

Fortunately, despite this and the usual barrage from the right wing newspapers, our party’s resilience and hard working held on for a great victory. I am proud to have played my own very small part in this (two days down there) and the fact that the entire party rallied around at its moment of need.

Congratulations to Mike Thornton and everyone in the Eastleigh Liberal Democrats.

Channel Four News - My Complaint

Dear Sir/Ma'am. I wish to make a complaint about Channel 4 News.

On Thursday 21 February, Channel 4 News ran a special report into alleged sexual harassment by Lord Rennard of the Liberal Democrats. I have no issue with the report itself and agree it is a newsworthy item which should be reported. My complaint is regarding the timing of the piece.

Channel 4 News are presumably aware that (i) there is a parliamentary by-election to be held at Eastleigh on Thursday 28 February, (ii) that polls indicate a close fight between the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative party, and (iii) political commentators agree on the importance of this by-election with likely consequences for either or both of the coalition parties, or even the government. It has been called the most significant by-election in 50 years.

Despite this, Channel 4 News decide to run this report at the time of maximum effect – exactly one week before polling – so that it can snowball and disable the Liberal Democrats in the lead up to polling day. One week earlier or one week later would have been different. But now, three days before the vote, the Liberal Democrats campaign in Eastleigh has been run off the tracks and Channel 4 News are the toast of every Conservative party gathering.

Surely this possibility had occurred to someone in the Channel 4 newsroom – or did they genuinely not know about Eastleigh?

The impression given is that Channel 4 News are deliberately seeking to influence the result of the Eastleigh by-election, and that the victims of the alleged abuse are being used for party political and election purposes. Such conduct is against all codes of professional ethics for televised media and removes any pretence of political impartiality by Channel 4 News.

Channel 4 News have built an enviable reputation for the quality of its news reports, so it is a shame that it should blatantly use a legitimate story in this way.

I would welcome your comments.

Review of 2012

This is my last entry of 2012 so I am using it to review the year gone by.

The highlight of the year was the London Olympics. I took two weeks off to follow TV coverage, visited various events on five occasions, and thoroughly enjoyed it all.

The highlight of my five visits was taking my wife to Wembley Stadium to her first ever football match, where we saw Team GB Ladies defeat Brazil 1-0 in a great atmosphere. We also met some Brazilian supporters at a volleyball event in Earls Court and the colour and enthusiasm they showed on both occasions convinces me that the next Olympics in Rio 2016 should also be a success.

The low point of the year was the death of my best friend, Adam, in October after a long battle with liver disease at the age of 42. We had been good friends since meeting at university in 1988 and even now it is hard to comprehend that someone younger than me has gone so soon. As someone told me, remember the smiles. And with that spirit, I think back to the good times and to many Christmas and New Year events which we enjoyed together with other friends over the years.

Politically, it was not a great year for me but then chances were limited. There were no local elections in my area, although we had a council by-election in March which got me back into the campaigning spirit. I aimed to be an MEP candidate for the Liberal Democrats in London and, while enjoying the six week campaign, was disappointed to fall short of the final list.

Blog-wise, my most read entry was back in January with ‘Be loud and be proud. The Liberal Democrats are the party of the poor’ which, having thought about it, makes a rather misleading headline – it should mean that the Lib Dems are the best representatives of the poor, and not the fact that the party is very poor itself – although that is not too far from the truth.

I argued that by taking a million people out of paying tax completely, cutting taxes for every basic rate payer, bringing in the pupil premium to invest billions in under-performing schools, and restoring the pensions to earnings link – all of which are measures that would not have happened under a ‘pure’ Conservative government nor a Labour administration – that it is to the Liberal Democrats that the poor can look to for support. To add to this, we can point to the fact that we are vetoing over-the-top Conservative measures to cut the benefits bill. The bill needs to be cut but fairness should be the watchword. I hope we can do more to get this message across.

My favourite entry was in July when I talked about the ‘war of two coalitions’. In my view, it is a fact that the Conservative and Labour parties have an unofficial unwritten alliance to ensure they keep all the power between them, and that other parties (of whom are growing support all the time) should be kept in their place. This is chiefly why both parties are so angry with the Liberal Democrats rather than each other for daring to get into government.

This point is further strengthened by the year’s biggest political disappointment – the failure of the House of Lords reforms. Labour decided to betray their great forefathers and ally themselves with the right wing Tories in order to protect privilege and patronage in the Lords against democracy – a once in a century opportunity – which just displays the emptiness and vanity of the modern Labour party. Who would ever have thought that the Conservative party leadership would be more reformist than that of the Labour party?

As for the Liberal Democrats, I am pleased to see us pursuing our policies on tax, education and the environment. I am concerned that our ‘differentiation’ strategy has started too early – we are only halfway through the parliament and I would much prefer both parties getting on with the job. We don’t need to lower ourselves to the yah-boo spoilt-child level of Peter Bone, Nadine and the others on the Tory backbenches.

If the Conservatives can exert some discipline and keep their loony element quiet then it is quite possible the two parties can work together up to and through the next election to sort out the economy, bring in social and political changes, and keep Labour out. This, however, would be up to David Cameron. If he continues to show weakness and fails to exert discipline, it may not be long before Ed and Ed are in Numbers 10 and 11 – and then we are all in trouble!

Come 2014 we can think more about differentiation. But I want to see more co-operation and productivity in 2013. If we are worried about the council elections, we should remember that Labour did very badly in 2009 – so we will take a hit and Labour have a good result regardless.

My last act of the year in my blog is to thank you all for reading, whatever your views and whichever party you support. Without the Olympics or the Diamond Jubilee, 2013 will undoubtedly be a quieter year but I am sure we will all have just as much to talk about.

I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year.

Who will save the Church from itself?

One of our most treasured institutions in English life is the church, and, in particular, the Church Of England. Religion and faith is deeply rooted within our national conscience. Go to any English village or town and you will see, in pride of place, a church – sometimes it dominates the area, other times of more modest size, but in nearly every case it will be a main centrepiece of the community, an organiser of social activities, a place of celebration at Christmas, a place of solemn reflection on Remembrance Day, and always a place of worship and thanksgiving.

I write as a regular attendee at my local church. I am actively involved in event organisation and fund raising, I sit on the Church Council, and I edit the church newsletter. On Sundays, when I can, I go along to pray for my friends and family, enjoy some fine hymns, and partake in the service.

So it grieves me when I see the church and its leadership regularly shoot themselves in the foot, completely unaware of how their actions, or inactions, may make a difference to the future of the existence of the church itself.

Everyone who loves the church should bear in mind two simple facts and commit them to memory. These facts are (i) each year, the numbers regularly attending church have been steadily reducing – congregations get fewer and fewer in size, and (ii) the average age of those who regularly attend church has been increasing. Even at the age of 45, I am one of the youngest in my congregation. Apart from the children, who may have been dragged along, the vast majority of those present are pensioners – and there are very few young adults.

Should these two trends continue then, sooner than we think, congregations will die out and disappear altogether. And churches all over England will become empty disused buildings.

Why is this the case? Why don’t people go to their local church? Some tell me they are simply too busy, others that they like a lie-in on Sunday mornings after a busy working week, and others, not unreasonably, think churches are full of old people and they would feel out of place. But the most common reasons are that people say they ‘don’t feel religious’, although these people celebrate Christmas and see their kids in nativity plays or, the issue I wish to deal with, they simply do not see the relevance of the church to themselves and to today’s world. It is part of the old corrupt British establishment of politicians, financiers, businessmen, people who are only in it for what they can get out of it, and of complete disinterest to ordinary working people

Now I defend the institution as much as I can but feel the Church is its own worst enemy and this viewpoint is only confirmed by two massive blunders in recent months. Blunders which continue the battle between church and society (and history has shown that when the church battles with society, it is usually society that wins out).

The first blunder refers to female Bishops. There is still some way to go but, in the modern age, women have made great advances in all areas of society and that is something we should welcome. You would have thought the General Synod would almost unanimously have voted to allow women to be ordained as bishops – after all, why not?

The Synod did indeed vote for this measure by a considerable majority, but in the House of Laity it fell a few votes short of the necessary two thirds requirement. But people at large are not interested in the finer details and procedures of church decisions – all they know is that the church has considered the issue of women bishops and held out its hand with a big NO!

The second blunder, in my view, refers to the, perhaps more divisive issue, of same sex marriage. In the week that we learn that fewer couples are getting married than ever before, the church considers the government's proposition of same sex marriage and once again it is the hand with the NO! To be fair, some would consider allowing same sex marriages in their church, but the government decided on a complete ban on the Church of England while those of other faiths and religions have the option of ‘opt-ing in’ – a clear case of religious discrimination. Had the church shown a more positive and enthusiastic response, then the situation may be different.

In my view, the institution of marriage is a wonderful presence. I have been happily married for ten years. If two people wish to publicly commit themselves to love and protect each other, under the eyes of God and regardless of their gender, that is something we should welcome and encourage. Opponents say that marriage should be solely between a man and a woman, and I have sympathy for that view, but in the modern age, many couples are of the same sex.

Statistics show that married couples live happier, healthier and longer lives. If more people were married, the world would be a happier place. I believe that the institution of marriage would be protected not undermined by same sex marriage. As more heterosexual couples see the happiness that marriage can bring, they may well take the plunge themselves. Allowing and blessing more unions would reverse the current trend towards marriage dying out.

So what do people see of the church? They see the Archbishop of Canterbury and an array of old men dressed splendidly in fine robes, preaching to us about charity and sacrifice but not showing signs themselves of either, of an old boys club living in a long forgotten world where women know their place and the presence of homosexuality is not acknowledged.

Now, like most people, I am no religious expert. I am in no doubt there are many who would defend the Church’s view with quotes and passages from the Bible and the study of theology. I respond by borrowing the phrase of the Occupy London movement – what would Jesus do?

If he were around today, would Jesus prevent the full inclusion and participation of women in his church? Would Jesus close the door to gay people who wanted his blessing in their unions? Of course not – Jesus, and God, loves everyone. It is the Church of England who apparently does not.

We are deep into the 21st century, and as we go further on, and as society continues to change, however much many may not like it, the Church of England is crying out for the modern and forward thinking leadership that is necessary to make it relevant once again to people’s lives and the modern world. Will we see that leadership come to the forefront soon? Will the Church find the backbone within to save itself from extinction? Will anyone save the Church from itself? We can only watch, hope and, yes, continue to pray.