The media ownership rules were put in place by Parliament to protect the public interest by promoting plurality for television, radio, and newspapers. In the interest of democracy, these rules aim to protect the plurality of viewpoints, give citizens access to a variety of sources of news, information and opinion and preventing undue influence by any one, or certain types of, media owner.
Ofcom has a statutory duty to secure and maintain a sufficient plurality of providers of TV and radio services. We also have a duty to review, at least every three years, the operation of the media ownership rules and report to the Secretary of State on our conclusions, including recommendations as to whether the Secretary of State should use any of their specific powers to change them.
We published our last review in November 2021, for which we conducted an extensive consultation and made recommended changes to the existing rules. We are now publishing our seventh report on the discharge of our duties, which can be found below.
In this review, in light of the ongoing market changes, we are reiterating the need for these previously recommended changes to the media ownership rules without proposing any new recommendations.
In particular, we reiterate our 2021 Review recommendations that the Secretary of State exercise her powers to:
- broaden the scope of the existing Media Public Interest Test framework beyond print newspapers and broadcasters to capture a broader range of online news creators. We welcome the consultation published by Government which outlines plans to expand the media merger regime broadly in line with this recommendation. As this consultation remains open, we will continue to monitor these developments; and
- repeal certain categories of the Disqualified Persons Restrictions, including the discretionary prohibition for religious bodies, the prohibition on advertising agencies, and the prohibitions for publicly funded bodies.
