Clause 1 - The Office of Communications
Office of Communications Bill [Lords]
9:45 am
Dr Kim Howells (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department for Culture, Media & Sport; Pontypridd, Labour)
I also welcome you, Miss Widdecombe, to the chairmanship of this Committee. It is a great pleasure to serve on the Committee with you.
The communications White Paper set out the Government's proposal to create a new, unitary regulatory body for the broadcasting and telecommunications sectors and the intention that it would be called the Office of Communications. Hon. Members will recall that the second report of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, which was published in March 2001, made a recommendation that the new regulator's name should be the ''Communications Regulation Commission'', which is a bit of a mouthful, and the amendments echo that recommendation. The Government's response to the Select Committee noted that the nature of the governing body, Ofcom, had been made clear and confirmed the intention to retain the title ''Office of Communications''. That remains the case.
We must move away from the old-fashioned concept of regulation being purely about stopping people doing certain things and towards a more facilitating approach. Ofcom will be involved in more than regulating in the old sense. It will have positive obligations such as promoting the interests of consumers and citizens and media literacy and in relation to various matters concerning public service broadcasting. It will also facilitate the effective use of spectrum and access to a wide range of high-quality services. The use of the word ''regulation'' in the title of the new organisation would therefore set wholly the wrong tone for many of the things that Ofcom will do.
The Office of Communications and the acronym Ofcom are already familiar to many in the broadcasting and telecommunications sectors. Indeed, they have gained currency through use in the media, by the existing regulators and by Government, and are therefore becoming better recognised by the wider public. There is little to be gained at this late stage by altering the name as the amendments propose.