Amendment 1

Part of Media Bill - Report and Third Reading – in the House of Lords at 4:00 pm on 23 May 2024.

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Photo of Lord Addington Lord Addington Liberal Democrat 4:00, 23 May 2024

My Lords, I will speak briefly to my Amendment 7. The listed events regime is something that we all agree should happen—for sporting events and events of national importance. This amendment, initially moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, is an attempt to make sure that in the current viewing world, they are still relevant in the way that they should be. Not everybody watches these listed events on an ordinary television and, if you do, you may be watching on internet television. One of the joys of this is that you have highlights and replays and can watch out of sync. I would hope in this modern world that those are guaranteed, because if you do not guarantee that these sporting cultural assets, which the nation has said should be available to everyone and there is cross-party consensus on, are made available for free then you are going to take them away.

Also, if there is any danger of these highlights being taken away—when it comes to the Olympics, for example, determined as I am, even I cannot watch 15 events at once, especially not at various times—we must make sure that they are readily available. This is the second go at this. I hope that the Minister can give us a definitive reassurance that we will have this available to us now, in this Bill, because if not, the Government have thrown away, in effect, half the listed events.