UK government releases long-awaited media bill to bring Netflix, Disney+ and Prime Video under regulatory framework

The UK government has released its long-awaited draft media bill to bring US streamers under its regulatory framework and help public service broadcasters embrace the digital age.

The law is the next step in long-planned legislation that, if passed, could see Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video fined up to £250,000 ($308,000) or banned outright in the UK for breaching rules regarding Harmful material has been an issue for public broadcasters for decades.

The white paper outlining the plans for the April 2022 bill initially floated the idea that these streamers would either be fined up to £250,000 or 5% of their domestic earnings, whichever is greater, but the latter option is as of today s draft bill removed.

Once approved, media regulator Ofcom will be “given stronger powers to review standards and take action to enforce the standards where they see fit,” added the UK Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).

Given the amount of British content the US giants produce and the amount of British talent they have attracted in recent years, the move will meet calls for streamers to be more in line with broadcasters. In another sign that the government is keen to level the playing field between traditional players and tech giants, smart speaker operators such as Google and Amazon are required to give listeners access to UK radio stations, and these platforms are banned from charging for their services which is offered. .

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Another long-standing demand from BBC, ITV and Channel 4 bosses is for their VoD players iPlayer, ITVX and All4 to come forward, and the new legislation will force global TV platforms to “come to the fore come” that these services bring. which “helps ensure that British programming is easy to find as viewers increasingly move online, and British audiences can easily find the content they like when they turn on their TV.

Calls for more attention first emerged around half a decade ago, and broadcasters may argue that the move, which has yet to be approved by the UK Parliament through the Media Act, may have come too little too late.

Also included in today’s bill is the replacement of a set of ‘objectives’ for UK broadcasters with a ‘new mandate better suited to the digital age’.

Online programming will now count towards government-imposed quotas and Ofcom will have the power to require PSBs to offer more of a particular type of show if the regulator believes the public is being underserved.

Ofcom last week published a separate plan to update the BBC’s operating license for the digital age, outlining a number of ways in which quotas should be relaxed.

Controversial plans to force the PSBs to stick to “distinctive British content quotas” appear to have been dropped, drawing the ire of creative heavyweights such as Lucy Prebble and Jack Thorne.

Another policy removed from the white paper was the sale of Channel 4, which was recently reversed to the delight of the industry. Instead, a transformative move has been inserted, allowing Channel 4 to produce and own its own content for the first time in its four-decade history.

Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer said the media law would “give these brilliant broadcasters and our long-established radio industry the tools to continue doing what they do best” after they were “placed under unprecedented pressure” from “changing viewing habits”. .

Frazer replaced Michelle Donelan a few weeks ago. Donelan replaced arch-BBC sceptic Nadine Dorries – the original architect of the white paper – over the summer.