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Digital Economy Bill [HL]

My Lords, diluting this part of the Bill seems to me somewhat unhelpful. Maintaining the duty for Ofcom to promote and monitor investment in the infrastructure that we need to help secure our economic and social prosperity in the future seems entirely sensible, even highly desirable. Identifying where the private sector is simply not going to deliver a next generation service to our hardest to reach communities, and plugging it with targeted public money to ensure that all households have equitable access to the internet, which will include a whole range of public service media content too, is surely, at least to my way of thinking, a reasonable duty for our communications regulator in a digital age. I am also reluctant to concede that providing audiences with high quality public service media content is solely the responsibility of one or two broadcasters. The Digital Britain White Paper set out some unsettling truths about the shape of the broadcasting landscape at present and in the future. In this new world, the role of public service broadcasting cannot be left to chance, and cannot be left to the BBC and Channel 4 alone. Ofcom's role in helping shape the future of a second strong public service broadcasting institution around Channel 4 is a vital one. The whole point is that the market, if left to its own devices, would not provide much of the content that helps sustain, reflect and inform our culture. Some ability for the regulator to recognise this in its activities is simply common sense. I do not get the feeling that Ofcom is likely to be profligate with the element of flexibility; the clause simply makes sure that its hands are not tied unnecessarily in seeking to deliver the goals of the Bill, or that it has to complete extensive audit trails simply to demonstrate that all its activities are wholly efficient. The new duties appear to me to be good seeds. From them mighty oaks might grow. I therefore resist this amendment in favour of the Bill as it stands.