Diary 2/11/10

It’s raining pretty intensely in Manchester. I never can quite get used to it. Especially when cycling home leads to an absolute soaking.

Prompted by the campaigning organisation 38 Degrees, I emailed my local MP, the Liberal Democrat John Leech, about Rupert Murdoch‘s attempts to take 100% control of BSkyB. Mr Leech replied; here’s the full response:

Thank you for contacting me about News Corporation’s bid to take over BSkyB. May I apologise for the length of time it has taken me to reply to you.

I certainly would not be happy to see Rupert Murdoch further expand his media operations in the UK as I feel it would threaten diversity and plurality both of which are essential to a healthy and independent media. The Liberal Democrats have always been committed to a plural media combined with an independent BBC and indeed the Coalition Agreement specifically mentions these commitments.

On a personal level I do have great doubts about the amount of control and the possibility of undue influence that a single person can have when so many media outlets are controlled by one corporation and by one individual in particular. This would be true of any individual whether I agreed with their political point of you (sic) or not, although it is fair to say that I do not find myself in agreement with a lot of the news and opinion of much of the Murdoch controlled media.

I have passed on my own concerns to Vince Cable and will certainly forward your concerns as well.

It is perhaps worth noting that there is a clear legal framework set out within which Vince Cable will look at this decision. Firstly the European Commission’s competition directorate has to examine the proposals before the Secretary of State can intervene. Even then he must make his decision within the rules laid down by British legislation (the Enterprise Act 2002 and the Communications Act 2003) having taken all relevant information into account. This was laid out to ensure that there is not undue political interference in the media. It is for this reason that Vince Cable will not be making substantive comments at this stage as it would jeopardise any enquiries he will be making in the future.

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We shall see.

In other news, we took the recommendations of loads of friends and started watching Mad Men (I’m glad of the break from Damages).

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