COMMERCIAL BROADCASTING (Hansard, 25 July 1946)

§ 49. Mr. HENDERSON STEWART
—To ask the Lord President of the Council if he will 217 now indicate what steps the Government propose to take to prevent commercial broadcasting in this country, or when he hopes to be in a position to make a statement.

§ Mr. Henderson Stewart
May I call attention to a misprint in this Question? The phrase "in this country" should read "to this country."

§ Mr. H. Morrison
I am afraid I must answer the Question on the Paper. No one can originate broadcasts in this country without a licence from the Postmaster-General and the only licence granted will be that to the B.B.C. which is prohibited from broadcasting commercially sponsored programmes.

§ Mr. Stewart
Is the right hon. Gentleman prepared, now or later, to answer the question as to what steps he is taking to prevent broadcasting to this country from other countries?

§ Mr. Morrison
I dealt with that in the Debate on the B.B.C. I may add that another factor which influences us in that matter is the opinion of the newspaper proprietors, for which the Government have every consideration. They said last year that the members of the Newspapers Proprietors' Association are opposed in principle to the introduction of any system of sponsored radio broadcasting in this country, they considered it would be detrimental to the interests of the public as listeners, and that it was unnecessary from the point of view of advertisers. That is another contributing factor which does influence the minds of the Government, as we think the views of the newspapers are entitled to be taken into account.

§ Mr. Stewart
There is some misunderstanding here. The right hon. Gentleman has told us that he proposes to prevent Luxemburg broadcasting to this country; does he also propose to prevent any other stations with a similar objective?

§ Mr. Morrison
If the hon. Gentleman thought that I was worried about the United States of America in this case, he would be wrong. I am concerned with cases where there is specific organisation for the purpose of directing sponsored programmes at this country.