3. 3. Statement by the Chair of the Culture, Welsh Language and Communications Committee on the Committee’s Approach to its Remit and How it Plans to Engage with the Public in Wales

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 2:50 pm on 28 September 2016.

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Photo of Bethan Sayed Bethan Sayed Plaid Cymru 2:50, 28 September 2016

Thank you for your comments, David. Obviously, I share your sadness, really, that the ‘Port Talbot MagNet’ is coming to an end. Whenever I was speaking at various media events, I’d always show them as a shining light in the bleakness that is the situation where we’ve had ‘The Merthyr Express’, ‘The Neath Guardian’ and others close down their offices, taking away that ability for people to go and to talk to reporters to tell them their stories about their communities. I think that’s something that the ‘MagNet’ was seeking to do in an effective way, and not, perhaps, superficial stories—they were taking on quite hard-hitting stories, and you and I have both given them such stories. So, I think it’s important for that to be retained.

But what I think—and I think other members of the committee agree with me here, because we’ve talked about it privately—is that people often describe the problem in relation to hyperlocal and finding solutions, but nobody actually has the solution. So, if we do a piece of work, I’m very keen on making sure that we hone in on what those solutions could be. Obviously, Golwg360 has had Government money for that website through the medium of Welsh, but do we want to see that happening across the board? Will they feel that they’d have a vested interest in the news if they do receive Government funding? Is there another way of doing it? Can we look at local businesses, SMEs in the food sector, in the agricultural sector, to see how, perhaps, that could then relate to the media sector in Wales? I think we put it into a little box and think that there aren’t other ways of doing it.

But I take your point in relation to social media and the implications. I feel that many of us, like I and the Presiding Officer, have done Facebook live because we feel we have to create our own agenda if there is a lack of news provision or news outlets for us here in Wales. So, social media, I think, sometimes is filling that gap. I don’t necessarily know yet—you may know—if it will actually be a threat to such start-ups, but that’s something that we could potentially look at as a committee. But thank you for your comments.