7. 7. Debate on the Report by the Culture, Welsh Language and Communications Committee: 'The Big Picture: The Committee's Initial Views on Broadcasting in Wales'

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:08 pm on 14 June 2017.

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Photo of Bethan Sayed Bethan Sayed Plaid Cymru 5:08, 14 June 2017

Thank you. I’m not going to speak for very long, but thank you all who have contributed and I’m sure this will—as Suzy captured quite well, I think, saying this is the first chapter of many that we will look into in relation to broadcasting, the newspaper industry, radio, and such, as part of this committee. Other committees of the Assembly have looked at it sporadically, but I think there has been a place here to have more focus, with communications being in the title of this committee. So, I’m hopeful that we can achieve what some of us have self-congratulated on already achieving, although I think we have much more to achieve. Let’s not sit on our laurels; we have much more to learn.

In relation to what the Minister says on pre-appointment hearings, what I tried to say in what I was saying earlier was that you could potentially not give consent until you were satisfied that we would be able to have that appointment hearing—I’m not sure if the Minister’s listening to me—and whether we could have a committee discussion before it would get to you as a Minister. If other legislatures are not doing it at the moment, we could show the way in that regard in having that appointment hearing. So, I’m not sure whether I agree that you don’t have the power, and I’m sure many of us will be pursuing this issue with you down the line.

I would agree with you that accountability should lie here also. I think the committee would diverge on where the power should lie. I’m sure everybody knows where my view stands on that. But, especially now we have this committee, accountability is clear, and, as Suzy said also, ruffling the feathers is something that we have done. I think, with Lee’s comments on ITV, that’s where some of the feathers were ruffled, I should say.

But I think, from taking all the comments together, this is a good start for us for the future, not only looking at BBC—I do believe that that comment was correct. We have focused quite a lot, but I think that’s because the charter renewal process was coming up, and we had that focus on the charter. It’s safe to say that everybody is within grasp for us to scrutinise and hold to account, and, hopefully, they will see it in a good light, that we want to scrutinise in the best possible way so that we can make portrayal as effective as possible in future here in Wales, and to ensure that the funding streams fall in line to make sure that that is a possibility. We don’t want to be here in 10 years’ time without bilingual daleks. We would like to see bilingual daleks in 10 years’ time. So, therefore, we need to have those programmes—we need to have ‘Casualty’ with bilingual signs, and then we know we will have achieved our aim as a committee. No, to be serious, we have lots more work to do.

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