Sky/21st Century Fox: Proposed Merger — House of Commons, 2017-03-06
Topic: Mixed Topics
Karen Anne Bradley (Conservative, Centre-right): Before Christmas, I promised to give the House an update about progress on the process for the bid by 21st Century Fox to acquire the 61% share of Sky that it does not already own. I can confirm that formal notification for the proposed merger of Sky and 21st Century Fox was lodged with the European Commission on Friday 3 March and that I wrote to the parties on Friday to inform them that I am minded to issue a European intervention notice on the basis that I believe there are public interest considerations—as set out in the Enterprise Act 2002—that may be relevant to this proposed merger and that warrant further investigation. To be clear, I have not taken a final decision on intervention at this stage, but I have indicated what I am presently minded to do. In line with the guidance that applies to my quasi-judicial role, I will aim to come to a final decision on whether to intervene in the merger within 10 working days of Friday’s notification. Before I make my final decision, and in line with statutory guidance, I have invited further representations in writing from the parties and have given them until Wednesday 8 March to provide them In December, I made it clear that I would make this quasi-judicial decision independently, following a process that is scrupulously fair and impartial, and as quickly as possible with all the relevant information in front of me. To enable this, I instructed my officials to commence work to analyse the relevance of the public interest considerations relating to the merger and to consider the available evidence. Since the 9 December announcement, I have received representations from the parties to the merger, as well as representations made in writing to the Department from a range of people and organisations. This includes more than 8,700 responses made in connection with the Department’s consultation on the Leveson inquiry and its implementation, which referred to the merger. Given my quasi-judicial role, I can only consider evidence that is relevant to my decision On the basis of this preparatory work, I have issued a "minded to" letter to the parties on two of the public interest grounds specified in section 58 of the Enterprise Act 2002. The first public interest ground on which I am minded to intervene is media plurality—that is, the specific need for a sufficient plurality of persons with control of the media enterprises serving audiences in the UK. My concern here is that the merger will bring under common or increased control a number of significant news sources, including Sky News and News Corporation’s newspaper titles. As a result, I have told the parties that I am minded to ask for a report from Ofcom on the impact of the merger on media plurality before considering the matter further The second public interest ground on which I am minded to intervene is commitment to broadcasting standards. That ground relates to the need for persons carrying on media enterprises, and for those with control of such enterprises, to have a genuine commitment to attaining broadcasting standards objectives. As I have indicated to the parties to the merger, I am concerned about the nature of a number of breaches of broadcasting standards by 21st Century Fox, as well as the behaviour and corporate governance failures of News Corporation in the past. In the light of those matters, I am minded to intervene on this ground and to ask Ofcom to investigate them further I want to be clear on what this means for the overall process. My decision on whether or not to intervene is not the end of the matter. Instead, it would recognise that the public interest considerations may be relevant to the merger and will trigger action by Ofcom to assess and report to me on them and for the Competition and Markets Authority to report on jurisdiction. There would then be a further decision-making stage for me to undertake in the light of those reports, but we are not yet at that stage. As I said at the outset, I will aim to take the final decision on whether to issue a European intervention notice within the 10 working days set out in the guidance and will return to this House to notify Parliament of the decision I am today, as I said I would, keeping this House appropriately informed of developments on this important matter, and it is right that I continue to do so. However, given that this remains a quasi-judicial process in which I retain a decision-making role for the next 10 days and potentially beyond, it would be inappropriate for me, or any other member of this Government, to comment on the substantive merits of the case. I hope that this update is helpful to right hon. and hon. Members and that this statement gives an opportunity to debate an important issue, but at the same time I hope that right hon. and hon. Members will respect the limits of what I can say given my ongoing decision-making role.