The Emirati / RedBird IMI bid for the Daily Telegraph and The Spectator is opening up a wider conversation: how much of the national infrastructure should Arab autocracies be allowed to buy? The Emiratis have 10 per cent of Heathrow airport, 15 per cent of Vodafone, 49 per cent of the Dogger Bank wind farm and now they want the Telegraph and Spectator. The government is considering whether to block the bid. So where, if anywhere, to draw the line?
LBC radio has just held a phone-in on the topic hosted by Ali Miraj. I was on first, expanding on points I made in my recent diary (listen below). Foreign owners, I said, are not a problem: Nikkei owns the FT. The issue is government ownership: a free press means freedom from government.You can listen to my comments at the end of this blog and I’ve made these points before: I was interested in what those following me had to say.
First was Hassan in Kensington. ‘Media is an important part of our society. It’s not just another business, it is designed not just to hold foreign governments to account, it is designed to hold every centre of power to account, whether local or abroad.’ He voiced dismay at seeing Richard Sharp, a buddy of Boris Johnson, being made BBC chairman. ‘We have seen how important an independent media is.’ But Qatari-owned al-Jazeera, he said, did offer ‘very useful’ contrast to BBC.
Josh in Chiswick said that no foreign government should own media but ‘I’d say the same for key infrastructure.’ He saw the Evening Standard as a cautionary tale, given the Lebedev family’s links. He said this contradicted my point about how papers represent the opinion of readers not owners: the Standard came out for the Tories, but Sadiq Khan won. Lebdev, of course, became a Tory peer.
Josh then made a point that you see a lot on social media: that right-wingers don’t seem to like tasting their own takeover medicine. ‘You can’t be part of an organ that champions [free market] ideology and then suddenly call for restrictions on ownership.’ But free marketeers, of course, have always called for restrictions: to prevent monopolies and guard against state interference. When governments or their proxies buy private companies, that’s not the free market at work. That’s nationalisation, as Charles Moore has argued. So I’m not sure that there is inconsistency. There’s nothing free market about an Emirati dictatorship using petrodollars to nationalise assets of foreign countries.
Russ in Leyton said ‘for me, it boils down to whether Redbird’s assurances of editorial freedom can be assured in the long term.’ (An independent editorial board has been promised for the Telegraph but not the Spectator: as editor I’d report straight to Jeff Zucker in New York.) Russ said he shares my ‘consternation at the idea of any government owning a significant slice of our media landscape.’ Zucker strikes me as a professional, respectful of The Spectator’s traditions. I don’t think he’d distort the magazine’s character. The issue is that, under the proposed deal, either he or I could be replaced in two shakes of a camel’s tail. Sheik Mansour could wake up on Monday and decide to edit The Spectator from Dubai on Tuesday.
Then we had Shahid in Hemel Hempstead who said: ‘I’m not buying the the explanation that the opposition is because it’s a foreign owned government. If that was the case […] then why on earth are the likes of China and France allowed to own our nuclear power stations, especially China?’ I’d argue that the press, in particular, should not be owned by any government. But the point about Chinese ownership of UK critical infrastructure is well made.
Aaron in Liverpool said he spotted a flaw on my point that press barons don’t impose their opinions because papers who lose touch with the readers go bust. Surely this logic could be used to defend foreign government ownership? But it’s suspicious, he said, that the Emiratis would actually want to own a national newspaper. “Democratic governments don’t tend to own assets like newspapers,” he said. “It’s only really a dictatorship that would enable themselves to buy infrastructure or newspapers. I can’t see the British government owning a newspaper in America or France.”
Duncan in Romford pointed out that alliances change. ‘I don’t want any foreign government owning a British newspaper because even though they might be friendly governments at the moment, supposedly sharing our democratic values, there’s absolutely nothing to prevent them changing in the future.’ (The Emiratis have been getting closer to Russia in recent years and last month welcomed Vladimir Putin as a ‘dear friend’).
We need to remember that the readership also has the power to walk
Mark in Tunbridge Wells closed the debate by pointing out that journalists ‘can always walk’ if they don’t like the ownership. ‘We need to remember that the readership also has the power to walk. The reason the Spectator in particular is such a good trophy asset is because it’s done so very, very well over the last 10 to 20 years or so, particularly online.’ People wouldn’t read it, he said, if it goes downhill.
We don’t often write up radio phone-ins, but LBC has held an important conversation. And involved those who it affects; the readers, the people who will want to know what strings are attached to the radio stations, newspapers and magazine they read. MPs have been slow to realise the importance of this. ‘With some rare exceptions, security implications of foreign investment were a low or no priority for most economies until about a decade ago,’ said a recent OECD report. That is, now, changing. Parliament could do a lot worse than hold a debate along the lines of that opened up this evening by LBC. There is plenty at stake.
Should foreign governments own UK newspapers?
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28.01.2024
The Emirati / RedBird IMI bid for the Daily Telegraph and The Spectator is opening up a wider conversation: how much of the national infrastructure should Arab autocracies be allowed to buy? The Emiratis have 10 per cent of Heathrow airport, 15 per cent of Vodafone, 49 per cent of the Dogger Bank wind farm and now they want the Telegraph and Spectator. The government is considering whether to block the bid. So where, if anywhere, to draw the line?
LBC radio has just held a phone-in on the topic hosted by Ali Miraj. I was on first, expanding on points I made in my recent diary (listen below). Foreign owners, I said, are not a problem: Nikkei owns the FT. The issue is government ownership: a free press means freedom from government.You can listen to my comments at the end of this blog and I’ve made these points before: I was interested in what those following me had to say.
First was Hassan in Kensington. ‘Media is an important part of our society. It’s not just another business, it is designed not just to hold foreign governments to account, it is designed to hold every centre of power to account, whether local or abroad.’ He voiced dismay at seeing Richard Sharp, a buddy of Boris Johnson, being made BBC chairman. ‘We have seen how important an independent media is.’ But Qatari-owned al-Jazeera, he said, did offer ‘very useful’ contrast to BBC.
Josh in Chiswick said that no foreign........
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