BBC Trust Review of BBC Parliament

Response from the Librarians of the House of Commons and House of Lords

1. How well are these services performing against the terms of their service licence and the Quality, Reach, Impact and Value for money performance framework?

To what extent are the services producing high quality and distinctive content?

The BBC Parliament Channel and Democracy Live act as windows on the world for Parliament. Their core services provide consistently reliable coverage of the Chambers and selected Committees, in line with the rules set by both Houses. Their contextual data is appropriate and helpful, and adds value in comparison to the service currently provided by Parliament’s own website. Democracy Live is much admired both at home and abroad: visiting Parliamentarians from overseas often express their admiration for its concept and accessible content.

These core services support good political programmes on BBC TV and radio, such as Today in Parliament, which are governed by the objectives of impartiality and balance, and appear to be produced in a flexible and pragmatic way. BBC Parliament features, such as coverage of historic elections and the screening of lectures, are clearly aimed at the channel’s growing core market of enthusiasts. BBC Parliament documentaries are good quality and solid. We are aware that there are plenty of ideas for making more of them, and we would encourage trialling a more adventurous approach for some, which might help them to get the wider distribution they deserve. We would be happy to facilitate this by assisting with access where feasible.

Parliamentary officials maintain good contacts with BBC Parliament personnel, and are keen to continue and develop the current dialogue about developing further synergies and cross links between Democracy Live and the Parliamentary website.

To what extent are the services distinctive?

These services bring together the outputs of all the UK parliaments and assemblies and provide valuable contextual information and commentary. Other broadcasters report selected highlights of coverage, but do not provide comparable material.

No other service provides the breadth or depth of the BBC Parliament Channel and Democracy Live or has the capability to create the specialist connections that are required to bring the work of our democracy to such a variety of audiences.

To what extent are these services being used? Why do people choose to use them?

BBC Parliament is a vital channel for Parliament, enabling people to access its proceedings and enhancing their understanding of its functions and work. Viewing figures for the BBC Parliament Channel alone, which we understand to have averaged nearly 1.9 million each month in 2010, are considerably greater than the numbers of unique visitors to the parliamentary website, which average some 1 million a month.

Many Members have told us that they find Democracy Live invaluable for keeping track of the proceedings in both Houses and in the devolved assemblies. Our own recent research demonstrates that the public sees television and radio as their most important source of information about Parliament, and BBC Parliament is very much the leader in this area.

To what extent are the services contributing to the BBC’s public purposes?

In our view, BBC Parliament epitomises public service broadcasting at its best. Even more could be made of its public service remit if its content could be used more explicitly for educational purposes and to enrich political programming outside the BBC as well as within.

Are these services good value for money?

Benchmarking data, drawing in international comparators, would suggest that they are. But the audience could perhaps be grown even further to optimise the value for money of the Channel. On the positive side, the placing of BBC Parliament next to the BBC News Channel on Freeview Channel 81 works well and should be maintained, as should the promotion of some ‘specials’ to newspaper and online listings.

But is the BBC hiding this light under a bushel? Could marketing for BBC Parliament be improved, for example, by more cross‐promotion on other BBC programmes, such as Newsnight and the Today Programme? Could the BBC even ‘product place’ Parliament on other programmes (e.g. in The Archers ‐ a school might come on a visit to Parliament or individual fictional characters might lobby their (real) MP; the issues could be discussed on relevant blogs). We wonder also if more related regional content might be developed for BBC local radio stations, along the lines of the regional politics shows on TV

Are links to other BBC offerings, such as Democracy Live and BBC News Live pages online, clearly understood and easy to find and use?

These online offerings are findable by reasonably proficient web users. But could more be done to cross‐promote the Democracy Live website from BBC Parliament and the BBC News Channel, and vice versa? Democracy Live seems to draw on the same people and resources as BBC Parliament – a more uniform house style and better cross‐promotion would make this link more explicit.

Could more synergies be built between Democracy Live and BBC Parliament, for example giving greater prominence to links with the iPlayer where programmes can be stored and re‐used? And could a resource bank be created on thematic lines, drawing together content from a variety of sources including debates, Committees and lectures? Such a resource bank could in turn link in to the topic pages on the Parliamentary website.

2. What is the future strategic direction for these services?

What is the future strategy for these services?

BBC Parliament has positioned itself as a critical node in a network of players connecting Parliament and the people. Its unique proposition comes from the combination of the trusted place of the BBC in the minds of UK and international audiences and the knowledge that the BBC Parliament team has of our democratic institutions. The strategy for the future should aim to get ever increasing leverage from its unique position. BBC Parliament could do this by being a more active facilitator for other parts of the BBC to use Parliament and parliamentary activities and locations within wider programming.

At the same time the BBC is one amongst many other players and has a special role in supporting other organisations develop and innovate around the BBC offering. There is an increasing potential for new media organisations to connect with particular audiences in distinctive ways and an opportunity for the BBC to facilitate reuse of material through open standards and open source technologies in line with its public service mission.

Are the plans aligned with the wider BBC strategy? n/a Are there sufficient resources to deliver this strategy? n/a

3. Should the services licences for these services be changed? (For example, should the Democracy Live website be included?) n/a

John Pullinger, Librarian and Director General of Information Services, House of Commons

Dr Elizabeth Hallam Smith, Director of Information Services and Librarian, House of Lords

July 2011