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Almost since Channel 4 launched 38 years ago, with the first episode of Countdown, there has been speculation that it is facing privatisation.

In January 1983, just two months after the channel launched, Kevin Goldstein-Jackson – the executive who helped launch hits like Tales of the Unexpected and who later headed the ITV franchise operator Television South West – was calling for it to be privatised.

As Margaret Thatcher’s privatisation revolution rolled on through the 1980s, the calls kept coming, often from surprising directions.

In 1987, Michael Grade, who was then managing director of BBC television and who later went on to be dubbed Britain’s ‘pornographer in chief’ when he became Channel 4’s chief executive, said “it would be a very good thing indeed for British broadcasting if that were to happen”.

Culture Secretary John Whittingdale arrives in Downing Street, London, for the final Cabinet meeting with David Cameron as Prime Minister.
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The FT reported that John Whittingdale, a firm supporter of a privatisation historically, is to lead a consultation

Somehow, though, Channel 4 managed to remain state-owned. The last serious calls for the broadcaster to be privatised came after David Cameron’s 2015 general election victory, when John Whittingdale, the then Culture Secretary and Matt Hancock, the then Cabinet Office Minister, were said to be pushing for it.

A key aspect to their proposal was that it would raise up to £1bn for the government.

Now, however, privatisation talk is again in the air.

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The Financial Times reported on Friday that Channel 4 will be “steered towards privatisation” by the UK government as soon as next year. It said ministers were set to launch a formal consultation within weeks on the future of the broadcaster.

This could, according to the FT, even see an outright sale of Channel 4.

Ominously for Channel 4, which has always opposed being privatised, the FT said the consultation would be run by Mr Whittingdale himself.

There are a number of reasons why the idea has resurfaced now. The first is that, in the eyes of some in government, Channel 4’s business model is under pressure. As a free-to-air broadcaster that has few programme rights to exploit, it is unusually exposed to the vagaries of the advertising market, as has been shown during the last year.

The broadcaster reported a pre-tax loss of £26m in 2019 – Channel 4 itself has put this down to the cost of opening its new site in Leeds – but then suffered a collapse in advertising revenues when the COVID-19 pandemic erupted in March last year.

Channel 4's London HQ. Pic: AP
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Channel 4’s historic headquarters in London (pictured) has been watered down through a new site in Leeds. Pic: AP

For its part, Channel 4 itself has said that it expects to report a surplus for the year, with advertising having bounced back strongly in the second half of the year.

The broadcaster also shored up its finances with aggressive cuts to its budget during the pandemic and by taking out loans. One indication of its recovery to financial health was that it repaid furlough money to the Treasury as long ago as last autumn.

It is also argued that the rise of streaming platforms like Amazon Prime, Disney+ and Netflix and the continued strength of multi-channel television broadcasters like Sky, the owner of Sky News, makes Channel 4 vulnerable to a loss of viewers that would eventually hit its advertising revenues.

Channel 4 has responded by arguing that, in 2020, it actually raised its share of television viewing, not only in terms of linear television, but also via digital platforms. It said at the end of last year that digital viewing now accounted for one in every eight hours of Channel 4 viewing.

Despite all this ministers fear that, as a business, Channel 4 is unusually vulnerable.

Earlier this year, Oliver Dowden, the Culture Secretary, vetoed the reappointment of two of Channel 4’s directors, Uzma Hasan and Fru Hazlitt, even though both Channel 4 itself and Ofcom, the broadcasting regulator, were supportive.

It was reported at the time that Mr Dowden wanted the two women, both of whom come from a production background, replaced with new directors boasting more financial experience.

Culture Secretary John Whittingdale arrives in Downing Street, London, for the final Cabinet meeting with David Cameron as Prime Minister.
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The FT reported that John Whittingdale, a firm supporter of a privatisation historically, is to lead a consultation

Another reason why privatisation may be back on the agenda is the public finances.

Some in Whitehall believe that a significant sum of money could still be made from a sale of Channel 4 – although most analysts who have run the numbers believe any sale proceeds would fall well short of the £1bn mooted six years ago.

It is also argued that a new owner for Channel 4, with deep pockets, might help ensure the quality of its output. The problem is that there are few obvious buyers out there for the channel.

Most of the big US buyers who might be interested are focused on other things while Channel 4’s relative lack of intellectual property rights – a big contrast with, for example, ITV – means there would be few gains to be made by a big media buyer.

Viacom-CBS, the owner of Channel 5, is seen as the likeliest buyer but it, too, is more focused currently on building its streaming service, Paramount+, as well as trying to shore up confidence among its investors after a calamitous drop in its share price earlier this year related to the collapse of the hedge fund Archegos Capital.

Investors also suspect Viacom-CBS will be looking to conserve capital to invest more in content as it battles it out with rivals like Netflix and Disney, whose Disney+ streaming service has strongly outperformed Wall Street’s expectations, rather than use it buying an asset like Channel 4.

Channel 4 has prided itself on alternative programming. Pic: AP
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Channel 4 has prided itself on alternative, original programming throughout its history. Pic: AP

Moreover, if any of the big US broadcasters were interested in acquiring a UK free-to-air broadcaster, they are far more likely to alight on ITV which, unlike Channel 4, has its own production arm in ITV Studios and far more intellectual property assets to exploit.

That might make a flotation on the stock market, which would provide Channel 4 with more access to capital, as a likelier outcome – although it has been speculated in some quarters that ITV itself might be a buyer.

Expect Channel 4 to strongly resist any attempt to privatise it.

In the past the broadcaster has been able to muster a substantial lobbying campaign, relying on members of the arts establishment, to argue that its remit to produce distinctive programming would be jeopardised by a change of ownership.

It is also likely to point to the fact that it is a major investor in British content and spends heavily with independent production companies.

That, however, is a harder argument to make when the likes of Sky and Netflix are investing record sums in British programming, when the BBC’s drama output is still scoring hits and when ITV’s production arm is in such fine fettle.

In short, a lot of the arguments Channel 4 has used to resist privatisation in the past may not be as pertinent as was once the case.

This may represent Mr Whittingdale’s best opportunity yet to push for a policy he has sought for 25 years.

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Could Trump’s tariffs tip the world into recession?

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Could Trump's tariffs tip the world into recession?

Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs last week spooked the markets. 

Stock markets tumbled on Monday, with most US markets down and stocks in Hong Kong falling 13.2%, their worst day since 1997 during the Asian financial crisis.

There was slight growth in Asian and UK markets on Tuesday, but recovery is still a way off after a steep decline in reaction to Mr Trump’s tariffs on goods imported to the US, which he announced last week.

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US economists at Goldman Sachs raised their assessment of the odds that America will tip into recession to 45%, up from 35% the week before.

And if most tariffs aren’t reduced or negotiated away, “we expect to change our forecast to a recession”, Goldman’s chief economist Jan Hatzius said in an analyst note.

Other economists are raising similar alarms, with JPMorgan putting the odds of a US and global recession at 60% and projecting inflation will reach 4.4% by the end of this year, up from 2.8% currently.

How do you know if a recession has begun?

The most commonly used definition of a recession is at least two consecutive quarters of economic contraction – or “negative growth” – in gross domestic product (GDP).

To break that down, GDP is the total value of goods and services produced over a specific time period. When it goes up, the economy is considered to be doing well.

When it goes down – negative growth or economic contraction – it’s not doing well. And when it doesn’t do well for six months, it counts as a recession.

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Trump: ‘No pause to tariffs’

In the US, the National Bureau of Economic Research is the body which officially declares a recession – taking in a variety of economic data, not just GDP, defining it as “a significant decline in economic activity that is spread across the economy and lasts more than a few months”.

Currently, there are no signs the US or global economy is in recession, and it remains unknown if tariffs will have a large enough impact to knock America’s into reverse.

But it is this uncertainty that has the potential to cause the most damage.

“People are all at sea,” Sky News Business Live presenter Darren McCaffrey told the Sky News Daily podcast.

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“No one can quite work out whether President Trump wants a genuine rewiring of globalisation, what the consequences of that will be for the US and globally, and that these tariffs will remain permanent, or whether this is part of a negotiating tactic.

“That’s what no one can work out. That uncertainty is difficult, and it is going to cause damage.”

Stockbroker Russ Mould added that the markets are hoping the Trump administration is planning to use tariffs as a way of extracting better trade deals from existing trade partners. If this happens, it would help restore global trade to what’s been the standard in recent decades.

A screen shows trading of the Dow Jones Industrial Average after the closing bell. Pic: Reuters
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Pic: Reuters

What could a global recession mean?

If the US and the rest of the world falls into recession – even if the UK doesn’t – it will “fundamentally mean we will all be poorer in the future,” McCaffrey said.

He added that Britain especially has not had a prolonged period of serious economic growth for a long time – held back by the financial crisis in 2008, the shock of Brexit, COVID, the Ukraine war and now US tariffs.

However, it is not all doom and gloom.

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Day 79: Trump’s tariff turmoil

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“The markets will always find a way,” McCaffrey says.

“The US is the world’s largest economy, but it is only 13% of global trade. Countries like China, Vietnam, Cambodia and others with high tariffs will find new markets. And one of the places that benefit from that in the short-medium term could be the UK.

“It will also force big wealthy blocs – the biggest of which is the EU – to look for new markets. Canada is also suggesting they would like a trade deal with the UK.

“This will cause damage to the US economy more than anywhere else, because other countries will want to be more reliant on more stable partners. As always with economics, there are winners and losers and ultimately the market will find a place for lots of these goods.”

How could the UK best prepare for potential recession?

Instead of retaliatory tariffs, the UK is looking to secure a post-Brexit trade deal with the US, Russ Mould explained, calling that “the UK’s primary goal”.

But if the UK is stuck with tariffs in the long-term, Mr Mould said it would be wise to consider deals with other countries.

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PM makes first post-tariff moves

He said: “Statistics show that 87% of global trade does not involve US, so maybe you can look elsewhere for trade deals with countries who also feel they have been badly treated by tariffs. I would guess India would be at the top of that list.

“The question is how quickly can trade deals be struck, given the fact the UK has been casting the net around for the last five years without a huge amount of progress.”

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Mr Mould added that the recipe for economic growth in any market is the growth of the labour force coupled with productivity growth.

“In terms of productivity, [leaders] are probably looking at targeted tax breaks for investment and to stimulate research and development. Other positive things for long-term benefits include examining infrastructure and transport access,” Mr Mould said.

“In terms of encouraging labour participation, you are into the deep waters of whether it is education or tax breaks for child care. All of those are very long-term solutions to a potential near-term challenge.”

Listen to the full Sky News Daily episode here

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Philip Green’s human rights not breached when he was named in parliament over injunction, court rules

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Philip Green's human rights not breached when he was named in parliament over injunction, court rules

Retail tycoon Sir Philip Green’s human rights were not breached when he was named in parliament as the holder of an injunction against the Telegraph newspaper, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled.

The former Topshop boss previously obtained a court injunction preventing the Telegraph from publishing allegations of misconduct made against him by five ex-employees who had agreed to keep the details of their complaints confidential under non-disclosure agreements (NDAs).

Sir Philip “categorically” denied any unlawful sexual behaviour.

However, he was named as the businessman behind the injunction in parliament in October 2018 by Labour peer Lord Hain who used parliamentary privilege.

Parliamentary privilege grants certain legal immunities for members of both the House of Commons and House of Lords and is in place to ensure MPs and peers can go about their work without fear of being sued or prosecuted for contempt of court.

Sir Philip brought a complaint to the ECHR, with lawyers for the Monaco-based businessman challenging the absence of controls on the power of parliamentary privilege to reveal information covered by an injunction.

On Tuesday, the ECHR ruled against Sir Philip.

In a unanimous decision, eight judges in Strasbourg found the right to privacy under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights had not been violated.

A majority of the judges also found that his complaints brought under Article 6, the right to a fair hearing, and Article 13, the right to an effective remedy, were “inadmissible”.

NDAs are legal contracts often used by companies to preserve confidentiality. If the contract is breached, the party breaking the agreement could be liable for damages in the form of hefty financial compensation.

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Following the ECHR ruling on Tuesday, Lord Hain said: “I’m really pleased that the Strasbourg Court [has] defended parliamentary privilege.”

Sir Philip became one of the UK’s best-known retail tycoons when he bought department store group BHS in 2000 and Topshop owner Arcadia Group in 2002.

But his reputation was damaged by the collapse of BHS after he sold the chain for one pound in 2015 to a businessman who had previously been declared bankrupt.

Arcadia Group subsequently went into administration in 2020.

Sky News has approached Sir Philip’s representatives for comment on Tuesday’s ruling.

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Trump’s tariffs could herald one of the most painful episodes in modern times – here’s why | Ed Conway

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Trump's tariffs could herald one of the most painful episodes in modern times - here's why | Ed Conway

Of course this is dramatic. Of course markets are slumping.

Because if you take Donald Trump at his word (something investors are now finally beginning to do), he is attempting single-handedly to reverse and uproot decades worth of economic history in the space of a few months.

Because if this really is “the end of globalisation”, as a few politicians, including Keir Starmer, are now calling it, it constitutes one of the most wrenching, painful episodes in modern times.

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To see what I mean, the best place to begin is by pondering the hidden life of the device you’re reading this on. I’m assuming it’s a smartphone, specifically the latest iPhone, but most of the following applies for other smartphones and, indeed, many laptops or desktop computers.

The display was made in South Korea or Japan. The camera module was made by Sony in Japan (who have a particular expertise in this type of specialised silicon that few other companies have been able to match). The batteries (for the latest iPhone at least) are made in India, though these days, the vast majority of the world’s cells are made in China.

On it goes – the memory chips from South Korea, which has a near monopoly on solid state storage silicon. The logic chips – the ones that help the device “think”- made in Taiwan, albeit with intellectual property (IP) from all over the world, including America and even Britain. Some of the chips do indeed come from the US – in particular the modem, though the company behind them (Qualcomm) sometimes manufactures in Taiwan. But there are some from Europe too – most notably the spatial sensor chips that come from Bosch in Germany.

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Globalisation is in your hands

If you are looking for an example of “globalisation”, you couldn’t do much better than the smartphone. But even this potted geography lesson understates it because those fabrication plants in Taiwan and South Korea, turning out those silicon chips that help the phone think and remember stuff, are totally dependent on machines made by a company called ASML, based in the Netherlands. Those Dutch machines, in turn, contain components from hundreds of other companies around the world, including in Germany and the US. On it goes.

Nor is this degree of interconnectedness solely to be found in high-tech equipment. The other day, I was up in Scunthorpe at the blast furnaces of British Steel. It turns out the iron they smelt there doesn’t just go into the rails that striate this country. They also make the steel that go into the tracks of Caterpillar trucks.

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That’s right: the iconic tracked diggers – for many people the most American of all things – are all mounted on steel “track shoes” made in the North East of England (the plant is a little further north of Scunthorpe, in Skinningrove).

The further you look around the world of manufactured products, the more you realise that nearly everything you touch on a daily basis has, in the months before it arrived in your life, been on a long trip from factory to factory, taking it all around the world. That device you’re reading this on may say “made in China” on the back, but that’s an enormous over-simplification. It was made more or less everywhere.

This is the way the world works today – like it or not. In a sense it’s the ultimate extension of what Adam Smith discussed back in the earliest days of economics, when he described a “pin factory” where the work of making a simple pin was divided up between different people, with each worker specialising in a particular task rather than trying to make the whole pin themselves.

The swings and roundabouts of globalisation

Today, we have a sort of international division of labour. Today, nearly everyone goes to China to get their batteries. They go to South Korea to get their memory chips. The upshot is these factories have become ever more efficient at making their products. And – here’s where it matters for the rest of us – the price of making and buying this stuff goes down.

Today, the reason one can buy what would once have been classified as a supercomputer for a few hundred pounds is because of this division of labour. Globalisation made everything, from computers to Caterpillar trucks to T-Shirts, that bit cheaper than they would have been had we attempted to manufacture them all in a single country.

Trader Christopher Lagana. Pic: AP
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Trader Christopher Lagana. Pic: AP

But the ugly side of this economic shift is that those regions that used to do the manufacturing – be it the “rust belt” of America or the Midlands and North East of England – have seen much of their traditional work disappear. And while economists have insisted that cheaper products make everyone better off in net terms, the reality is that these parts of our countries haven’t got better off. They have been hollowed out. And in time, resentment about globalisation has built up – for good reason.

Trump’s aspiration

This is the world we inhabit today. Unpicking it will be phenomenally difficult and phenomenally expensive. Trying to relocate all those functions – factories and labour markets with expertise that has built up over decades – would be incredibly difficult and would take a long time. But that seems, as far as anyone can tell, to be the aspiration of Donald Trump. That appears to be the objective of his tariff policy.

Up until now, most investors had assumed that the president wasn’t entirely serious about this – that he merely intended to scare a few Asian companies into opening factories in key swing states. And who knows – that may well turn out to be the case. But he certainly seems more serious this time around – and less fazed by the negative market reaction.

In the meantime, we are left with those tariffs.

Costs will go up

Think back to that iPhone. Think back to those Caterpillar tracks. All those components now face swinging tariffs when they arrive in the US. That will push up the cost of buying pretty much anything in the US and will accordingly push down the demand for those goods. And since America is the world’s consumer of last resort – the biggest importer of goods anywhere – that has an enormous bearing on demand around the world.

So, yes, of course, this is dramatic. Of course, markets are slumping. No one knows what the US president will do next. But either way, what happened last week in the Rose Garden will reverberate for a long time to come.

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