If there was one point that struck a chord when the Presiding Officer was arguing for the control of S4C and its budget to pass to the Welsh Government it was his assertion that governance arrangements at the broadcaster need reforming.
This is something that the BBC has already done and is an exemplar for other organisations. They have separated the day to day management of the organisation from the Trust that oversees their activities, scrutinises decisions and takes soundings from outside the BBC. In addition they have formal structures that allow viewers and users of their services to have their say on how the BBC is run. A similar arrangement for S4C would give everybody greater confidence that the £95 million of public money they currently spend is giving value for money.
There is a strong argument for the devolution of responsibility for S4C. If, as has been argued elsewhere, the Welsh Government is to take responsibility for all aspects of the Welsh language then they should surely also have charge of Welsh language broadcasting. However, once they have that the logical progression is that they then assume responsibility for English language broadcasting in Wales as well.
Even a digitised, Welsh-only broadcaster such as S4C will become cannot operate in a vacuum. Their budgets help to sustain independent producers around Wales, they are part of a inter-dependent bi-lingual news and current affairs operation here and the talent they nurture in-house will also work in English language broadcasts.
There are specific differences in broadcasting policy between England and Wales. Our community radio for example is more closely defined by topography and community and needs a different approach to sister stations in Birmingham and London. The presence of a devolved Assembly requires Wales-only operations and clearer diversity in provision as well as more specialised news and current affairs operations. And we have a distinct culture that needs to be reflected on the media.
The time has come for the Welsh Assembly Government to assume responsibility not just for S4C but for the whole of broadcasting in Wales and its budgets. Let us not settle for half measures when only the full Monty will do.
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I believe that the rights of minority languages need defending.
The promulgation of English as the world’s “lingua franca” is unethical and linguistically undemocratic. I say this as a native English speaker!
Unethical because communication should be for all and not only for an educational or political elite. That is how English is used internationally at the moment.
Undemocratic because minority languages are under attack worldwide due to the encroachment of majority ethnic languages. Even Mandarin Chinese is attempting to dominate as well. The long-term solution must be found and a non-national language, which places all ethnic languages on an equal footing is essential.
An interesting video can be seen at http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8837438938991452670
A glimpse of Esperanto can be seen at http://www.lernu.net