More draft Letters. Please mail or email these people as often as you can. By making a pest of yourself, we can get a proper investigation into these companies. The drafts can be found at the foot of the page.
The names and contact details on this page are good ‘targets’ to pester. These are the people who just may have the clout to force some action against BARB:
Nadine Dorries – Culture, Media and Digital Secretary – enquiries@dcms.gov.uk 020 7211 6000
Nigel McLaughlan – BARB – Nigel.McLachlan@barb.co.uk
Melanie Dawes – CEO OfCom – Melanie.Dawes@ofcom.org.uk 020 7981 3520 (Direct)
The people above are just the starting point. By contacting these people as frequently as possible – weekly, daily, hourly if you like, we have a better chance of pushing them into action. It will also help the cause if we can get as many people to send the following draft (or your own interpretation of it) to:- cartelshotline@cma.gov.uk
Telephone: 0800 085 1664 or 020 3738 6888
Dear Sir/Madam,
The Broadcasters Audience Research Board Control the revenue, through advertising, of independent commercial television channels. They operate, without competition, using a technology that is now over 70 years old and have done so for around 30 years. This, in my opinion, is a large contributing factor in the limited availability of truly independent broadcasters given that BARB is owned and operated by a group of very large entities that stand to gain the most from controlling such an organisation. The owners of this organisation are: BBC, ITV, Ch 4, Ch 5, Sky, The Institute Of Practitioners Of Advertising and (until December 2022) UKTV. It has recently become evident that none of the biggest broadcasters pay for BARB service, claiming that they collectively ‘guarantee’ the company. That guarantee currently stands at £1 for each guarantor. The smallest channels are required to pay an annual fee of £40,000 in order to have their viewing figures ‘guessed’ by this out dated method with zero support from them during the pandemic when even the government were bending over backwards to help and protect smaller businesses. That fee increases sharply as the share of viewership increases. Given that 3 of the companies controlling this organisation also control the entire infrastructure of broadcasting in the UK, there is, without question, a massive conflict of interests and, at best, an accidental ‘cartel’ that is freezing out any meaningful competition in UK television broadcasting.
Trying to extract any correct or direct information from them is an epic adventure which smells of an organisation whose board is compiled of entities that are not used to being questioned or asked to account for their actions. It is high time that this, possibly, corrupt organisation was investigated and, at the very least, exposed as a monopolistic entity with the power to destroy its competition.
You can also send more general concerns of anti-competitive behaviour to: general.enquiries@cma.gov.uk
As we uncover more information and contact details we will add them to the site.