BBC GOVERNORS ISSUE QUARTERLY FAIR TRADING BULLETIN

THE BBC Governors, in their first quarterly Fair Trading Bulletin issued on June 15, have noted that no known complaints have been submitted to the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and only one enquiry was received by the Board of Governors in the first quarter of this year.
The Bulletin contains a summary of fair trading complaints made against the BBC between January 1 and March 31, 2001, including complaints that have been directly made to the BBC, OFT and the European Commission.
The BBC Board of Governors received an enquiry about alleged cross-subsidy of BBC Resources from MEP Glyn Ford. Ford wrote to the Governors following a complaint he had received from facilities suppliers 4:2:2 alleging that BBC Resources benefited from an unfair cross-subsidy from the public service.
The BBC explained in detail to Ford the rigorous procedural checks that are in place to ensure that there is no cross-subsidy from licence funds of the BBC’s commercial activities. Currently neither Ford nor 4:2:2 have replied to the BBC’s letter.
BBC Vice-Chairman and Chairman of the Fair Trading Compliance Committee, Gavyn Davies, said: The BBC are subject to the full rigour of UK and EU competition law, in an identical way to other UK organisations. Moreover, public funding and privileged access to the airwaves gives the BBC unique responsibilities. Whenever the BBC trades, they must do so fairly. I would encourage anyone who feels that the BBC have not lived up to the high standards they have been set to write to me, in the assurance that their concerns will be fully investigated and, where they are found to have weight, corrective actions will be taken.”
The Bulletin is in addition to the Governors annual assessment of fair trading compliance, which is accompanied by a report from an independent audit firm, in the BBC’s Annual Report. (CD)