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Ofcom has today warned that “traditional public-service TV is endangered” as more UK broadband users turn to online streaming platforms like YouTube. The regulator has thus published a new six-point action plan to tackle this, which includes urging broadcasters to make their content “easy to find and discover” on third-party platforms.
In 2024, the regulator states that 60% of all individuals viewed YouTube videos over their home broadband connection. Recent growth was driven by viewing on connected TVs with 42% of in-home YouTube viewing on the TV set (up from 34% in 2023) now that more than seven in ten households have connected TVs.
In addition, older audiences are also increasingly turning to YouTube, for example 75 year-olds and over now watch an average of ten minutes of YouTube a day (an increase of 46% since 2022). Suffice to say that the old model of content distribution, such as via terrestrial signals or specially controlled platforms (e.g. Freely), is under “serious threat” and requires some adaption.
Audience choice is now wider than it’s ever been, while broadcasters are experiencing fundamental financial challenges and structural change in the advertising market. And in this environment, public service broadcasters are finding it much harder to fund the production and distribution of quality UK content to all audiences.
However, Ofcom warns “there is no silver bullet that will address the challenges that the sector is facing“, and so they’ve proposed six recommendations – requiring a collective effort from public service broadcasters (PSB), social media and video sharing platforms, the Government, and of course the regulator itself.
Ofcom’s Six Point Action Plan
1. Prominence and discoverability for PSM content on the third-party platforms that audiences increasingly turn to. To deliver on this:
➤ The PSBs need to keep adapting to audience preferences by constantly challenging themselves to test and iterate new ways of distributing and creating content for diverse audience groups.
➤ It is critical that the PSBs and YouTube work together to ensure that PSB content is prominent on its service, and on fair commercial terms. This is important for PSM to continue to connect with all audiences, particularly for news, which supports democracy, and for UK children’s programming which helps young audiences learn and grow.
➤ The Government should consider whether this needs to be underpinned by legislation. This would require significant work but would give prominence for PSB content on YouTube statutory backing, just as the Media Act provides PSB players prominence on connected TVs and other devices.
➤ More widely, the Government may wish to explore prominence for news on social media and other platforms, even though implementation would be complex and would need to reflect the different ways that platforms promote content to users. In the meantime, the PSBs need to work with other VSPs and social media platforms to ensure their content is available and easily discovered by users.
2. Stable and adequate funding to sustain a broad range of PSM content, including trusted and accurate news, and programmes that showcase the diversity of the whole of the UK and bring the country together:
➤ Stakeholders have called for a range of measures to support funding for PSM content like levies and changes to tax credits to fund specific PSM genres. It is for the Government to consider these, and to lead work on the future funding of the BBC through its Charter Review. However, if there is to be new funding we recommend that it should prioritise genres that are socially valuable but commercially less viable and attract lower advertising revenues, such as news, local news and children’s programming.
➤ Content creators need to earn a fair return for their work on third-party platforms, including when used to train GenAI services. The Government is considering responses to its consultation on AI and copyright. The CMA has also recently opened a consultation on Google Search, which includes a number of potential interventions that should help improve commercial terms for content creators who rely on search.
➤ Ofcom’s regulation will continue to support the provision of content that reflects the diversity of the UK – particularly in the nations and regions – including through targeted and proportionate quotas.
3. Urgent clarity on how TV will be distributed in the future.
The PSBs are required to be universally available. As viewers increasingly move online, they have to broadcast over Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) while also investing in distribution across multiple platforms. In this context, delivering content over DTT is quickly moving from being one of the PSBs’ most valuable benefits to a significant cost. These resources could otherwise be used to both create PSM content and experiment with strategies for engaging all audiences in a rapidly evolving sector.
➤ Last year Ofcom published a review of the options for the future of DTT including implications for spectrum use and digital infrastructure. We said a decision by Government would be needed within the next two years and we continue to believe a decision in early 2026 would allow sufficient time. A later decision risks undermining the investment and innovation needed to put universal TV distribution on a sustainable footing inclusive of all audiences.
4. More ambitious partnerships amongst the PSBs.
Modern media organisations need technology to reach audiences and compete with global platforms who they depend on in some cases to reach viewers. Scale is critical for the PSBs’ and domestic broadcasters’ ability to connect with all audiences in a fast-moving sector:
➤ The PSBs (and other UK providers) will need to be ambitious in pursuing new strategic partnerships – in technology and how they reach audiences.
➤ Regulators, including Ofcom, need to assess any mergers or partnerships in the context of an up-to-date assessment of market conditions, recognising there continues to be fundamental change in the sector.
➤ In its Creative Industries Sector Plan the Government has asked the CMA, supported by Ofcom, to assess how sector changes could affect the approval of “strategic partnerships or possible consolidation between broadcasters which may benefit their financial sustainability and audiences.”
5. Investment in media literacy is vital for everyone’s ability to use digital services and to understand and critically engage with news and content.
Media literacy is, defined as the ability to use, understand and create media and communications across multiple formats and services. With the emergence of new technologies (including new forms of AI) the media landscape is only going to get more complex and personalised. Broadcasters are in a unique place to support audiences to critically engage with news content from a range of sources, distinguish fact from fiction, provide transparency about how they establish facts and raise awareness about conspiracy theories and prevalent fraud schemes. To help audiences develop their media and digital literacy skills:
➤ The PSBs need to invest and contribute to media literacy in the UK and use their distinctive and trusted relationship with audiences to give them confidence to use digital services.
➤ The BBC plays a further role, supporting media literacy through its children’s education initiatives. It is also considering how it can further support young people’s digital literacy skills so they can better assess trusted information and recognise disinformation.
➤ Alongside broadcasters, online platforms including social media and VSPs, should enable media literacy by design. This autumn Ofcom will publish a Statement of Recommendations under the Online Safety Act, setting out how online platforms and broadcasters can empower their users to understand and engage with online media and services.
➤ Ofcom has longstanding duties to promote media literacy and support others to carry out media literacy activities. But when it comes to the curriculum and education spending, it is for Governments – in Westminster and the nations – to ensure that the modern education system gives children and adults the skills they need for the future.
6. Streamlined regulation which strips away any outdated unnecessary restrictions.
The majority of the current legislative and regulatory framework was designed for a linear world. It needs a fundamental review to determine what is required to support audiences as they shift their viewing and listening online and to encourage growth and innovation.
➤ Ofcom is already implementing the Media Act which provides critical support for the PSBs, in particular through giving them greater flexibility to meet their obligations across their linear and online services and making their on-demand players prominent on connected TVs.
➤ We are also working with Government on its BBC Charter review which will play a central role in supporting the future of PSM.
➤ In parallel, we will review our regulation of broadcast TV and radio. We will seek input from stakeholders about the priority areas for reforming regulation and supporting the future provision of PSM content. We will look at what further reform is needed to ensure regulation supports all audiences benefitting from PSM content in the future and how we can ensure audiences are protected from harm wherever they are. This may involve legislative change as well as changes to our regulation.
➤ Before the end of the year, we will publish a comprehensive call for evidence on the work we are intending to do.
If no action is taken, Ofcom states that “the very existence of the PSBs will be threatened” and that “time is running out to save this pillar of UK culture and way of life“.
Cristina Nicolotti Squires, Ofcom’s Broadcasting and Media Group Director, said:
“Public service media is stitched into the cultural fabric of UK society. It starts conversations, educates and informs, and brings us together in moments of national importance.
But in a world dominated by global streaming platforms, public service media risks becoming an endangered species, and time is running out to intervene to protect it.
Our six-point plan would involve collective action from broadcasters, online platforms, the Government and Ofcom. It maps out a clear route that would help sustain public service media for the future.”
The issues that Ofcom are touching on above naturally flow into the often-divisive debate over the future of TV distribution in general (here) and at what point it may become necessary to start switching off the old terrestrial signals in favour of a broadband-only delivery model. Not to mention future funding and the TV licence fee, which is always a “fun” topic and still the subject of much debate.
The PSBs currently support a transition to IPTV in the 2030s as it is becoming increasingly challenging “to bear double costs from running multiple distribution platforms”. However, without intervention, by 2040, some 5% of homes (1.5 million) are currently forecast to still be relying on digital terrestrial television via the airwaves.
The regulator clearly warns that the time for debating such issues is fast running out, and the time for decisions is now upon the government. “Without PSBs there would be significantly less UK content and there is a risk that society becomes ever more fragmented and polarised,” claimed Ofcom. But taking those decisions will undoubtably come with a whole can of worms.