The facts
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has indicated she is "minded to intervene" in the proposed £1.6 billion deal where Sky would purchase ITV's media and entertainment division. Nandy stated there are grounds to believe the deal could impact free expression in the media and the diversity of Britain's news landscape. Sky acknowledged the letter and committed to engaging constructively with the review, expressing confidence that the merger would create a stronger British media entity. ITV welcomed the intervention, believing the deal would enhance its ability to compete with global streaming platforms. The transaction, announced in July, involves ITV's broadcasting channels and the ITV X streaming service but excludes its production arm, ITV Studios. Nandy is considering issuing a public interest intervention notice to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to investigate the merger. Her concerns include the need for free expression and a range of views in news media, as well as a variety of media controllers and programming across the UK. The letter highlighted that Sky News and ITV News together hold a 26% share of television news viewers, and that the combined entity, along with the BBC, would control 86% of the news market. Nandy suggested that regions like the North of England, non-English nations, and lower socio-economic groups could be disproportionately affected due to their reliance on broadcast news. Sky and ITV have until October 20 to respond to Nandy's concerns. Sky has previously committed to protecting ITV's identity, free-to-air services, and editorial independence. Nandy indicated that if she decides to intervene based on these new public interest considerations, she would introduce legislation to extend the scope of public interest considerations to on-demand programmes.
Our take
Lisa Nandy, the fucking Culture Secretary, has apparently decided her job is to be a human handbrake on a £1.6 billion deal because she’s personally shitting her knickers about who gets to read the fucking autocue. This absolute state of a minister is ‘minded to intervene’ because Sky News and ITV News together have a 26% share of telly news viewers and, if you add the BBC, that’s a terrifying 86% of the market. Her main concern is that poor people, northerners, and anyone not English might get their brains washed by a single viewpoint because they’re too thick to change the channel. What a patronising, bureaucratic cunt.
Sky and ITV, two colossal corporations who clearly see this for the performative wank it is, have responded with the kind of polite, corporate bullshit you reserve for a toddler having a tantrum. Sky said it will ‘engage constructively’ - code for ‘we’ll humour the dickhead until she gets bored’ - and ITV ‘welcomed’ the intervention, which is like thanking a pigeon for shitting on your new car. They’ve got until October 20 to formally explain why this busybody should fuck off and let them get on with it.
The deal doesn’t even include the bit that makes the shows, ITV Studios. It’s just the channels and the streaming service. So Nandy is threatening to unleash the full might of the CMA’s paperwork over who owns the broadcast rights to *Coronation Street* and the ITVX app, because that’s where ‘free expression’ apparently lives. She’s even dangling new legislation to extend her meddling powers to on-demand telly, because the existing ways for her to stick her oar in aren’t fucking sufficient.
Sky had already promised to keep ITV’s identity and editorial independence, but that’s not good enough for a minister whose entire public persona is built on looking concerned about things she doesn’t understand. There’s zero evidence in her letter of any actual censorship, just some scary-sounding percentages and a load of hand-wringing about ‘diversity of views’. It’s pure, unadulterated job-justification wank.
By the time this bureaucratic pissing contest concludes, the only ‘free expression’ being threatened will be the lawyers’ freedom to bill by the hour. Nandy gets to play the hero defending the north from a news monopoly that already exists, the companies get to pretend they give a shit, and the public gets another masterclass in why politicians are useless, vain cunts who couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery, let alone a media landscape.
