Radio: House Music

An All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) has advised the Government to relax commercial radio regulations in the face of competition from digital download and streaming services. It’s an interesting point- commercial radio is still bound by various rules surrounding content, local production and license renewals that the likes of Spotify don’t need to stress about.

Trade Body RadioCentre, this week published the snappily titled ‘Action Stations’ report, revealing that commercial radio broadcasts an average of over 10 hours of ‘public value content’ each week.

According to the report, such stations also raise over £18m a year for charities, with 78% of stations investing in community and outreach programmes and 80% supporting live music.

Referring to the report, Chief Executive of RadioCentre Siobhan Kenny said that it: “Shows that commercial radio continues to play a central role in the life of local communities across the UK, even within an ever-changing digital landscape”.

Kenny continued: “Radio is evolving rapidly to meet these new challenges, but we ask Government to ensure that the industry is not fettered by outdated regulation, and welcome this chance to discuss the issue in Parliament”.

Chairman of the All Party Group for Commercial Radio, Andrew Bingham MP recommended a more level playing field, saying: “The report published by RadioCentre highlights the enormous amount of good work by commercial radio stations. I don’t want to see this value put at risk, so I will be looking for some time for a debate in the House, to highlight the benefits of and challenges facing commercial radio”.

In other commercial radio news, the Radio Academy Awards took place earlier this month. To see the winners and find out more, go here.