Bipartisan Critique of a la Carte Surfaces at House Hearing
Government-mandated a la carte was panned by a handful of House members who used a hearing by the Telecommunications Subcommittee on child obesity to attack recent proposals by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin. Rep. Fred Upton of Michigan, the ranking Republican member, said forcing individual channel sales by cable, satellite and other pay-TV providers will not improve children’s programming quality. Reps. Hilda Solis (D-Calif.) and Jane Harman (D-Calif.) panned a la carte, which got no support during a three-hour hearing often interrupted as members left to vote.
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Rep. Nathan Deal’s (R-Ga.) questions embodied pressure brought to bear on executives, whom he pressed for information on TV and film issues only tangentially related to children overeating. A threefold increase in child obesity the past 30 years prompted Subcommittee Chairman Edward Markey (D-Mass.) to hold the hearing. He repeatedly warned cable and broadcast TV officials their industries will face more FCC regulation if they do not reduce the number of junk food ads aired targeting kids. Markey threatened to ask the FCC to start a rulemaking to regulate TV marketing of fatty, sugary food under the Children’s Television Act, which he sponsored. “If there is not a proper response from the industry, I am prepared to press the Federal Communications Commission,” he said.
Broadcast, cable, film and food officials said they are addressing the problem. TV stations air public service ads promoting healthy eating, said Jon Rand, general manager of three Fox affiliates in Washington state. “The solution to this problem is found well beyond what children see on broadcast television,” and to that end one of his stations, KAYU-TV Spokane, is working with a hospital. The 3 stations will take the campaign a step farther by covering the effort. Some members questioned the campaign’s impact on the obesity “epidemic.” Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) compared the ads to “having an umbrella during the London blitz.” Speaking for the National Association of Broadcasters, Rand said Congress should not set programming limits, a sentiment echoed by National Cable and Telecommunications Association President Kyle McSlarrow and Motion Picture Association of America Chairman Dan Glickman.
Rand, McSlarrow and Glickman took swipes at an April FCC report to Congress (CD April 26 p1) backing as constitutional a mandate on a la carte and regulating violent TV. Glickman’s prepared remarks said the commission failed to note a litany of ways industry offers parents for filtering violent content. Parental controls aren’t “perfect, but they're pretty good” and Congress should let the industry improve them, McSlarrow testified. “We don’t believe that society, acting principally through you as policy makers, should be forced to choose between protecting children and protecting the First Amendment,” he said: “Our industry wants to work with you to make a good system better.” Rand said V-chips in TV sets, parental controls from cable operators, digital video recorders and content filters from DirecTV and EchoStar help parents protect their progeny from objectionable shows.
Upton offered the most thorough critique of a la carte, saying legislation can’t solve childhood obesity because “kids get fat from what they eat, not what they see.” In a seeming reference to Martin, he said: “Some have mistakenly suggested that choosing channels a la carte is the solution. That’s wrong.” Solis said: “We've often heard from FCC Chairman Martin that a la carte is the solution, but as many on this committee know” that may raise cable rates, not lower them as proponents contend. Martin has said a la carte will dampen keep cable rates down, citing successful industry efforts in Canada, Hong Kong and other countries to sell smaller bundles of channels.
Harman said a la carte may help her and other “techno- lazy parents” block objectionable channels. “But the problem is it may also take away the diversity in programming that people like me, and I think most people, value.” Members seem to be criticizing a la carte seems because upon studying it they wonder if it would raise prices, as cable contends, McSlarrow told us after the hearing: “I think when people dig into it and realize the real-world consequences of a la carte they are aghast.”
Broadcaster critic Deal said cable and satellite should sell more packages of programming containing fewer channels so parents can shield kids from violence and sex. A forced la carte system is impractical because cable operators must carry all TV stations opting for FCC must-carry status to subscribers in each market, he added. Answering Deal’s query, McSlarrow said cable operators cannot sell programming rated only “PG” and “G” because some broadcast shows are meant for more mature audiences. “It’s called the must-buy tier,” he said: “I happen to like the bundle, so I am not saying it’s a bad thing.”