Sports Rights: Quiz the BBC's Director General

BBC Director General Greg Dyke was in the hotseat after the BBC lost the battle for highlights of the English Premiership, but won back live coverage of the FA Cup and England home internationals.

Greg answered a selection of your questions about the BBC and its sports coverage.

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Matthew Parry, UK: Bearing in mind that I am a licence fee payer - and thus the BBC is ultimately answerable to me - surely you are obliged to divulge the financial aspects to us. Thus I find it odd that you refuse to disclose to us the amount you have paid for the FA Cup and England rights. I thought that your appointment would end the whole cloak and dagger secrecy of the BBC!

Greg Dyke: I don't like secrecy either but in this case, I am sorry but I can't disclose the fee because the agreement involves a third party, namely BSkyB, and they don't want the details known. Please be assured it was a fair and reasonable price - much less than the Press suggested - and is a genuinely good deal for BBC viewers.

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Guy Dresser, UK: Will the money saved by not winning these football rights be ploughed into some other sports-related area or into other new programming?

Greg Dyke: It's too early to say precisely what we will do with that money but it is no secret that I want to keep trying to bring more sport to the BBC. I also want to spend more on drama and a host of other things. For instance I have just announced that we will spend more on developing an exciting way of helping kids cover the syllabus for GCSE exams. Whatever we end up doing, I promise the money will be spent on programming.

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James Walford, Wales: As Greg Dyke quite rightly recognises that the Premier League is not the only football played in the British Isles, does this mean the BBC will review its attitude towards coverage ultimately improving its Nationwide League coverage?
For example, will the corporation look to Div. 1 2 and 3 among the other avenues it may pursue for retaining public service broadcasting of football?

Greg Dyke: We bid for the rights to those games but they were unfortunately awarded to OnDigital and ITV.

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Martín Mazur, Argentina: Would you consider that in the future any sports events will be broadcast on the Internet? Will it be a war between media groups for them, like for TV rights nowadays?

Greg Dyke: Sport is already on the internet. We have a very popular BBC Sport website where we already audiostream our Radio 5 Live coverage. And in the broadband world we hope to be videostreaming coverage but of course we would need the rights to do that. A competitive market for internet rights will develop. It is inevitable.

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Harry Kirk, UK: Why not look into getting some coverage of other European Leagues - Channel 4 did well with Serie A in Italy. I for one would be interested in seeing Real Madrid v Barcelona; Benfica v Sporting Lisbon; or Paris St Germain v Marseilles etc etc....and the rights to the various leagues would probably be relatively cheap?

Greg Dyke: It's an interesting idea but I have to be really careful with public money to balance all the interests of viewers. Rights to foreign leagues might be cheap but pressure for airtime on our channels would still be a problem while we have to cater for all tastes.

For instance I've noticed that our telephone lines have been kept just as busy by people ringing in to say thank goodness there won't be so much football on the BBC as by those who are upset about losing the Premier League. Letters to the papers are polarised as well.

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Andrew Wardlaw, UK: What plans does the BBC have to ensure that it is not overtaken by ITV as the country's most respected sports broadcaster? I am referring to presentation format, scheduling, the internet. Commercial TV has done well to make their coverage more energetic.

Greg Dyke: I think the energy of our coverage of Euro 2000 speaks for itself. And just wait to see what we do with the Olympics in a few months time and the magical FA Cup weekends that we plan.

That's not to say that ITV doesn't do a good job on television but they're nowhere on the internet compared with our site and that's not just my opinion. Paper reviewers have been tipping the BBC Euro 2000 internet site as the best and I agree with them.

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Anthony Cunningham, UK: Why doesn't the BBC look to gain the rights to other sports? I would love to see more professional cycling events covered on TV and I'm sure that many others would too. Now that you've saved 40 million from football you could bid for sports that don't currently get a look-in.

Greg Dyke: We already cover a greater range of sports than any other broadcaster and have more sports coverage than the other terrestrial channels put together. We constantly review our portfolio of sports - but of course it has to be balanced against other programming.

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Elizabeth Hardware, UK: The vast majority of licence payers, especially most women, are totally uninterested in the coverage of male sport on the BBC. How can you justify the large sums of licence payers' money spent on this? Is it because male sport fans just make the most noise?

Greg Dyke: As I've already said, we have to limit our spending precisely because some people are not interested in football. Even if we had been given the chance to outbid ITV for Premier League rights, I wouldn't have done so.

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Ian Smart, England: I was very disappointed that the BBC lost the rights of Premiership football to ITV but pleased that the FA Cup and internationals were returning. Could Mr Dyke give me an indication of what other live sport he would like to see return to the BBC.

Greg Dyke: We already have a lot of other live sport including Wimbledon, the Open Golf, athletics, Euro 2000 and the Olympics. In recent years we have lost the Ryder Cup, Cricket and Formula One to other channels - as and when those rights become available again we will seriously consider trying to win them back.

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Jalal Syed, UK: Why doesn't the BBC consider a mixed-mode license fee/advertising form of financing. The best scheme it seems to me is to share license fee revenue with the commercial sector while the BBC builds up its advertising revenue which will undoubtedly lead to pure commercial advertisers haemorrhaging revenue. This public-commercial financing should ensure plentiful revenue to all broadcasters whilst retaining the safety net to be able to experiment adventurously with public-service oriented programming.

Greg Dyke: I think that audiences would lose out if the BBC began to compete with commercial broadcasters for advertising revenue. More and more broadcasters would be dipping into the same pot, the money would be spread more thinly and, ultimately, the range on offer would diminish and the content would suffer.

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David Hurren, England: Having heard you answer some questions on Radio 5 I thought the points on prudence with public money and the principles of access for all were well made.
Would it not however offer greater good if the BBC were to use the synergies from running its own subscription sports channel to provide the kind of war chest that would enable it to keep at least parts of some major sports events in the public sector. As it stands it is making partnerships with BSkyB - why not have similar arrangements with its own subscription channel?

Greg Dyke: Ultimately it is a question for government whether we can offer a commercial sports channel in this country. It is certainly an idea we would like to investigate.

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Andy Coxon, UK: By pledging to retain MOTD, does the BBC plan to aggressively invest for the future of sport on BBC, and look to win back the rights after 2004?

Greg Dyke: Most definitely but it cannot be at any price.

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Geoff Carlill, England: Does this mean that the BBC will not have enough football to cover to keep its technical staff, commentators and pundits occupied? Is the expertise built up over the years likely to be lost?

Greg Dyke: No, I hope it won't be lost. Gary and the team are under contract for some time yet and we still have Match of the Day for another year and then it goes live with at least 17 FA Cup and England games on the BBC to keep them busy.

Also, our technical and production teams will be making the programmes for NTL's pay-per-view service. Besides providing a useful boost to our income, it will help us keep our expertise.

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Andrew MacInnes, UK: Can you please give Scotland an assurance that the BBC Scotland will secure the right to keep its Sportscene highlights? Are we just being ignored?

Greg Dyke: No, you are not being ignored. BBC Scotland has separate arrangements for Scottish football which are unaffected by this week's announcements.

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Roy Culley, Switzerland: For me the biggest threat to me as a sport lover is exclusive rights given to individual TV companies. What you think of this and do you feel that the average viewer loses out with these exclusive contracts?

Greg Dyke: The reality is that Sport is now part of a very competitive commercial market - so I am afraid it is inevitable many sports will be bought on an exclusive basis. However in Britain there are certain listed events which have to be made available to free-to air channels and most big international events, like Euro 2000, are not sold on an exclusive basis.

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Stephen Beat, UK: With so much of the nations' sport being taken out of the 'public domain' (so to speak) do you think it is now time for parliament to secure the rights of the public to a certain amount of guaranteed 'free view' programming?
Would it not be fairer for the likes of the FA to be legally obligated to provide a percentage of matches for public access broadcast?

Greg Dyke: The Government recently reviewed the list of events that must be available to free-to-air broadcasters like the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 or Channel 5. But even if they are listed, there's still competition for the rights and there is no guarantee the BBC would get them.

But clearly more people would be able to watch more sport if the list were longer. If you want the list changed, talk to your MP because it's a decision for government.