Sue,—One wonders whether Mr. Fairlic has actually read the Pilkington
Report, when he criticises it for `diminishing freedom. The Report argues that the viewer's freedom to choose from the full range of possible programmes is itself restricted by the com- mercial pressures under which the independent companies' programmes are conceived. The freedom Mr. Fairlie is concerned about is reduced to that of the commercial companies to exploit but not serve the public. But when Mr. Fairlie can find no meaning in the Committee's request that the television service should have a 'responsible engagement with the moral condition of society,' and when he rests con- tent with not being able to identify, and distinguish between, 'public opinion' and 'public conscience,' we see him occupying a very special position, separated from the tradition of English thought. From this standpoint a view of the Report as a 'stupid and a sad waste of time' will have the less force.
Mr. Fairlic is angry with the Committee for doing two things: (I) for assessing the two existing services and comparing them; far from this being 'a return to a sterile argument,' it is a normal attempt to learn from experience. (2) Mr. Fairlie complains that the proposals abandon 'true commercial incentives,' implying that there should have been a prior com- mitment to defend this concept. Why? There is no cause for anger if it should turn out that methods suitable for producing cheese, for which people pay by weight and quality, work badly in a form of entertainment in which the methods of payment are different.
Finally, the contention that because of the diffi- culty of working out a direct demonstration of the effect of entertainment on viewers, we must presume that it has none, is unreasonable. Millions of pounds are spent by advertisers in the belief that influence is probable.
Worth, Sussex
MAURICE BUTTERWORTH
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