MEDIA STUDIES
A sad fate for the once great Express: a bit-part player in the machinations of TV moguls
STEPHEN GLOVER
A" day now Stephen Byers, Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, will deliver a ruling that is likely to transform ITV. Carlton Communications and United News & Media want to merge. Granada would like to bid for either one of them. Under the existing rules, none of this is possible since no single ITV company can control more than 25 per cent of ITV advertising. If Mr Byers relaxes this rule, which he probably will, the way is open for consolida- tion. This means fewer, and bigger, ITV companies.
Needless to say, quite a lot of people are excited by this prospect. These are bankers, media groupies, and those who run the exist- ing companies and want to get their fingers in a larger pot. Ordinary people don't really come into it. The argument is that Britain needs a global communications player that can sit at the same table as a Disney or an AOL Time Warner. At the moment Grana- da, Carlton and United — valued at some £7.5 billion, £5.5 billion and £4.5 billion respectively — are regarded as tiddlers. The chaps who run them don't like being tid- dlers. They would much prefer to be sharks. There are several possible permutations that could follow a decision by Mr Byers to relax the rules. United could simply merge with Carlton, which was the original idea, but that seems rather unlikely now. Grana- da Media has demerged itself from Grana- da's catering business and stands lean and ready — with a pile of cash in the bank — to take over Carlton or United. Ideally it would prefer Carlton, which owns more lucrative ITV franchises. But there might be problems with a Granada–Carlton merg- er; one would be that the combined group would own two franchises in London — Carlton and LW'!' — which is not allowed under existing legislation. Mr Byers can't easily change that. What would be the benefits of an ITV behemoth to the average television viewer? I can't really see any. This is all about money. It might be argued that Granada, which used to make good programmes, would improve the quality of Carlton or United, but I doubt that we would notice much difference. For me, by far the most interesting aspect of this affair is the future Of the Express titles, currently owned by United. This is probably the only media column in the world that regards what hap- pens to the Express as more important than whether Carlton gets into bed with United or Granada or Uncle Tom Cobbleigh.
Whatever the eventual permutation, it seems almost certain that the Daily and Sunday Express and the Daily Star will come up for sale. United and Carlton have announced that as a combined group it would keep the newspapers but, as I have said, such a merger seems the least likely final outcome. Granada has privately let it be known that if it acquires United it will put the Express titles up for sale. But what if it goes for Carlton, notwithstanding the dif- ficulties I have mentioned? That would leave United a threatened company and Lord Hollick, its New Labour-supporting chief executive, a threatened man. Already most of his board would like to get rid of the newspapers which, although not yet loss-making, are seen as under-performing assets. If United is left out of this merger merry-go-round, Lord Hollick will be lucky to survive. If he does survive, he will be forced to sell the Express titles. Indeed, he may already be preparing the way. The free- hold of the Express building by Blackfriars bridge in London was sold off recently, and the newspapers' lucrative Internet sites have been bundled off into another company.
One way or another these papers are effectively already in the shop window. The trouble is that for all their great history — I exclude the Daily Star — they are not the mouth-watering properties they once were. Both the Daily and Sunday Express have been losing circulation for as long as can be remembered, though in the past year the decline of both titles has begun to taper off. They could be saved, I am sure, but huge amounts of money are needed. United has presided over a holding operation, denying the newspapers adequate editorial resources and spending very little on marketing.
Associated Newspapers, owner of the Daily Mail, would presumably like to get its hands on the Express titles, but would be prevented from doing so by monopoly regu- lations. The same goes for News Internation- al, publisher of the Sun and the Times. The most likely purchasers remain the Barclay brothers, about whom I have written here before, but they are said to be rather less keen than they were. Possibly they or their representatives are trying to talk the titles down so that they will have to pay less when the time comes. But it is argued that David and Frederick Barclay are over 65, and that David has not been very well. They may not have the appetite for the long and expensive struggle of saving the Express titles. If the Barclays are not interested, it is difficult to think of other plausible suitors, though the names of Mohamed Al Fayed and Richard Branson are inevitably mentioned.
A struggling newspaper group about to come on the block and no obvious buyers: that is the story. So if you would like to be a press tycoon, now may be the moment to go and see your bank manager. Someone will buy it, of course. I just hope it's the right person. How fantastically odd that Lord Beaverbrook's newspapers, which once bestrode the world, should be reduced to the role of bit-part players in the machi- nations of television moguls.
Iam no expert on the Harry Potter books, and the little I know about them has been gleaned from newspapers. However, an interesting media angle has been brought to my notice. The disagreeable Dursley family, with whom Harry lives at the beginning of J.K. Rowling's latest offering, are readers of the Daily Mail. You will get some sense of what Ms Rowling thinks about the Dursleys from the following passage in Harty Potter and the Goblet of Fire: 'None of [the Durs- leys] looked up as [Harry] entered or sat down. Uncle Vernon's large red face was hidden behind the morning's Daily Mail and Aunt Petunia was cutting a grapefruit into quarters, her lips pursed over her horse-like teeth.' The Dursleys are not a good adver- tisement for Middle England.
Actually Uncle Vernon, with his 'large bushy moustache', might seem a more nat- ural Daily Telegraph reader. But it is diffi- cult to escape the thought that Ms Rowling is having a dig at the Mail. And I can't help wondering whether the response of both papers to Harty Potter and the Goblet of Fire does not reflect this fact. Last Saturday the Daily Mail greeted the book with a sympa- thetic feature but on Monday sounded a darker note by brilliantly exhuming J.K. Rowling's strange Portuguese ex-husband. Meanwhile the Telegraph was working itself up into a state of ever greater rapture, cul- minating in a leader which suggested that J.K. Rowling was all that stood between civilisation and chaos. Future scholars may decide that the Harry Potter books are not so much about wizards as newspapers.
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