Proposed tax on aggregators to help newspapers feeling the pinch

Posted by Helena Humphrey on March 15, 2010 at 12:13 PM

Heading up the Commission of Inquiry into the Future of Civil Society, an independent investigation looking at the future of public life, Geoff Mulgan has branded the majority of online news as little more that "recycled 'churnalism'", the Guardian reports. To combat this, the commission has proposed a tax on the likes of Google and websites using news that they themselves have not produced. It is estimated that the tax could generate £100m a year, which would be distributed amongst local newspapers feeling the pinch.

The report "Making Good Society" argues that too few media giants control the media, with 70% of the local and regional press in the hands of just four publishers. It is also points to the fact that over 100 local and regional UK titles were forced under in 2009, owing to the emergence of further free newspapers, as well as audience and advertisers migrating to online platforms.

Currently, charity law in the UK prohibits charities funding news gathering, something that the report calls to overturn, so that Britain could benefit from "philanthropy journalism"- or charity funded reporting, in the same vein as the Huffington Post in the US.

The idea of a tax on aggregators was also proposed in France earlier this year, when Zelnik report the commissioned by French culture minister Frédéric Mitterand, recommended imposing a 'Google tax' on the online advertising revenues of Google and other Internet giants as part of an initiative to support creative output in France.

Source: Guardian, Press Gazette