Part 1: Public service television Sporting and other events of national interest Section 20: Categories of relevant service
The "listed events" regime works by prohibiting the exclusive live broadcast of an event on the list drawn up by the Secretary of State under section 97 of the BA 1996 without prior consent from OFCOM. It aims to ensure that rights to live coverage of listed events are offered to free to air broadcasters who meet certain criteria: currently, broadcast channels which are received by 95% of the population and which are free to air are categorised as ‘qualifying services’. Others are non-qualifying services. As a matter of practice, the only channels that meet this criteria are provided by public service broadcasters. Both qualifying and non-qualifying services require OFCOM’s consent to show exclusive live coverage of a listed event, unless the rights have also been acquired by a person providing a service of the other kind. OFCOM’s code on listed events sets out that OFCOM will wish to be satisfied that broadcasters of both kinds of service have had the opportunity to acquire the rights on fair and reasonable terms.
	Listing does not guarantee that an event will be broadcast live, or on a free to air channel. Rights holders are not required to sell live rights and broadcasters are not obliged to purchase them or to show the events. The legislation sets out to ensure that, where live rights to a listed event are being sold, they must be offered to both a qualifying and non-qualifying service.
	This section updates the listed events regime to make qualification for the regime a PSB-specific benefit, and amends the regime to ensure that TV-like services providing live content to UK audiences via the internet, as defined in the section, must comply with the legislation.
	This section amends section 98 of the BA 1996 to define the services that will be within the scope of the regime, referred to as the "relevant services", and amend the qualifying conditions for the regime. The relevant services are split into two categories: a) those services that satisfy certain conditions (referred to as "qualifying conditions" under the current regime), and b) all other relevant services. These are what OFCOM would currently refer to as the "qualifying" and "non-qualifying services". The amendments ensure that qualifying services must be a PSB service, and received free of charge.
	The new definition of "relevant services" ensures that TV-like services not currently captured by the regime but providing live content to UK audiences via the internet, will now be captured. The updated range of services includes television programme services, on-demand programme services, and non-UK on-demand programme services. The definition also includes services, or dissociable sections of services, whose principal purpose is the provision of programmes, accessed by the internet, where there is someone who has control of what programmes are included, and when it is made available by that person for use by members of the public in the UK.
	The expanded definition includes TV-like service providers that are not based within the UK, where they intend to show live coverage of listed events to UK audiences. This reflects the fact that UK audiences now have the ability to access live content via TV-like services provided over the internet, and that these services should not be able to purchase exclusive rights to show live coverage of a listed event without having to comply with the conditions or obtain consent from OFCOM.