Advice Shop

EDM number 1036 in 1993-94, proposed by Jim Dowd on 18/04/1994.

That this House notes that Advice Shop is the only regular programme on British Television to deal with social security benefits and a wide range of other issues concerning citizens' rights and that it manages to carry out this public service in an entertaining and informative style; further notes that there has been a series every year for the last eight years and that the repeats of the last series currently going out late on Monday nights are attracting over a million viewers; is shocked and dismayed to learn that the BBC has cancelled any future series of Advice Shop; hopes that the decision is unconnected with its embarrassment of large institutions and excellent investigations into controversial consumer issues, including the exposure of the loss of hundreds of thousands of pounds in the privatisation of children's homes by Bromley Council, currently at the centre of a three year long investigation by the Fraud Squad; believes that the programme is an excellent example of responsible journalism, which also provides essential information to the public, nearly all of whom will have to claim at least one social security benefit in their life; and calls on Will Wyatt, head of BBC Television programming, to ensure that there is in 1995 a regular programme within the BBC schedule dealing with social security benefits and other citizens' rights issues.

This motion has been signed by a total of 53 MPs.