Revealed: British Broadcasters In Stand-Off With Newspapers Over Queen Elizabeth II Funeral Coverage

deadline.com:

Major British broadcasters have been engaged in a fierce stand-off with UK newspapers over the rights to the live coverage of Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral, Deadline can reveal.The BBC is producing the bulk of the live feed of the funeral and is footing most of the bill, while ITV and Sky has also invested heavily in coverage.The newspapers via the UK’s News Media Association (NMA) had wanted to strike a deal to use the BBC’s feed on their websites.

The rights to the funeral belong to the Royal Family.While the newspapers were always keen to livestream the funeral on their websites, Deadline understands the broadcasters have pushed back on making their coverage available to other outlets in the U.K.The NMA’s member base includes The Sun, The Guardian, Daily Mail, Daily Mirror and a number of regional papers.Pushing onThere is still potential for a deal to be struck but talks are expected to go down to the wire.In the meantime, the newspapers are understood to be pushing on with plans to use the live feed of the funeral regardless, accessing it via local news agencies that are running it for international client use.

The newspapers are long-standing subscribers of these agencies.In correspondence to members seen by Deadline, the NMA this week set out the principles of using these feeds.Those principles, which stress the “solemnity and dignity of the occasion,” first state that newspapers will not strike deals with third parties to access the livestream.NMA titles should not archive footage or use it in documentaries, dramas or comedies, the correspondence goes on to say, and there should be no advertising sitting around the web page hosting the live feed.The correspondence concludes: “When exercising editorial judgements,