The CEO of UK pubcaster Channel 4 (C4) has warned that the wave of US firms snapping up British TV interests could stifle the territory’s creativity and has called on government to intervene.

Delivering this year’s MacTaggart keynote at the Edinburgh International Television Festival today, David Abraham said that 2014 could go down as the peak year of “the Gold Rush of British television.”

“In just a few months we’ve seen a spate of deals that will reshape our industry and alter where decisions get made and by whom,” he said. “Diversity of ownership on both the supply and the buying side of our industry is reducing rapidly. Consolidation is driving even bigger bets.

Reflecting on Viacom snapping up Channel 5, he said the UK’s free-to-air channels have become “the must-have accessories, the tiny dogs of 2014, amongst US media companies eager to stay ahead of each other by internationalising their revenues, priming their distribution pipes and their tax exposure.”

Going further, he said: “Channel 5 now takes its orders from Viacom in New York. Liberty and other US shareholders are trying to play footsie with ITV; which could eventually put Britain’s largest commercial channel in the hands of Dr John Malone, resident of Colorado and who also now controls the UK’s pay-cable platform Virgin Media, our largest producer All3, and Discovery.”

The C4 chief then turned his attentions to 21st Century Fox’s attempt to take over Time Warner, its sell-off of stakes in Sky Deutschland and Sky Italia to the UK’s BSkyB, and its proposed roll-up of Shine Group with Endemol via Apollo Global Management.

“It may be on hold for now but, if Fox, Time Warner and Shine/Endemol all merge, how long before that would subsume Sky Europe (presumably all taking sensitive nuanced direction from a Murdoch in New York)?” said Abraham. “Such an entity would have combined revenues three and a half times the size of the entire UK television industry. Just think about that for a moment.”

While extolling C4’s own investment in digital media and efforts to better harness electronic data, Abraham also took aim at the world of tech.

“TV is clearly now a combat vehicle for tech and mobile companies and platforms to compete with each other rather than a sovereign industry in its own right,” he said. “An Apple-Disney merger would substantially dwarf Fox-Warner-Sky. But what duties or obligations will these new global gated communities have towards our industry whose future they increasingly influence?”

Later on, he alluded to YouTube as among those “who would burgle the relationship our viewers have with our brands and your productions.”

“Our independent sector, built up and nurtured over decades, is being snapped up almost wholesale and acquired by global networks and sold by private equity investors at a faster rate than tickets to a public flogging of Jeremy Clarkson,” said Abraham, referring to the controversial Top Gear presenter.

“It is estimated that soon the proportion of turnover of UK production that will qualify as ‘independent’ will soon drop from 76% to around 50%. The term ‘super-indie’ has, in effect, become redundant. There are now just indies and studios.

“UK production has turned in 20 years from an ugly duckling into a very valuable goose indeed – one that as a result of hard work and talent, has laid some very valuable golden eggs.”

He said the the indie sector now risked becoming a victim of its own success: “Scale demands an increased focus on cost-cutting and margins. Reformatting ideas is more efficient than the messy business of finding new ones.”

Abraham welcomed the UK’s governments recent introduction of tax breaks that have encouraged more overseas producers to shoot in the territory but also cautioned on the effects.

“Bringing American movie and drama productions here is great for jobs in the same way as making iPhones in China is great for China – but the IP and profits are on the first boat out of here.”

Abraham noted the role “enlightened politicians and regulators” had played in this in their support of PSBs – a sweetener for his calls on government to now step in and take action over carriage fees.

“Public service broadcasters receive no payment for the immense value their channels bring to pay platforms. Now is the time to correct this and we need new rules to do it,” he said.

“We need regulation at a minimum to act as a backstop if the parties cannot reach an independent agreement,” added Abraham, pledging that C4 would “reinvest all of the proceeds of a fair deal back into commissioning more original UK content.”

As expected, the C4 chief also sided with his opposite number at the BBC, Tony Hall, and director of television Danny Cohen in their recent calls for revisions to the terms of trade between pubcasters and the different-sized producers they work with.

“Smaller companies need a special level of support and protection when participating in a market characterised by big players, many of who are connected to broadcasters,” said Abraham.

But the show of unity was short-lived as he went on to warn that the situation was especially critical given BBC management’s concurrent idea of freeing up its in-house production teams to compete in the open market.

“In my view it would be a mistake to underestimate them,” he said. “As the market changes around us, flexibility to evolve our deal terms is becoming increasingly important for the future of C4,” Abraham continued. “We are looking for a regime that allows us to make the best of the opportunity to innovate new digital services.”

He said C4 would be looking to media regulator Ofcom to “devise measures for a healthy and diverse market for programming supply in the future.”

While not going into further detail, he noted that many things won’t need to change, “for example, the presumption that indies will own the copyright in programmes, and control how international distribution is managed.”

Abraham wound up warning that if left to market forces alone, the UK’s PSB system and the creativity it has helped foster may be seriously compromised.

“We need politicians and regulators to act,” he said. “To update and strengthen the PSB system. The system that has delivered so spectacularly for UK viewers and UK PLC.”

To read the full text of David Abraham’s speech click here ^[1].