Television in the United Kingdom 4 Corp, according to BARB's viewing figures for January 2018. On 18 January 2011, then Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport Jeremy Hunt announced his intentions to set up a network of local television stations across the UK. The initial plan was to create a network of local television stations, connected through a national backbone. This plan would create a television network similar to that of the network-affiliate model in the United States and Canada. In June 2011, however, it was announced that the national spine plan would be scrapped, and a 'bottom-up' approach would be followed instead,
2011 News Corporation scandals NDS European chief, Ray Adams. In 2012 it was also revealed that Australian Federal police were working with UK police to investigate hacking by News Corp. Various News Corporation owned media outlets have come out in defense of News Corporation, these defenses have themselves met with criticism. The "Wall Street Journal", a News Corporation owned outlet, opined that "politicians and our competitors are using the phone-hacking years ago at a British corner of News Corp. to assail the "Journal", and perhaps injure press freedom in general." Researchers from the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism reported that Newscorp's Australian papers gave