Under existing rules anyone who controls more than 20% of the national newspaper market is prevented from controlling a terrestrial television licence.

BBC: Media ownership laws to be relaxed

Her comments to Holyrood's culture committee came as she repeated calls for a slice of the television licence fee to create a digital network.

BBC: Lack of TV network is bizarre, says culture minister

The government also wants to use "push technology", so it can send reminders about changes in services or important dates, such as receiving a personal e-mail when a television licence or car tax needs renewing.

BBC: Whitehall drive for e-government

Alas this happy ploy is more or less confined to countries such as Sweden, where ministers resign for forgetting to pay television-licence fees, and members of parliament perch in tiny, state-owned bedsits while working in the capital: 72% of Danes and 66% of Swedes duly told a 2010 Eurobarometer poll they trusted national parliaments.

ECONOMIST: British distrust for politicians is peculiarly dangerous

The government is pondering a report which recommended raising the licence fee for digital television, a move which could slow the take-up of digital television.

ECONOMIST: Government and the Internet

The Carlton boss's coup in snatching the licence for London weekday television from under the nose of Thames TV boss Richard Dunn, was largely down to his knack of knowing just how to pitch a deal.

BBC: Green keeps growing

BBC's tradition, and its constitution, that the services for which the licence fee pays must be universally available, as are broadcast television and radio.

ECONOMIST: The BBC

Technological developments such as online television and the proliferation of channels are making it harder to defend the regressive licence fee.

ECONOMIST: The future of the BBC

BBC, the harder it becomes to justify the flat-rate licence fee (in all but name, a regressive tax) levied on all the country's television owners to pay for the corporation.

ECONOMIST: Digital follies