The BBC is pressing ahead with proposals to invest £100m in new local text and radio broadband services.

However, in a bid to stave off opposition to the plan from the Newspaper Society and local newspapers, the BBC's new My Local websites are set to link to print media sites.

Appearing in front of the Lords communications select committee today, the BBC director general, Mark Thompson, reiterated the fact that a lower-than-expected licence fee will mean the corporation will not launch local broadband television services.

But Thompson said he reckoned that actually, "local radio, complemented by the web is probably a complete solution".

He added that the BBC's wish list if it had been given more money would have included more local radio stations, particularly in Somerset and Cheshire.

Speaking about the new My Local services, Thompson gave more detail about how they will operate - if the BBC Trust approves them.

Users will be able to personalise the sites around news or sport and Thompson said he expected the services to be "map-based".

Viewers of BBC programmes such as Coast will be able to type in their postcode and find places to visit near them that have been featured in the series.

Thompson said: "No one else is doing anything like this. For local democracy, My Local will be a fantastic way of getting involved.

"We would expect [My Local] to link to and complement local newspaper websites."

Caroline Thomson, the BBC chief operating officer, said the corporation expected My Local to be subject to a public value test by the BBC Trust.

Quizzed by the Lords committee on the BBC's six-year cost savings plan, Thompson defended the cuts being made, denying efficiencies would affect the quality of BBC News.

He said he "agreed 100%" with committee chairman Lord Fowler that news was the essence of the BBC.

Thompson added that, inevitably, if the BBC had had a better licence fee settlement it would have had to make fewer "net redundancies" than the 1,800 it is planning.

He confirmed that the corporation had got £2bn less than it was hoping for over the six years between 2007 and 2013.

However, Thompson admitted that many of the changes to adapt BBC News to the digital world - and the resulting redundancies and redeployments - would have been made no matter what the licence fee settlement was.

After the committee asked if Thompson was annoyed by presenters such as Jeremy Paxman speaking out about cuts at the corporation, the director general said he wanted an "open debate" about the issue.

· To contact the MediaGuardian newsdesk email editor@mediatheguardian.com or phone 020 7239 9857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 7278 2332.

· If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".