VLV WELCOME DIGITAL TELEVISION REPORT

VOICE of the Listener and Viewer (VLV) have welcomed the publication by the DCMS of the long-awaited Report by the Viewers’ Panel ‘Digital Decisions: Viewer Choice and Digital Television’.
The Report is the first by the Panel, set up by the Department in 2000, to monitor progress on the switch-over from analogue to digital television, and it forms part of the Government’s first two-yearly review of the situation.
VLV welcomes the emphasis that Panel places on three key strategic challenges which must be met by the Government if digital television is to bring the promised benefits to viewers and consumers in the UK. These are: the need to protect and inform consumers; the need to clarify and improve the digital offer; and to remove barriers to adopting the new technology.
One of the key issues identified by the Panel is how to achieve the near-universal service currently provided by analogue terrestrial television broadcasters in digital television. This is one of three key criteria - availability, affordability and accessibility - to which the Government has given a commitment before it will sanction the switch-off of analogue transmissions, and which both the Panel and VLV welcome. Analogue broadcasts must not be switched off before virtually all areas of the country and population have made the switch to digital. VLV considers that viewers’ and consumers’ interests must be central to Government policy, including universal availability, if the many potential benefits of bringing digital television to the UK are to be realised.
VLV welcomes the Report for the welcome corrective it provides to some of the hype surrounding digital television and for the sober assessment it makes of the strategic decisions and action the Government must undertake if the full benefits of introducing digital technology to the UK are to be achieved, and if the present lead which the UK has in Digital Terrestrial Television is to be translated into tangible benefits to consumers and the UK as a whole. (GB)