Basingstoke has been named as one of 65 towns and cities in the UK in the running for a pioneering local television service.
Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt MP named the town as potentially one of the sites that could apply for the first wave of licences for a local TV station, when they are awarded in 2012. Basingstoke has been invited to make a case for why the borough should be one of the first to enjoy what would be the UK's first local TV network.
MP Hunt said: “These new, local TV services will be a fundamental change in how people get information about their own communities, and how they hold their representatives to account.
“There’s a huge appetite for local news and information in communities the length and breadth of the country. I want people to be able to watch television that’s truly relevant to them, about what’s happening where they live and featuring the people they know.
“The first licences will be open to bidders in just a few months. But before then, we need to decide which areas are best placed to pioneer the new service. In deciding the order in which licences should be made available, we need to judge the level of interest from potential broadcasters and audiences, and take the views of companies interested in bidding for the single multiplex licence.”
The Government has launched a public consultation on the proposals, and is seeking views from multiplex operators on which locations they think are are necessary to make their model a success. The framework for local television, published last month by Department of Culture, Media and Sport confirmed that a block of geographic interleaved (GI) spectrum will be awarded to a single multiplex licence holder, which will carry local services licensed by Ofcom to broadcast local TV. Ofcom has carried out a detailed analysis to establish which towns and cities across the UK have good GI spectrum coverage from existing transmitters and are therefore potential locations for the first licences.
It is expected that the initial list of 65 locations will be narrowed down to around 20 contenders for the first tranche of licensing before the end of the year. Plans to develop local, digital terrestrial services are part of the Government's strategy, which in the longer term will include low cost broadcast over the internet.
