Update on UHF-TV Licence Renewals - 24 March 2005
[ Last Updated 13 December 2005 ]
In accordance with Cabinet decisions the Ministry has re-engineered most of the existing licences within management rights 1 and 2 and is currently preparing renewal offers for these licences.
In the case of some licences the engineering work has highlighted the following matters that need to be resolved before finalising the renewal offers for these licences.
Compliance
The engineering assessment of UHF-TV licences (based on current actual utilisation of licences) has made the Ministry aware that some licences are seemingly operating in breach of their licence conditions. The Ministry will not be making offers for licences where the engineering assessment has given the Ministry cause to believe that existing transmissions are non-compliant until the licensees have confirmed that either, the transmissions are compliant, or that suitable licence changes are being made. The Ministry will contact the relevant licensees individually to clarify the compliance issues. Re-engineering and renewal offers will occur after these issues are resolved. Issues of apparent non-compliance in regard to licences within UHF-TV nationwide sets have already been addressed by the affected licensees.
Linking
A small number of licences exist within management rights 1 and 2, which are used solely for linking purposes and not for broadcasting directly to the public. Current Government policy to offer replacement licences only covers licences in use for direct broadcasting purposes and therefore renewal offers for linking licences will not be made at this stage. The policy concerning these licences will be developed after making the offers for the other UHF-TV licences.
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