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Attn Mr Gordon Neil
General Manager
Licensed Broadcasting
DCITA
GPO Box 2154
Canberra ACT 2600

I'm writing to you in response to the call for submissions on the reforming of the ACA and ABA.I would like to bring to your attention some of my points of view.

My first point is I don't see any reason why the two should be combined. There are issues that these two authorities need to address in their own unique ways. Given the fact that the ABA has now completed the large task of the planning process, effort should be put towards streamlining it's decision making. Without being specific there has been a large amount of inconsistent decisions made with regards to the recently licensed Community Aspirants.

A good start would be the total abolition of Community radio in the BSA. Replacing it with "Pay Per Watt" licenses. Given the level of competition these days most "successful" community radio stations are blurring the line too much. This needs to be addressed. The potential "high power and free" license is the root of the ABA's inconsistent decisions. Also the current rules for HPON's are bordering on stupidity. Also the "fattest wallet" auction system in no way promotes variety and effective spectrum use, this should be replaced with a sealed bid out of a hat approach for all licenses.

The way in which the ABA conducts it's self, the mountain of in consistent decisions, as well as an adherence to an old frequency model all need to be looked at. We in the know technically do know there is room where the ABA say other wise.

My second point is with the ACA it is a bit more sensible but still needs to be able to make some decisions a bit faster.

My third point is to do with emerging technologies. these will no doubt evolve as per the internet etc, but the elastic rules the ABA has to work with is not what is needed. This is more like make the game up as one goes along. How can the government expect private enterprise to to take up the opportunities these emerging technologies make possible, if the rules change daily. This would suggest that for a long time to come new technologies like DRB would not be jumped at by major players in the broadcasting industry.

I realise that my views are of a broad nature as made here. But one thing that is not so broad is my wish for the ABA to be "tidied up", this cannot be any more to the point without going into specifics.

Regards,

Peter Tate
28/08/02

• Document ID: 9213 |
• Last modified: 6 February 2008, 2:23pm