HDforall

Our poor beleaguered set of Public Service Broadcasters and TV Manufacturers have bandied together to pay for a PR agency to lobby for free spectrum.

I love the way a set of interested parties can claim us the taxpayer are suffering because they are not going to be given a scarce resource for free. My stance is that they or anyone else has the right to bid for the spectrum and broadcast HD TV. In fact, the BBC is already renting satellite capacity from SES-Astra to broadcast “free” HD signals on the Freesat platform.

At least, they have chosen the government’s latest tool for ignoring the Great British Public – epetitions – which must have sounded like a great idea on a powerpoint slide until the British people decided they would like most of all to repeal planned taxes, current taxes and abandon legislation. Currently, the top three current petitions are to:

• scrap the planned vehicle tracking and road pricing policy (708,255 votes)
• ensure that inheritance tax is scrapped in this year's Budget (27,946 votes)
• repeal the Hunting Act 2004 (22,639 votes)

Currently, at 784 votes the grand theft lobby has a long way to go before 21st Feb to even appear on the e-petition radar. In fact, there are lots of other looney causes which seems to have gathered a load of votes for instance, the petition for the Prime Minister to stand on his head and juggle ice cream.