Tuesday, June 20, 2017

Future of Radio Australia Shortwave broadcasting - Senate Committee Hearings begin

Last Friday the Senate Committee hearings into a bill by Senator Xenophon to compel the ABC to resume short wave broadcasting began.

The SWLing Post reports that former RA transmission manager Nigel Holmes appeared. He jovially described being "grilled like a breakfast kipper" but I'm confident his encyclopaedic knowledge would have served the committee well.

I think it's important that there is a discussion about the value of short wave broadcasting at this time,  there have been many interesting submissions, in my submission I argue that it's not the archaic technology as it has been presented and in times of conflict or natural disaster it's the only thing that gets through.

Geoff Heriot has written that abandoning shortwave is just one more step in the winding down of Australia's engagement in the Pacific. Graeme Dobell describes the end of our shortwave service as "technical bastardly".

The inquiry has been granted an extension of time and will report on 9th August 2017.

No comments: