Spectrum Pricing - Year Five

Press Release - 18 January 2002

The Radiocommunications Agency today announces the publication of a consultation paper on the next stage of spectrum pricing, proposed to take effect from July 2002. The sectors/licences classes where fee changes may occur are:

Programme Making and Special Events;
Public Telecommunications Services, including Common Base Stations
Fixed Links including Scanning Telemetry and Point to Multipoint;
Interactive User Terminal Networks (Very Small Aperture Terminals);
Private Business Radio Licence;
Ship Radio Fixed Licence.

The consultation paper is available on the RA website at: www.radio.gov.uk/topics/spectrum-price/condocjan02/index.htm together with an initial Regulatory Impact Assessment giving details of how proposals will affect each of the sectors listed above. Comments on the specific proposals in each of the chapters should be sent to spectrumpricing@ra.gsi.gov.uk, by 12 April 2002.

Notes for editors

1. The proposals on which the Agency is consulting are part of the phased introduction of spectrum pricing that began in 1998.
2. Spectrum pricing is the principle of setting fees for access to spectrum that reflect the value of the spectrum. The Wireless Telegraphy Act 1998, which came into force in June 1998, substituted spectrum pricing for cost recovery as the basis for setting radio spectrum licence fees in the UK.

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PN/RA/2002/01