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Ofcom
Proposals
Received from Tony and Nell Faulkner on the 6th
October 2008
Dear All,
If you haven’t already
responded to the Ofcom proposals, please read the attached appeal from
the Lifeboats, asking everyone to make a reasoned protest to Ofcom on
the online response form. Please take the action recommended in the
note from HQ and add your names to the protest. If we don’t, the RNLI
stands to “donate” to the government the cash raised by about 50 or
more Guilds and Branches such as ours in Mirfield.
All the best,
Tony and Nell
The attachment is reproduced below:
Government Stealth
Tax – Your chance to have your say!
OFCOM – Administered
Incentivised Pricing
The RNLI currently pays £40,000 in
licence fees annually to OFCOM for the use of radio channels in our
station/ boathouse radios, lifeguard radios and pager system. Under
OFCOM’s new pricing proposals this is set to increase by a staggering
600% to £260,000 per annum. The current fees are at a discounted rate
of 50%, but the RNLI strongly maintains that our charity should not
pay anything for the use of radio spectrum, which is used solely for
safety and SAR purposes. Especially as we provide a first class marine
rescue service, in order that the Government can meet its
internationally agreed SAR obligations.
Ships’ licences are not affected by
this consultation and are already free of charge and we believe that
there is a good case for channels used solely for safety and SAR to be
made available free of charge to all users.
The RNLI is extremely concerned that
OFCOM is currently looking at the way charges are applied for the use
of radio spectrum and that OFCOM proposes to introduce a scheme known
as Administered Incentivised Pricing which, if
applied, would increase charges to users substantially and in the case
of the RNLI, from £40000 per annum to over £260,000 per annum.
OFCOM have published a consultation
document a summary of which can be found at:
http://www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/aip/summary/
(scroll down for the full document
PDF)
Question 6
affects the RNLI and other SAR charities. If you can find the time to
respond as an individual who supports charities I would be most
grateful. The RNLI will respond for the RNLI as a whole and will be
responding to all of the questions in the consultation.
You may like to consider answering
that nobody should have to pay for any channels that are used for
safety and SAR and that charities should not be charged at all for
channels they use for safety, SAR, training and other operations,
which contribute to the safety of the UK citizen.
I would ask that you do not simply cut
and paste your response from this email as OFCOM may discard any
responses that are just cut and paste.
Details on how to respond can be found
at: http://www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/aip/
kind regards
Peter Bradley – Staff Officer
Operations (Communications and Information)
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