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Scotland to get Gaelic TV service

(November 2005)

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TP
Techy Peep Founding member
Ofcom posted:

Ofcom Agrees Terms for a Gaelic Digital Channel
Ofcom today announced an agreement with Scottish TV and Grampian TV to aid the establishment of the proposed Gaelic digital television channel by 2007.

The regulator has agreed a contribution towards a Gaelic digital channel from STV and Grampian to the Gaelic Media Service (GMS) worth £1.2m in programming support and promotion over three years.
Ofcom's Statement on Programming in the Nations and Regions, published in June this year as part of its Review of Public Service Broadcasting, concluded that the commercial public service broadcasters should support the establishment of a Gaelic digital channel with the BBC as the preferred broadcast partner for the new service. The document also suggested the commercial broadcasters should gradually move away from broadcasting Gaelic programming as the Gaelic digital channel became more firmly established.

Ofcom believes that Scottish and Grampian TV can most effectively contribute to the future of Gaelic television by supporting the new channel. The regulator recommended that this contribution should come from the money released by reducing the amount of Gaelic programmes shown in peak transmission time on the Scottish and Grampian channels. However, there will be no drop in the total number of hours of Gaelic programming on these channels until after the dedicated Gaelic digital channel has been in place for a year.

Further changes to Gaelic programming on the commercial channels up to digital switchover and beyond will be the subject of more detailed discussions over the next few years. It is anticipated that changes to primary legislation would be required in order to effect some of those further changes, a process that is outside the control of Ofcom.

Vicki Nash, Director of Ofcom Scotland, said: "Ofcom's agreement with Scottish and Grampian represents a positive step forward in the progress towards a digital channel dedicated to Gaelic viewers."
Ofcom is also responsible for approving the corporate plan of the GMS and has asked for a detailed timetable from the service for establishing the channel. Ofcom's view is that it should be possible to have a channel in operation by January 2007, with a budget of £13-16m.
:-(
A former member
I through that was channel 8? on Freeview in Scotland. 6pm - 7pm

I did ( so I double cheak, freeview never got a red line!)
NW
nwtv2003
623058 posted:
I thourgh that was channel 8? on Freeviwe in scotland. 6pm - 7pm


I think they're getting a new one, other than Tele G, which only transmits for an hour a day, which AIUI has next to no programmes that are useful for Gaelic viewers.

Plus if they get a channel backed by Scottish & Grampian, it has a better a chance in succeeding rather than one that's only on an hour a day on DTT. Plus this channel would have more PSB value than the current Gaelic output on Scottish & Grampian.

Wouldn't they be easier transmitting TG4 in Scotland?
GS
Gavin Scott Founding member
Who on earth (or more accurately, in Scotland) is going to watch this? TeleG at the moment probably has about a dozen viewers.

And who the hell is picking up the tab?

Please 654321, would you SPELL CHECK your posts before you submit them? It's not as if you haven't been asked a million times.
:-(
A former member
I through STV & Grampian had over 2 hours of slotted time on a Tuesday night after 11am – 1am?
CT
Chris Turnbull
Gavin Scott posted:
Who on earth (or more accurately, in Scotland) is going to watch this?

The Gaelic speaking community, perhaps? It’s not quite as small as most people think, on Saturdays I go to music Lessons and there is around 100 Gaelic speaking children whom attend.

Gavin Scott posted:
TeleG at the moment probably has about a dozen viewers.

That is probably true, but when you consider the time and duration of that "Channel" (One hour a day 6-7pm), most people are busy through that hour.
GS
Gavin Scott Founding member
Chris Turnbull posted:
Gavin Scott posted:
Who on earth (or more accurately, in Scotland) is going to watch this?

The Gaelic speaking community, perhaps? It’s not quite as small as most people think, on Saturdays I go to music Lessons and there is around 100 Gaelic speaking children whom attend.


There are around 60,000 Gaelic speakers in Scotland. Even in the digital world the potential reach is small

I'd like to see a £16M budget being spent on a Scots channel, but I can scarcely beleive that it couldn't have been better spent.

The Executive currently pay nothing to encourage the continuance of dozens of local Scots dialects, and yet pay millions to keep a dead language alive.
BR
Brekkie
nwtv2003 posted:
Wouldn't they be easier transmitting TG4 in Scotland?


Different language though! Not sure how different, but Gaelic is different in Scotland and Ireland (though probably has alot of similarities!). One is "gaylic" while the other is "galic"

What I want to know is where this channel will be squeezed in? Will Scottish Freeview viewers lose ABC1?

Is there space allocated in the event of a Gaelic service being launched?
TV
TVDragon
nwtv2003 posted:
Wouldn't they be easier transmitting TG4 in Scotland?


Well surely the relevance to Scotland then becomes somewhat absent?

I would imagine a news service would also be an important part of this service.

Besides which the two languages aren't that mutually intelligible, especially when you consider where the majority of Gaelic speakers are specifically located.

As for the subsidy, these matters are always going to be extraordinary from a business point of view, not least because the people concerned are vocal enough.

From a social policy perspective, the democratic rights of the Scottish Gaelic speaker to be able to enjoy as full a Scottish Gaelic life in the Gaelic Scotland areas must be afforded as far as possible. People have voted for a Scottish Parliament to protect this -- requiring the media industry to pull their weight as part of it -- and so can't really complain.

I'm not entirely sure that this stretches to dialects -- it doesn't in Wales, where the language policy is much more advanced.
PE
Pete Founding member
Chris Turnbull posted:
on Saturdays I go to music Lessons and there is around 100 Gaelic speaking children whom attend.


i think they just put it on to make sure you don't talk to them.

I find BBC Scotland's gaelic output very odd. That Eorpa programme looks fab in all the trailers but then if you sit down to watch it you realise it's all in gaelic with subtltes which is a nightmare. Why can't they use the audio description service on digital to give a gaelic dub to popular programmes instead? I mean that's virtually all CBBC Alba is.
TV
tvmercia Founding member
do border scotland carry any gaelic programmes?
AB
ABC Australia
maybe this new station can be like TG4 is Ireland

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