The long-mooted digital radio switchover has been a bugbear for TalkSport, which campaigned against a proposed 2015 switchover date and quit commercial radio's trade body, the Radio Centre, in protest at its pro-switchover policy three years ago.
Today, the Korean Central News Agency quoted a Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying that if the United States was "ready to make a bold switchover in its Korea policy for a settlement of the nuclear issue," then North Korea would "not stick to any particular dialogue format".
12 April: In a surprise move, North Korea signals it may be ready to end its insistence on direct talks with the US, announcing that "if the US is ready to make a bold switchover in its Korea policy for a settlement of the nuclear issue, [North Korea] will not stick to any particular dialogue format".
The licence fee has been used to pay for rural broadband, for S4C, for digital switchover – that is, for aspects of industrial policy.
With the digital economy bill now passing into law, Ofcom, as overseer of commercial radio, has to make changes in line with a policy of deregulation and the goal of digital switchover.
According to his LinkedIn profile, in April 2011 Zeff was promoted to "director" at the DCMS, with membership of the executive board, with responsibility for "flexible resourcing and policy delivery; broadband, spectrum; mobile telecoms; digital TV switchover; BBC issues; oversight of press and communications".
Including part of the cost of switchover in the BBC's budget means that the government is funding its industrial policy by means of a regressive tax on licence-fee payers rather than raising income tax.The Treasury may well refuse the BBC's proposal, even though the Department for Culture, Media and Sport is thought to support it in principle.
Despite the accusations of posturing, he thinks iconic ideas are crucial in politics, citing Chris Smith's policies of free admission to museums and setting a timetable for digital switchover.
The switchover is now unstoppable.
At which point I would invariably switchover.
