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to enforce programme standards and protect the service from use by commercial or other undesirable users, it would be necessary to restrict access to identifiable entities that can be traced for post broadcast sanctions or to registered "bona fide" non-profit organisations only; but this would run contrary to the spirit of having a public access service, namely free access to all, and might have Bill of Rights implications;
for such a service to operate effectively, it would need legal powers. However, setting up a statutory body would not be cost effective for the sole operation/regulation of one channel. Also, this body might duplicate or conflict with the authority of the Broadcasting Authority especially in areas such as imposing standards and sanctions; and
experience elsewhere shows that the lack of a sustained public demand for such a service beyond the initial novelty stage might lead to the service being dominated by a few consistent users, thus defeating the purpose of true public access.
As regards the proposal related to the public broadcasting service, the Governor in Council considered that, given the claims for new or additional funding in competing programme areas, further allocation of an additional $61 million in recurrent and another $61 million in capital to establish a dedicated channel could not be justified, particularly in view of the limited reach of Cable, even on full development.
The RTHK, which is funded by the Government under a recurrent provision of $373 million for 1995-96, is already providing a series of public affairs programmes.
The Broadcasting Authority has been consulted and agreed with the recommendations of the Working Group.
End/Thursday, May 11, 1995
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