Local TV Group Six TV Join Opponents Of Project Canvas
Project Canvas is coming
The local TV group Six TV, will formally this week request an Ofcom investigation of the Project Canvas online venture, stating that its likley to be a “poison pill” for the regional broadcasters.
Virgin Media has already complained to Ofcom, which sees Project Canvas as an anti competitive cartel that will crush the nascent online TV market. Later this year Ofcom is expected to make a decision on whether to scrutinise Project Canvas, the joint venture that also includes TalkTalk, BT, Arqiva, Channel 4 and ITV. Orange and Channel 5 are also looking to get involved.
But Six TV the largest holder of local TV licences in the UK – has warned that new entrants will be kept out of the broadcasting market if Canvas is allowed to go ahead. Given clearance by the BBC Trust earlier this year, Canvas will add online functionality to the current free to air Freeview digital terrestrial TV service.
After trying to get its local TV channels on the Freeview platform, Six TV fears Project Canvas will present the traditional broadcasters with a way of ensuring their dominance of the new era of digital TV.
The Chief executive of Six TV Daniel Cass, which owns licences to broadcast digital channels in Oxford, Reading and Southampton, said: “Far from a panacea, we regard Project Canvas as a poison pill which will have a negative effect on opportunities for important new television services to enter the market.”
Six TV, he said, “has already been forced to delay plans to launch its channels on Freeview because it was allotted a channel in the 200s on the service’s current electronic programming guide EPG.” He said his core audience may be unable to find its channels because they would first have to scroll through Freeview’s children’s, interactive and adult services.
“We are calling upon Ofcom to launch a full investigation of the actions of the joint venture partners in Canvas as we do not believe local TV will be viable in the UK otherwise,” he said.
Not content with just contacting Ofcom, Six TV will also submit its complaint regarding Project Canvas to the Office of Fair Trading who approved the project.
Keeping Project Canvas in its current form would be “catastrophic for small-scale services seeking to promote democratic participation and civil society.” Six TV also says it wants to lobby communications minister Ed Vaizey, whose Wantage & Didcot constituency would fall within reach of its Oxford service if it became operational.
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