TELEVISION FOR NEW ZEALAND

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25678, 15 December 1948, Page 4

TELEVISION FOR NEW ZEALAND

GOVERNMENT POLICY UNCHANGED

HIGH COST OF ANY SERVICE The Government had not changed its policy on the establishment of television services in New Zealand, the Director of the National Broadcasting Service (Professor J. Shelley) has advised the New Zealand Manufacturers’ Federation. Engineers of the service were keeping a' close watch on overseas developments. Professor Shelley said, in a letter to the federation. The main difficulty in establishing a service in New Zealand was the extremely high cost of equipment, and of the production of high-class programmes which would maintain the interest of “view'ers’’ and justify, in their opinion, the payrhent of the very high annual licence fees which would be necessary. The topography of the country was such that the range of coverage expected from any one station would be severely restricted, he said, and that would add to the cost of any service. Radio manufacturers were vitally interested in any plans for television, the federation had advised Professor Shelley, and at their recent conference delegates had said that tenders had been called by the Australian Government for the production of experimental units. Considerable interest in television was evident in other overseas countries, and it had tended to create “television consciousness" in the Dominion. The federation offered the Government its full co-operation and assistance in any development of television.