Posted: 17th Jun, 2010 By: MarkJ
Digital UK, a not for profit organisation formed by the broadcasters to assist consumers in converting to Digital TV (i.e. Digital Switchover), has revealed that it will be able to hand back £55 million to the government in 2012 when the project completes.
Back in 2005 the UK government allocated over £200 million to Digital UK. The cash was designed to help the group inform customers about the switchover to digital television and assist them in making that change. However they appear to have given Digital UK more than it needed.
The result is that £55m of the original total will be left over and could conceivably be funnelled into broadcasters pockets or, more likely, to assist in the deployment of superfast fibre optic broadband services around the UK.
Digital UK's Chief Executive, David Scott, informed
The Telegraph newspaper that £26m of the predicted savings could now be released for other purposes. The cash is in addition to approximately £250 million that was left over from the digital help scheme.
BT has already said that it would welcome any extra cash to assist in the deployment of superfast broadband services, although it correctly said that the distribution of such funds was entirely in the governments hands. The government has already made clear that surplus cash from the digital switchover will go as a "
priority" to "
support broadband in the UK".