[UK-CONTEST] Draft of new licence

[Don Beattie]

Yes, and a couple of other points too, Chris:

a) The reintroduction of  "/A" when operating at an alternative address. 
Personally I would have thought that pre-notification to Ofcom of the 
intention to use the alternative address should mean that the addition of 
the "/A" suffix when operating from there was not required. The "/P" 
facility remains (no pre-notification required, but need to identify 
location from time to time). I also worry that this may be the beginning of 
a more stringent requirement for /P to provide proper location information 
(I suspect this rarely happens in HF contests these days - on VHF the 
locator is probably enough to comply). It won't be popular if /P stations 
are required to use /A instead, to overcome the need to announce location 
regularly, I suspect.

b) The right of Ofcom to withdraw the licence if you don't revalidate your 
details every five years. I would have thought an e-mail reminder from Ofcom 
that the five years was up would be an appropriate addition here !

But overall, the wording of the new licence is a huge improvement.

73

Don, G3BJ






----- Original Message ----- 
From: "G3SVL" <G3SVL at manyoaks.co.uk>
To: <uk-contest at contesting.com>
Cc: <Dave at G3UEG.co.uk>
Sent: Tuesday, July 04, 2006 12:41 PM
Subject: [UK-CONTEST] Draft of new licence


>
> OFCOM have put a draft of our new licence on their website today.
>
> http://www.ofcom.org.uk/consult/condocs/aradio/lifetimelicence/licenceformat.pdf
>
> A quick read through shows that:
>    * 400W limit remains :-(
>    * Free licence condx embedded (as per the consultation doc) :-)
>    * Foundations get 10m
>    * Log book no longer mandatory (but on demand from OFCOM to
> investigate QRM etc.)
>    * BUT, a new and welcome addition - Full licensees can now
> control and operate their station remotely using amateur-band RF or
> wired connections! This is for personal use only but does cover club 
> licenses.
> This remote capability is a real credit to Dave, G3UEG who has had an
> NoV for a couple of years (see RadCom articles & HFCC presentation)
> and has worked behind the scenes to get this into our licenses.
>
> The remote operation wording is a little confused i.e clause 7(3)
> implies all licensees can use up to 10mW ERP of amateur-band RF to
> control their station over a max distance of 100m; clause 10(2)
> removes the power restriction for Full licensees, but not the 100m
> restriction and Clauses 10 5) and 10(8)b imply only Full licensees
> can control a rig over RF! Guess we can get this tidied up before it
> goes live on 1st October 2006.
>
> The website says its issued for 'information only' but I'm sure the
> new responsive OFCOM (Steve G8MXZ)  will listen to input (someone
> needs to check if my interpretation of the clauses is correct)
>
> 73  Chris G3SVL
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