ACMA was quizzed this week about the number of community broadcasting licences renewed (271) and not renewed (5) during the regulator’s current round of community radio licence renewals. There was particular interest in the recently cancelled licence in Perth.

ACMA Chair Chris Chapman and Senior Officer Jonquil Ritter were both answering questions on this topic:

Ms Ritter—… Licences come up every five years for renewal and under the legislation
ACMA is required to look at the same criteria that were applied when the licences were first allocated to see if they should have their licences renewed or not.

Senator BIRMINGHAM—How many community radio licences are there around Australia?

Ms Ritter—Something like 284. I will get the exact number for you—274.

Mr Chapman—Community radio?

Senator BIRMINGHAM—Yes.

Mr Chapman—Three hundred and fifty-eight.

Senator BIRMINGHAM—A five-yearly licence rotation means there are quite a number that are being
reassessed at any one time.

Ms Ritter—That is correct.

Senator BIRMINGHAM—Do you have data on how many have been renewed over the course of this
financial year versus how many have not been renewed?

Mr Chapman—Since July 2004 when the new renewal process was introduced we have renewed 271
licences and only five licences have not been renewed. So that gives you an order of magnitude of the number
that are renewed, and only five have not been. That is since July 2004 when the new process was introduced.

Senator BIRMINGHAM—What are the grounds usually for those nonrenewals?

Ms Ritter—Normally there were some serious problems with the services to do with meeting the
community needs, targeting the community that they were licensed to serve; sometimes some quite serious
governance issues. Whenever we had services which had problems but showed they were able and willing to
fix them, we did renew the licences but we looked at undertakings or other measures to help them get back on
track.

Senator BIRMINGHAM—Was there much community feedback from any of those cancellations?

Ms Ritter—It would be fair to say we have been surprised by the small negative response to those
nonrenewals.

Senator BIRMINGHAM—Does that mean that new licences are being issued in those—

Ms Ritter—Normally, where they are still able to provide a service, we have given a temporary service so
that they can have some time to rectify the problems. It also allows for new services who might want to try temporary services to come on board and compete for that spectrum, and they share the spectrum for a period.
Then after a period of time we will look at ongoing allocation again.

Senator BIRMINGHAM—How many new licences would have been given in that same time period?

Ms Ritter—We had the two new community licences for Perth. They were the main ones that happened
during that period. Where there is spectrum in remote parts of Australia, we quite regularly make it available
for new temporary licences. When they feel ready to go for an ongoing licence, we look at allocating those.
Quite frequently they are uncontested. More often—say in Perth—there is a contest and the one who has the
greatest merit under the legislation will get the licence.

Senator BIRMINGHAM—How many temporary licences are currently outstanding?

Mr Chapman—By ‘outstanding’, you mean ‘are in operation’?

Senator BIRMINGHAM—Are currently in operation, yes.

Ms Ritter—There are currently 38, but it is hard to say because at any given time there will be some
coming and going and they will be sharing spectrum in different parts of Australia. It is really the opportunity
for new services to trial what they can do.