BBC’s Tim Davie: Radio switchover plans are “ambitious”

The government’s target of completing the digital radio switchover by 2015, as set out in Lord Carter’s Digital Britain report, is “very ambitious”, according to the BBC’s director of audio.

Speaking at The Radio Academy’s annual festival in Nottingham today, Tim Davie said that although Carter’s plans are ambitious, he is hopeful that the switchover “should provide the action needed”.

GMG Radio’s chief executive Stuart Taylor praised Carter’s decision to close down the analogue signal in the next six years, saying: “We cannot carry on with dual transmission.”

Panellists at the Radio Festival also agreed that the commercial sector and the BBC should both foot the bill for digital transmission.

However, Andrew Harrison, chief executive of RadioCentre said the commercial radio sector would only invest “where viable” and argued that if digital transmission is “public policy, it should come out of the public purse”.