'Strong' letter to BBC over poor Lizard TV reception (From This is The West Country)

'Strong' letter to BBC over poor Lizard TV reception

1:00pm Friday 12th October 2012 in Cornwall

Poor television reception in St Keverne and Coverack is prompting the parish councillors to write a “strong” letter of complaint to the BBC.

It was claimed that the digital television signal was worse than analogue had been and a number of factors were affecting the quality even further.

St Keverne parish councillor Bill Frisken said: “The reception here in Coverack now we have gone digital is much poorer than it was before when it was analogue, despite all the promises of the BBC.

“Undoubtedly the ships at anchor out here are interfering. It was noticeable for the past couple of weeks - no ships in anchor, no problems. Last night there was an anchored one and blow me the screen started to pixelate. It's very annoying.”

He claimed other European countries had bought up many of the old frequencies and this was one of the main reasons that digital television had been brought in.

Councillor Dorothy Kemp said that during the summer she could “hardly get” BBC1 and BBC2 in St Keverne and currently the picture was “all colours of the rainbow” with poor sound.

Councillor Derek Kevern said the problem stretched to Porthoustock. Members questioned why they were paying the licence fee for such a poor service, with Councillor Frisken adding: “They promised us better reception on digital and they should jolly well come up and provide it.”

It was agreed to write a “very stiff letter” to the BBC, copied to Mr Andrew George, saying the council felt “let down.”