Dutch Parliament has voted in favour of creating a so-called programme council for the Dutch terrestrial operator Digitenne. The system already exists for cable operators with regards to the line-up of the basic analogue tier.
The Parliamentary motion from Socialist Party MP Jasper van Dijk calls for the creation of a programme council that will give a binding advice to Digitenne about one third of the available 21 channels. The three Dutch national pubic channels have their own multiplex and will not be part of the proposed ruling.
With Parliament accepting the socialist initiative it is by no means a law: it is requesting the minister of culture Ronal Platerk to act on the matter.
At the moment KPN Digitenne has over 700,000 subscribers nationwide and the operator hopes to reach the 800,000 landmark anytime soon. This represents a penetration of between 10 and 11% of all Dutch households as compared with between 75 and 80% for cable. At the moment, the terrestrial service is hurting both cable and the DTH platform Canal Digitaal Satelliet.
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