HC Deb 05 March 1986 vol 93 cc132-3W
Mr. Hunter

asked the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what decisions have been taken on the award of licences to operate private mobile radio (PMR) systems in band III and on the licensing of further national wide-area radio-paging frequencies.

Mr. Pattie

I have received, and am very grateful for, the advice of the Director General of Telecommunications on applications for licences to operate nationwide pmr systems, systems in London, and further radiopaging licences. The Department has also considered applications to operate local pmr systems in band III in the areas of greatest demand outside London.

I have decided that the following applicants should be invited to participate in further discussions with the Department leading to the issue of those licences:

Band III Nationwide pmr (two networks of 100 channels each)

  1. (a) a consortium of Pye Telecommunications; Digital Paging Systems (UK); Investors in Industry; Racal Telecommunications Group; and Securicor Communications.
  2. (b) GEC Telecommunications.

London pmr (networks of 20 channels)

  1. (a) London Car Telephones.
  2. (b) Air Call.
    3. 133
  3. (c) Relcom Communications.
  4. (d) Sinclair Communications.
  5. (e) National Radiofone.

Provincial pmr (networks of 5–19 channels)

  • Birmingham-National Radiofone.
  • Manchester/Merseyside-National Radiofone.
  • Nottingham-Zycomm Electronics.
  • Leeds/Bradford-RT Radiophones.
  • Glasgow/Edinburgh/Aberdeen-Tactico/National Radiofone (joint venture).

National wide-area radiopaging

153 MHz

  1. (a) A consortium of Air Call, Digital Paging Systems (UK), Inter-City Paging and Pageboy Services (UK).
  2. (b) A consortium of Mercury Communications and Motorola.
  3. (c) Racal.

454 MHz

  1. (d) Infowave.
  2. (e) Millicom (UK).

In relation to pmr systems in band III, the applicants named will now be invited to discussions at the Department to define further the technical aspects of the proposed systems (including the degree of interconnection to the PSTN) and to discuss performance requirements that will be applied to the licence conditions. Licences will be granted when these discussions have been concluded and subject to the Department being satisfied that the licence conditions will be properly observed.

Licences will not be awarded at this stage in four of the other areas outside London for which applications were invited. This is because insufficient suitable applications were received.

In relation to national wide-area radiopaging, licences will be awarded following discussions about which frequencies should be assigned bearing in mind the need to make provision for future expansion of services. It may be appropriate for some of the above operators to be allocated frequencies in the band 138–141 MHz, rather than at 153 MHz.

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