Do you ever watch
TV?
Even if you have not yet got a
satellite dish and may even never get one, you may still want to watch the cricket or footy on someone else's setup.
As passed on by Rick from Solar N Sat and announced on Imparja's website, they are stopping legitimate travellers (and even people living in a reception black spot) from recieving Imparja (Nine network).
Pelbo has gone to the trouble of composing a letter:
Dear Sir,
I am a self funded retiree and have joined the thousands of
grey nomads touring this great country.
My wife and I have been travelling for 3 years now and part of the enjoyment in our life style, has been the ability to travel and enjoy remote areas of Australia. In fact, we spend most of our time in these areas
well away from the east coast of Australia.
We have had a traveller’s permit to view free to air
satellite for these past 3 years and it has enabled us to follow our favourite
TV programs, especially sport, such as cricket and the Olympic Games, no matter where we are in remote areas. The process until now has involved us reapplying with both commercial stations every six months to keep our decoder cards working. No doubt this is an unnecessary administrative burden on the stations involved.
However, this enjoyment is about to end. The free to air
TV stations are now about to stop giving us travellers the licence to watch
satellite TV in remote areas, because they will no longer switch on our decoders. Surely we could be allowed to apply just once, and thereafter have the ability indefinitely to watch
satellite tv. This would save the on-going and time consuming administrative burden on the stations involved by not having to renew everybodys access every six months.
I always thought that all citizens of Australia had the same rights as all other citizens. No matter our age, location or lifestyle. We understood that one of these rights is to be able to enjoy television programs of our choice, no matter where we lived.
This decision by Imparja (to start with and probably to be followed by Central 7) to no longer cater for travellers will affect many of the 250,000 people in caravans and mobile homes. Most of these are pensioners and self funded retirees.
Sir, it is a simple request we ask for. We are not asking for money or hand outs. Just the means of watching free to air television like all other fellow citizens. We have already invested our own money into
satellite dishes and decoders to give us this freedom of choice.
What can you, as our elected Minister, do to help maintain our freedom to watch what we have paid for?
Yours truly,
Please copy this letter, feel free to modify it to cover your exact situation, and send it to:
The Minister for Communication,
Senator the Right Hon. Stephen Conroy
Parliament HouseCanberra
Email:
minister@dbcde.gov.au
With an email or two, nothing will likely happen.
With a flood, we may just get somewhere.
Also please copy the message in full and post this message on any other forums you may visit.
Thankyou!
David