The BBC Trust said today that regional commercial television news could be funded by selling off broadcasting spectrum rather than using a share of the licence fee.

The trust, which has come out strongly against government plans to "top-slice" part of the licence fee to fund regional news on ITV, said that selling off spectrum could instead fund the plan.

The BBC Trust chairman, Sir Michael Lyons, said that "harnessing the value of the broadcast spectrum" that becomes available in 2014 could bring in £130m a year from commercial operators.

He added that the BBC's plan to share facilities with other outlets, as well as potential changes to media ownership laws, could also provide indirect financial support for commercial news providers.

The BBC's proposals were set out in the trust's response to the government's Digital Britain report, which proposed setting up a new contestable fund using the slice of the licence fee currently reserved for the digital switchover help scheme to provide top-up funding for news consortiums.

ITV has said it will not be able to fund local television news in the future.

The trust said it believed that there needed to be other local news sources besides the BBC. "But top slicing the licence fee is the wrong answer – it would undermine the BBC's independence and its direct accountability to licence fee payers, it would risk turning the licence fee into general taxation and we do not believe any ring-fenced amount could be contained," Lyons said.

He added: "There are other solutions for supporting regional and local news and it is not too late to consider them.

Source:-
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/sep/25/bbc-trust-broadcasting-spectrum