02:02
Coronavirus: Hong Kong to ease social-distancing rules as city sees record 8.9% economic slump
Source:
https://scmp.com/comment/letters/article/3089759/are-digital-tv-sets-low-income-households-best-use-hong-kongs Letters
Are digital TV sets for low-income households best use of Hong Kong’s public funds?
- If set-top boxes had been provided instead, the money saved could have been given to those facing difficulties during the pandemic
- However, care must be taken to provide set-top boxes that offer access to all free channels
Analogue television will soon be replaced by digital television in Hong Kong. Photo: Winson Wong
Analogue television in Hong Kong will be replaced by digital terrestrial television in December. While the Community Care Fund Digital Television Assistance Programme was launched in January to help low-income households still using analogue television sets, the government must ensure public resources are efficiently used to benefit as many people as possible, including those whose access to digital television is limited by proprietary digital set-top boxes.
The assistance programme has secured HK$450 million to help around 80,000 eligible households, which can choose to receive a digital set-top box or a 24-inch or 32-inch digital television set. Ninety-six per cent of applicants by mid-April had chosen digital television sets.
However, had the Community Care Fund offered to provide digital set-top boxes, which cost about HK$300 each, it would only have to spend about HK$24 million. The government owes the public an explanation for its decision to turn 80,000 functioning analogue television sets into electronic waste given that the money spent on digital television sets could have benefited low-income households in other ways, such as a direct cash payment to help people cope with hardship during the pandemic.
Among 2.4 million households with access to digital television, 7 per cent of them are still using analogue television sets connected to a set-top box. Some of the set-top boxes are provided by proprietary television networks offering limited access to television programmes.
For example, through TVB’s myTV Super boxes, households cannot access free channels from ViuTV and Now TV. Since Hong Kong Broadband offers myTV Super boxes as part of a package to its broadband customers, we recently asked the Office of the Communications Authority and the Competition Commission to investigate whether TVB and Hong Kong Broadband were engaged in anticompetitive practices.
While the authority does not consider these practices anticompetitive as the services delivered through the internet do not prevent people from accessing free television channels, we believe the Competition Commission should investigate the case further as Hong Kong Broadband customers with TVB boxes are less likely to buy another set-top box.
Lu Zhang and Haolin Xie, Kowloon Tong