An interesting debate emerged on Mat Cooper'Last Word show on Today FM recently. It concerned the new digital television rollout in Ireland named Saorview. This free to air service has recently announced the new channels that will be provided in the May 2011 launch period and this caused a sparky digital debate on the radio show.

Adrian Weckler from the Sunday Business Post began by explaining that the current analogue to digital change will only affect a minority of the population as over 85% of the country already gets their TV coverage through Sky or other digital TV channels. It does however give the option for these subscribers to change set top box and receive digital for the price of their licence fee.

TV3's Chief Executive David McRedmond annotated his grave concerns about the RTE free to air digital scheme. One concern was that two days before the General Election, what McRedmond described as a Part-time Minister, had issued an announcement that would have a huge impact over future television viewing when it would have been better if they had waited until a new Government was elected. This way, whichever New Minister gained responsibility for the roll out of Saorview could have been accountable for the whole procedure.

RTE's Head of Corporate Communication Kevin Dawson hit back on this stating that TV3 was trying to portray the announcement as a land grab by RTE when they had already shouldered the cost of the infrastructure build and that the bigger picture was that the free to air service would provide a greater national reach for all channels including TV3 and 3E. He also stated that prior to the Announcement there had been a consultative process with the Government and that TV3 had been more than welcome to address their concerns but they had not.

Casting the ongoing media bickering to one side though, Adrian Weckler concluded with some advice for the Irish public regarding Saorview. He advised the public to ensure that the digital set top box purchased for this viewing was one that was compatible with the Irish free to air service. He warned that the set top boxes that displayed the sticker freeview applied mainly to boxes that are compatible with the UK market and that it was best to seek advice before purchasing.

RTE have launched a publicity drive to ensure that the public are aware of what is going to happen in May, but the underlying battles over the Digital TV service look set to continue right up to the date of the launch. Whilst the public decide on their change of set top box, the biggest boxing showdown remains with the TV station stalwarts of RTE and TV3.

After listening the the reps from Ireland's two biggest TV stations argue like children over the roll out of Digital TV, you just have to wonder how anything gets done in this country. While both make good points (to suit their own needs, I might add), Saorview is the most exciting development in the history of television broadcasting in Ireland and as such, our nations broadcasters should try to sing from the same hymn shhet on this. It's not bad enough that we have to put up with petty squabbling but in the end this disagreement will hinder the roll out of DTT services and it will be the TV viewer that ultimately loses out.