Records of the Independent Television Authority, the Independent Broadcasting Authority...

TV

1953-1990

Records of the registries of the Independent Television Authority, the Independent Broadcasting Authority and the Cable Authority.

The archive reflects the workings of these regulatory bodies. It contains official publications and communications, internal correspondence and reports, as well as many letters and communications from members of the public, leading media figures, politicians and literary and cultural figures with relation to both the technical and social implications of broadcasting. It consists of approximately 1,000 boxes containing over 21,000 paper files and perhaps one milllion documents in total.

These records are held by Bournemouth University Library.

Not Public Record(s)

• Independent Broadcasting Authority, 1954-1990
• Independent Broadcasting Authority, 1972-1990

1100 box(es)

No records held at The National Archives in this departmental code

Topics

Archives and libraries

Radio and television

Official publications

The Independent Television Authority (ITA) was constituted under the provisions of the Television Act 1954, with the function of providing television broadcasting services additional to those of the BBC; and under the provisions of the Wireless Telegraphy Act 1949 the Postmaster General granted the ITA a broadcasting licence. In March 1971 in Command paper Cmnd 4636 the government signalled the introduction of commercial radio broadcasting, and its intention to expand the remit of the ITA to cover commercial radio, and to rename it the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA). In November 1983 the government announced that it did not intend to license operators other than British Telecommunications and Mercury to provide basic telecommunications over fixed links, whether cable, radio or satellite, both domestically and internationally, during the following seven years. The policy subsequently became known as the duopoly policy.

From 1985, the new cable system was placed under the control of the Cable Authority (CA), which had been created in December 1984.

In November 1988 in Command paper Cm 517 the government signalled the establishment of the Independent Television Commission (ITC), to supervise a more liberal approach to delivery of television services, and of a Radio Authority for radio services. The ITC was created under the Broadcasting Act 1990. It replaced the IBA and the CA from 1 January 1991.