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On Monday, 26th March 2001, the barrier was broken. Sky Digital viewers in the Republic of Ireland, long having to put up without terrestrial channels, finally had access to a solitary terrestrial station - BBC ONE Northern Ireland (and BBC TEXT). BBC TWO Northern Ireland arrived on April 30th. But what plans do other channels have? ICDG investigates - and gives you the means to contact these channels and try to persaude them to conclude negiotations with Sky. As the situation develops, I'll update this page.

BBC NORTHERN IRELAND
BBC, PO Box 1116, Belfast BT2 7AJ
http://www.bbc.co.uk/info/contact/com_email.shtml

Current Situation: Negiotations concluded and BBC ONE Northern Ireland, BBC TWO Northern Ireland, and BBC TEXT are now available. BBC CHOICE, BBC KNOWLEDGE, BBC NEWS 24, BBC WORLD, and BBC PRIME are not available, nor are there plans to make them available - although either BBC NEWS 24 or BBC WORLD could be made available with a very minimal effort.

ITV NETWORK LIMITED
200 Grays Inn Road, London. WC1X 8HF England
dutyoffice@itv.co.uk
UTV PUBLIC LIMITED COMPANY
Havelock Hse, Ormeau Avenue, Belfast, Co. Antrim
http://www.utv.ie/Utv/viewers/reaction.asp

Current Situation: ITV, including UTV is offically available on Digital Satellite in the UK only. While viewers in the Republic of Ireland could view via Other Channels, this changed in February 2002 and is no longer the case. However it has been offically confirmed that Sky are in negotiations with UTV and ITV for the availablity of their channel in ROI...

CHANNEL FOUR TELEVISION CORPORATION
124 Horseferry Road, London SW1P 2TX
http://www.channel4.com

Current Situation: We don't know for certain - Channel 4 has said nothing publically. But its highly likely given the fact that C4 sells advertising in the Republic - and that version has recently replaced the London adverts shown until now. Expect C4 to be the next channel available to SkyDigital viewers in the Republic.

RTE
Montrose, Donneybrook D4
pobeb@rte.ie

Current Situation: A deal has been done and assuming planning premission - or licencing - difficulties don't arise, RTE will be available from April 2002.

TV3 TELEVISION NETWORK LIMITED
Tallaght, Dublin 24.
info@tv3.ie

Current Situation: TV3 is apparently in negiotations to go on SkyDigital in the Republic, as reported first on Richard Logue's website. Its not universally available via MMDS or even analogue terrestrial - something SkyDigital will be able to make up.

TELEFIS NA GAELIGE - TG4
Baile na hAbhann, Co. Galway. Tel: 091-505050
linda.ni.ghriofa@tg4.ie

Current Situation: A deal has been done and assuming planning premission - or licencing - difficulties don't arise, TG4 will be available from April 2002..

CHANNEL FIVE BROADCASTING LIMITED
22 Long Acre, London WC2E 9LY, England.
http://www.channel5.co.uk/channel5/contact.php

Current Situation: Doesn't look promising. Unlike just about every single other UK channel, Channel 5 have no interest in the Republic of Ireland and have tried their best to keep ROI TV out of the UK by objecting to RTE being relayed by NTL in Belfast. They will probably be the last channel, if ever, to go on DSat in the Republic.

BRITISH SKY BROADCASTING GROUP PLC
Grant Way, Iselworth, Middlesex TW7 5QD
http://www1.sky.com/Home/Feedback.html

Current Situation: All their channels are available. So why are they listed here? Because they're the other side of the negiotations with all of the above! You can lobby them and ask them what channels they're in negiotations with.