An alliance of UK satellite and cable broadcasters has lashed out against the plans of the BBC to launch new digital channels aimed at markets that they are already serving. 
   The group, representing the interests of commercial media companies, is attacking the suggestion that the BBC's proposed services will drive adoption of digital TV services. The group is voicing its attack in a report that it will be submitting to the government's media department this week. 
    The alliance, which is made up of eight broadcasters-- BSkyB, Discovery Networks Europe, Artsworld, Nickelodeon, Telewest, MTV, Turner Broadcasting and Disney Channel UK--was set up in response to growing concern that the BBC is encroaching on commercial markets.
    As a state-owned public service broadcaster, the BBC has taken on the duty to drive an unenthusiastic British public to subscribe to digital multichannel TV. 
    The government supports this aim because the sooner it can turn the majority of the British public on to digital, the sooner it can auction the spare TV spectrum to mobile phone companies for an estimated $15 billion profit. 
   However, with only 25 percent of the British public tempted so far by digital TV, the BBC wants to launch new channels to make the proposition more attractive.   
    But the BBC's commercial rivals say that it is picking off niche markets that are already being well served. 
   This week's criticism is expected to focus on the BBC's two proposed children's channels, claiming that they would have little impact on lifting subscriptions to digital.
    Recent research by the Disney Channel showed that nearly 90 percent of households with children will be multichannel by the middle of next year. Commercial broadcasters argue that if the BBC is sincere about helping to boost the popularity of digital TV it should aim its new services at those sectors of the public that are slow to switch to digital, such as over-65 viewers.
    Government guidelines for approving new BBC services say that the corporation must give reasons why the channels should be funded by the license fee rather than by commercial enterprise. 
   The commercial broadcasters argue that there is little evidence that the proposed channels will offer any programming that is not already available on the existing BBC1 and BBC2 channels. 
   They insist that the onus should be on the BBC as a public service broadcaster to prove its digital channels carry a challenging mix of news, documentaries and drama and that they differ from channels that already exist in the commercial arena. 
     The commercial broadcasters are also questioning the BBC's claim that its proposed children's channels, with significant amounts of UK programming, will differ from what is already available. Nickelodeon says that 75 percent of the programs on its own pre-school channel, Nick Jr., are UK-originated.
    The government is expected to make its decision on whether to allow the BBC to go ahead with its plans for the new digital channels at the end of April.

-Simon Bond covers European media for Media Life, writing from outside of London.

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