ITC INCREASE SUBTITLING REQUIREMENTS

NEW targets for increasing the subtitling requirements for the deaf and hard of hearing on ITV1 and Channel 5 have been announced by the Independent Television Commission (ITC).
The increases fulfil the commitment made by the ITC in 1997 to review the subtitling levels in 2001, to establish if further increases for ITV1 beyond 80 per cent would be feasible.
ITV1 will now be required to subtitle at least 90 per cent of programme hours in 2010, representing an increase from the 80 per cent of programme hours to be achieved by 2004. The new target will apply to all regional licensees and GMTV.
Channel 5 will now be required to subtitle 80 per cent of programme hours in 2008, which represents an increase of the existing requirement of 50 per cent of programme hours in 2002.
Channel 4 is not subject to a statutory requirement for subtitling but has agreed to match the same level of programme hours, provided by ITV1 by 2010.
The extended timescale available to ITV1 for achieving the increase from 80 per cent to 90 per cent of programme hours, reflects the fact that in order to achieve a 90 per cent level more live, regional and part-networked programmes will need to be subtitled, substantially increasing the amount of programmes to be subtitled as a whole. (CD)