Manx Radio breached licence condition over spoken content
BBCThe Isle of Man's national radio station breached its licence conditions by not broadcasting enough spoken content, the regulator has found.
Under its licence conditions, Manx Radio's output is required to hit a target of 40% but averaged 35.75% when monitored.
Manx Radio has since changed the number of hours that broadcast is carried on AM. The station has been contacted for a comment.
The station, which receives a £1.3m government subsidy each year to help it meet its public service obligations, was established on the island in 1964.
Its regular programmes are broadcast on its FM network on a daily basis.
As well as carrying the Gold service, the station's AM frequency is used for broadcasts including parliamentary sittings, road racing coverage, and some dedicated Manx Gaelic and sport programmes.
The concerns focused around the overall amount of speech featured on the FM and AM offerings combined.
The Communications and Utilities Regulatory Authority started a formal investigation in May after reaching an impasse with the station over potential remedies to the situation.
The watchdog said the broadcaster fell short of the 40% requirement between 06:00 and 19:00 on eight of the 10 days it had monitored in April and May.
Its report said while programmes on FM alone exceeded the licence's requirement for speech, when combined with AM the average fell to 35.75%.
The authority concluded the station had failed to comply with its licence condition on speech content but said a fine or licence suspension of revocation would be "disproportionate".
It instead proposed issuing a direction that the station "curtail the inclusion of Manx Radio Gold on its AM service, during relevant hours, to the extent necessary to provide at least 40% speech content across its combined AM and FM services".
Read more stories from the Isle of Man on the BBC, watch BBC North West Tonight on BBC iPlayer and follow BBC Isle of Man on Facebook and X.
