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www.southgatearc.org
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UK Amateur Radio Licences as at 31st December 2006On 1st December Ofcom switched over to their new Online Licensing system. Licences issued from that date remain valid for 5 years instead of the previous 1 year. This means that in future, the number of licences issued will no longer represent the number of active Radio Amateurs since those who leave the hobby or die will still remain in the figures for up to 5 years. As a result we would expect to see an apparent increase in licence numbers in the coming years. The figures for the end of December appear to show a sharp decline in the number of Full (Advanced) licence holders. This may be because the new online system is providing accurate information for the first time or perhaps in the change-over process a number of Amateur Radio licences were inadvertantly not renewed ? The number of Foundation holders shows a very small increase and looking at the figures over the last year it would appear that the numbers coming into Amateur Radio have slowed down to as little as 1500 a year which is below the rate required to keep Amateur Radio numbers stable let alone increase them. A sizeable number of the 7915 Foundation licences are in fact held by Full Licence holders. Back in 2002 Full Class B holders were forced to take out a Foundation licence in order to work the HF bands as their Full licence didn't permit them to operate below 50 MHz (a seperate morse test was required for Class A Full). In total over 3000 Foundation licences were issued to Full licence holders and most of those still retain the Foundation licence in addition to their Full. This may mean the real number of "true" Foundation only holders could be as low as 5000.
73 Trevor M5AKA
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