New Zealand Amateur Radio Licence
and Callsign issues
At the NZART Nelson Conference in 2002, Katherine Moody of MED RSM announced
to the meeting that MED were to issue a free life-time licence to New
Zealand amateur radio operators.
Previous to the Nelson conference, our NZART ALO had been in constant
contact with MED RSM regarding a possible free life-time licence for radio
amateurs but this sudden announcement still came as a surprise.
Another surprise came later. It was the expectation of MED RSM that all
amateur radio beacons, repeaters and fixed links, previously free, would
now attract a licence fee of $250.00 each. With over 300 such installations
the total fee was out of the question, how would this sum be raised?
Over many months of negotiation with MED RSM, our ALO in consultation
with FMTAG and Council, managed to gain a reduction in the proposed fee
for each beacon, repeater and fixed link to $50.00 each, with a proviso
that MED issue one invoice to one address for one payment, thereby reducing
the invoicing costs to MED. This was considered to be a more manageable
fee.
The proposed life-time amateur licence for operators: General User Radio
Licence" (GURL), was to come into being on July 1st this year and
the beacon, repeater and fixed link fee would first come due in May 2006.
The problem Council was faced with is: how is this fee to be collected?
There were many options, some were:
Add the sum to NZART subscriptions: not acceptable as non- members get
another free ride.
Send out separate invoices to all amateurs: not economic, 4700 Amateurs
billed for $3.83 each, non-members have no compulsion to pay and still
get a free ride. The invoicing cost is too high for such a small amount.
A donation scheme where all members would be encouraged to donate $10
and non-members $15 into a charitable trust: this scheme removes the invoicing
cost and there could be tax advantages. Members are better off by $25
and non-members by $20, with no more annual MED invoices for $35 to every
amateur licensee.
A very astute businessman and Member of NZART offered to assist with
preparing a business plan, negotiate and to provide support to NZART to
enable NZART to have a similar scheme to other agencies that MED RSM deals
with.
Negotiations are continuing with the MED and I hope to be able to announce
something at or before Conference this year.
Peter Norden ZL2SJ
NZART President
31 March 2005
|
