It’s out! OFCOM today published the new licence terms stating that licences are changed from today, see https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0029/278345/amateur-radio-general-notice-decision.pdf
I did respond to the consultation. The two things that I was rather unsure of was the new rule that one cannily hold one personal licence – I still have my foundation and intermediate as well as the full – and the business about RSLs.
On the licences I have not used my foundation or intermediate calls since I got the full licence but I maintained domains named after all three and in some cases my login ID for various forums etc is still my foundation callsign. But no biggie, the domains can expire, I will make sure I do not use any old email addresses and it doesn’t actually matter if my login ID is the old callsign in any given forum provided my email address is correct. But to be tidy I’ll work my way through those. It looks like OFCOM will be revoking one’s ‘lesser’ licences during 2024/25.
RSLs always stuck out with me but as I live in England never affected me. I can see the point where people want to use the RSL, I mean if I lived in Scotland, say, I would definitely use MM. But the change is optional rather than RSLs being outlawed somehow. I have never operated outside England (I don’t seem to travel much!) and often wondered how, say I were driving up the A1 do I change callsign on approach to the Scottish border. But it was always academic because I never use radio while driving anyway.
I do like the bits about data stations and such but it will take some time to properly digest the new rules. I did find to my surprise that my 70cm pi-star setup could be heard from a few miles away given it was connected to a dummy load! One half of my setup – it’s a dual HAT – runs a pager for Dapnet and given a bit more power would be rather handy for the local area.
Also nice is the supervised use by unlicensed people whereas before those people needed to be on a recognised training course (I may have remembered that wrong…) – not that I have the need personally but it can only be helpful to the cause.