Senate Standing Committee on Environment, Communications and the Arts
Answers to Senate Estimates Questions on Notice
Supplementary Budget Estimates Hearings October 2009
Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy Portfolio
Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy
Question No: 22

Senator Ludlam asked:
Is it true that the Digital Tracker reports published by the Digital Switchover Taskforce and reporting the level of digital take up mostly measure the extent to which homes have purchased digital reception equipment and are not primarily aimed at detecting whether those homes can actually receive and watch all local digital TV services all of the time?

Answer:
The Digital Tracker is not testing coverage and reception. It is a survey, primarily aimed at measuring households' readiness for digital switchover-not only in terms of digital reception equipment-but also in terms of broader measures of readiness, as follows:

• Awareness of digital switchover (awareness)
• Understanding of how to get ready for digital television (understanding)
• Attitude to the digital switchover (attitude)
• Intention to convert main television set to digital (intention)
• Conversion of main television set to receive digital television (conversion)
• Satisfaction with Digital TV conversion (satisfaction).