Legislation

The Senate committee which reviewed the Government’s proposed amendments to the Broadcasting Services Act, including changes to the captioning provisions, has issued its report. It has supported all but one of the proposed changes, including an end to the requirement that free-to-air networks need to make annual captioning compliance reports. The only amendment it has rejected is the cancellation of a scheduled review by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), although it recommends this be delayed by three years.

Today is the deadline for submissions to the Senate Communications and Environment Committee which is reviewing proposed changes to captioning regulations.

The quality of live captioning was a major topic discussed at the recent The Future of Subtitling conference held in London on 10 November 2014. Media Access Australia CEO Alex Varley presented at the conference and he gives his impressions on the main issues from the UK perspective.

After lobbying from consumer groups, the Government has referred to a Senate committee a bill which would change captioning requirements for broadcasters and subscription TV providers.