M7 licences now being issued by OFCOM

Foundation Licences (OFCOM)

Now issuing

M7 + 3 letters

Formerly issued

M3 + 3 Letters
M6 + 3 Letters

New Amateur Radio Licence Syllabus for Great Britain.

The Radio Society of Great Britain have now issued a new Syllabus which comes into effect from August 2019.  There will be three levels of examination (and licence) The Foundation, the Intermediate and the Full licence.
Details are as follows:

licence syllabus for 2019

How much time do you spend on the Internet - OFCOM report.

The following OFCOM report makes for interesting reading (? are you using Network Radio)

OFCOM report

New Zealand may ban the import of certain Radio's

New Zealand's RSM Compliance team are working on a Prohibition Notice to limit the import and illegal use of a range of low end two way radios.  There are a variety of these radios on the market, like Baofeng, Pofung and Woxun for example. They allow users to programme their own frequency from the front panel or via a USB cable.  Although designed for the Amateur Radio Operator, these radios in the wrong hands have been attributed to malicious calls on police, forestry and rail frequencies. The import of Amateur two way radios locked to the Amateur bands won’t be affected by this new Notice.

UK Callsigns at 5th July 2018

OFCOM have supplied the following information about live UK callsigns registered on their database. 

Call Sign Count of Live Prefix Call Signs 
20 8612
21 1596
G0 8615
G1 4910
G2 164
G3 4631
G4 9157
G5 58
G6 4901
G7 5829
G8 4837
M0 8363
M1 2275
M3 9961
M5 297
M6 13777
Grand Total 87983

• Foundation are M3 and M6 
• Intermediate are 20 and 21 (in use a Regional Secondary Locator is inserted after the 2)
• Full are all the other prefixes
............................................................................................................
Another OFCOM statistic say the following:

OFCOM can confirm that the total number of individuals holding one or more current UK Amateur Radio Licenses is 9971.

(at 1/4/2018)

(? 8 callsigns per individual, something adrift with OFCOM stats?)