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Section 361: Meaning of "available for reception by members of the public"

Communications Act 2003 · 2003 c. 21View on legislation.gov.uk

Part 3: Television and Radio Services ETC — Chapter 6: Other provisions about television and radio services

The services that are to be taken for the purposes of this Part to be available for reception by members of the public include (subject to subsection (2)) any service which—

is made available for reception, or is made available for reception in an intelligible form, only to persons who subscribe to the service (whether for a period or in relation to a particular occasion) or who otherwise request its provision; but
is a service the facility of subscribing to which, or of otherwise requesting its provision, is offered or made available to members of the public.

A service is not to be treated as available for reception by members of the public if it is an on-demand programme service or a non-UK on-demand programme service that is a Tier 1 service (see section 368HA).

References in this section to members of the public are references to members of the public in, or in any area of, any one or more countries or territories (which may or may not include the United Kingdom).

The Secretary of State may by order modify any of the provisions of this section if it appears to him appropriate to do so having regard to any one or more of the following—

the protection which, taking account of the means by which the programmes and services are received or may be accessed, is expected by members of the public as respects the contents of television programmes or sound programmes;
the extent to which members of the public are able, before television programmes are watched or accessed, to make use of facilities for exercising control, by reference to the contents of the programmes, over what is watched or accessed;
the practicability of applying different levels of regulation in relation to different services;
the financial impact for providers of particular services of any modification of the provisions of that section; and
technological developments that have occurred or are likely to occur.

No order is to be made containing provision authorised by subsection (7) unless a draft of the order has been laid before Parliament and approved by a resolution of each House.

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About this text

This legislation text comes from legislation.gov.uk. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. These source and reuse terms cover the legislation text, not Remedy's commentary.

Reuse reviewed 21 August 2026 under Open Government Licence v3.0.