[Stooky Bill]

This is precisely my point. There are further examples of collaboration between 1993 license bidders too - didn't Westcountry outsource their playout to HTV?

They did, but I don't think it was what they planned when they applied. TSW took their license win to judicial review and delayed Westcountry being able to start. So they ended up moving to a cheaper smaller building on the outskirts of Plymouth and playout came from Cardiff.

Of course they wouldn't have promised that in their application, there's not exactly a lot of facility or TV companies down that way who'd do it. But then the ITC wouldn't have cared where it was played it from, the only factor was financial - if being able to afford the bid was down to promises of outsourcing then if they didn't there'd be a problem.

Although companies not being able to afford their bids wasn't a problem in the end