LASGOW-based academic and commentator, Philip Schlesinger, has been appointed chair of a committee run by broadcasting regulators, Ofcom.
The Glasgow University professor of cultural policy has been made chair of Ofcom’s Advisory Committee for Scotland, which has also welcomed two, new appointments: Mairi Macleod, who has experience of the broadcasting access issues facing people with hearing difficulties, and Franck Chevalier, a telecoms expert.
The Advisory Committee was established under the terms of the Communications Act 2003 to provide advice to Ofcom about the interests and opinions of people living in Scotland on all communications matters.
The new appointments last for four years, from the first of next month.
Among other things, Glasgow-based Macleod is a volunteer with Deaf Connections, a charity giving advice to people with hearing problems.
Meanwhile, Edinburgh-based Chevalier has over ten years’ experience in the telecoms industry, in consulting, engineering and research. He has a PhD in Optical Communication and is an Institute of Engineering and Technology Chartered Engineer. He is also a managing trustee of the charity, ‘Supporting Education in Ghana’.
In addition, Thomas Prag has been re-appointed to the Committee. He is chair of Media Support Solutions which specialises in media projects in Africa and Afghanistan. He was involved in setting up BBC Radio Highland in Inverness in 1976 and then became founding managing director of Moray Firth Radio. He is a Fellow of the Radio Academy and a Liberal Democrat councillor on Highland Council.
He was the previous chair of the Committee, which Schlesinger has been a member of since 2004.
Schlesinger has held visiting academic posts in France, Italy, Norway and Spain and Switzerland and regularly gives lectures overseas. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and of the Royal Society of Arts, and is an Academician of the Academy of Social Sciences.
