British Citizens Band Confederation back from the dead?

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AxleJack
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British Citizens Band Confederation back from the dead?

Post by AxleJack »

I've just noticed that the British Citizen Band Confederation is listed as a country club in Basildon. Its on several websites.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/British- ... 4355378858

If someone having a laugh? Anyone know whats going on?

The BCBCs tax records state the society is disolved. The last record of accounts in 2003.
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Re: British Citizens Band Confederation back from the dead?

Post by RadioPixie »

So far there's only one member and one following (obviously the same person). Living on past glories??
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Re: British Citizens Band Confederation back from the dead?

Post by AxleJack »

Maybe Dave. BCBCs business address was Basildon so its maybe an ex-committee member trying to keep the name alive.
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Re: British Citizens Band Confederation back from the dead?

Post by RadioPixie »

Is there a need for one? CBers organise themselves pretty well. Courtesy of Euro standards, UK has 80chs and the inclusion of AM/SSB.

But on the other hand, there's interfere issues such as PLT devices, and lack of VHF/UHF CB allocation in the UK. But I don't think any organisation is going to solve that one.
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Re: British Citizens Band Confederation back from the dead?

Post by AxleJack »

No is the short answer.

There were 3 main organisations during the campaign to legalise CB. Which became redundant when CB was legalised.

After legalisation there were 12,000 CBers who wanted some sort of representative society and the BCBC was formed. But... they never got more than a few hundred members. The 12,000 who shouted for a society vapourised. But BCBC continued and attempted to do their job anyway. I was an area rep for them in 1999.

However, like all these volunteer national "authoritive" societies they suffered from a under informed skewed view of CB and over expanded egos. In 1999 their major push was to get CBers compulsory government issued callsigns which had to be recited on air every 15 minutes. They were telling the comms authority that CBers wanted official callsigns like hams had. I begged them to believe me that CBers did not want that, but was ignored. The BCBC committee wanted it which meant everyone had to want it. My relationship with the BCBC became a little heated after that, and they shunned me and got rid of me. Which made me very angry at the time.

So that's why the few of us who had a CB license got those 2F0AB style callsigns on our licenses. But the comms authority didnt make them compulsory to use on air as by that time they were having serious doubts about BCBCs motives.

The BCBC shut down 4 years later, according to the tax records. I know some of the committee were very ill and perhaps when they gave up the society did too. It makes you wonder what they could have achieved if they had people who actually knew the hobby on the committee. They had members who did but the committee positions were protected so nobody could get a committee position without full approval of all the existing committee. Basically it was fixed.

The one bloke who shone was Tony Jaconelli. I didnt leave on good terms with Tony, which I have always regretted as he was a good bloke. If you are reading this Tony, sorry about all the sh*t that happened.

Whoops, sorry, went into waffle mode :)
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Re: British Citizens Band Confederation back from the dead?

Post by Transwarp »

They always sounded like mob mentality rather then a do good brigade to me, just like some organisations I could mention today.
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