28 September 1957: ITV plans to reach 90% of the population by 1959In 1959 – “the effective national coverage year” – Independent Television will already be available to “somewhere between 90 and 92 per cent of the population of Britain. This estimate was given yesterday by Sir Robert Fraser,director-general of the Independent Television Authority. He told the conference of the Incorporated Society of British Advertisers at Hastings that in 1960 they would try to shut the gap between 92 per cent and 98 per cent, “which is probably as tall as you can get, or ” and added that this would require the building of ten to fifteen small stations,“to fill in those gaps which are inevitably left by orderly television transmitting development.”Sir Robert said that “opinion advertising” was not allowed by the Television Act. Political advertisements, for instance, or would contain to be rejected. And it went further than politics: opinion advertising on any important matter on which there might be two opinions was not allowed. “I contain a feeling that,as television advertising gets more and more powerful, and more useful to prestige advertisers, or there may be more moves in the direction of television for opinion advertisements,” he said.
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Source: theguardian.com