BBC One HD English regions:
The cheap, interim way would be to use a function similar to the BLUE button red button stream changer. When the regional news starts on satellite, up comes the blue button which offers a list of English regions switching to the relevant SD streams. Yes, users could just go and switch to the BBC One SD channel no (as they can with Red Button streams), but I reckon a lot of people would lazily use the blue button function.
On Freeview, it would be easy to implement BBC One HD regions initially based on the current level of regionality on the Freeview HD mux (i.e based on the itv HD regions within England). Earlier this year, there was a fault with an encoder at Winter Hill, which affected BBC One HD all over the area served by itv HD Granada on Freeview HD - including Yorks, Lincs. So there is currently one version of the Freeview HD multiplex for all of Northern England based on the current coverage area of itv HD Granada on 103.
To begin with, you would then have BBC One HD London, West Midlands, North West and South on Freeview HD using the current regional structure of the multiplex. North West and London already have HD facilities. I'm not sure how Birmingham fares - a lot of production has recently moved away from The Mailbox.
Then over time, the additional regions would come on line as each regional centre was HD-enabled. (It took a while for all of them to go true widescreen, if you remember). Some of you may also remember how the BBC One English regions initially appeared as a red button service on satellite, with only five main regions to begin with. It's a bit like that all over again!!
BBC One HD English regions:
The cheap, interim way would be to use a function similar to the BLUE button red button stream changer. When the regional news starts on satellite, up comes the blue button which offers a list of English regions switching to the relevant SD streams. Yes, users could just go and switch to the BBC One SD channel no (as they can with Red Button streams), but I reckon a lot of people would lazily use the blue button function.
On Freeview, it would be easy to implement BBC One HD regions initially based on the current level of regionality on the Freeview HD mux (i.e based on the itv HD regions within England). Earlier this year, there was a fault with an encoder at Winter Hill, which affected BBC One HD all over the area served by itv HD Granada on Freeview HD - including Yorks, Lincs. So there is currently one version of the Freeview HD multiplex for all of Northern England based on the current coverage area of itv HD Granada on 103.
To begin with, you would then have BBC One HD London, West Midlands, North West and South on Freeview HD using the current regional structure of the multiplex. North West and London already have HD facilities. I'm not sure how Birmingham fares - a lot of production has recently moved away from The Mailbox.
Then over time, the additional regions would come on line as each regional centre was HD-enabled. (It took a while for all of them to go true widescreen, if you remember). Some of you may also remember how the BBC One English regions initially appeared as a red button service on satellite, with only five main regions to begin with. It's a bit like that all over again!!
having the BBC 1 regions linked by blue button would probably also mean that the receiver stays in 1080 mode on Dsat, as it currently wouldnt if you leave it in automatic and switch bettween SD and HD channels,
having the BBC 1 regions linked by blue button would probably also mean that the receiver stays in 1080 mode on Dsat, as it currently wouldnt if you leave it in automatic and switch bettween SD and HD channels,
It would work in the same way as the Blue Button Red Button stream changer worked between BBC RB HD, RB1, RB2, RB3 on Freesat during Wimbledon and Glastonbury. The Freesat box output whatever it was set-up to do in the set-up menu (upscaling if set to do so). I wouldn't know what a Sky box would do.
The Freesat function was based on MHEG, also used by Freeview, so Freeview could also have a blue button prompt/stream changer. In this plan, viewers in the parts of England where no regional version in HD was yet available would be able to switch to the locally transmitted SD version by pressing blue. An MHEG prompt would pop up, triggered off by the EPG time for regional news, advising viewers "outside of this region to press BLUE for their regional news programme in standard definition." An explanatory page on Red Button Text would advise viewers that "this is a temporary solution until your regional version of BBC One is available in HD."
So, in practice: You turn on BBC One HD. At 6:30pm, up comes North West Tonight. You live in Yorkshire, see the prompt for viewers outside of "this region" - i.e. North West and press Blue, and get taken to BBC One SD Yorkshire. This would be the interim solution until BBC Yorkshire was available in HD. Lazy option yes, but then if everyone just pressed the channel numbers, you wouldn't need the Red Button stream changer either!
It would work in the same way as the Blue Button Red Button stream changer worked between BBC RB HD, RB1, RB2, RB3 on Freesat during Wimbledon and Glastonbury. The Freesat box output whatever it was set-up to do in the set-up menu (upscaling if set to do so).
well it would be an anoyance for people to have a resolution change as well as a pause for stream change! it really needs to be instant otherwise we may as well carry on with what we have now!
well it would be an anoyance for people to have a resolution change as well as a pause for stream change! it really needs to be instant otherwise we may as well carry on with what we have now!
In practice, the aforementioned Red Button stream changer was no different in speed to someone manually flicking from an HD to a SD channel.
On Freeview, it would be easy to implement BBC One HD regions initially based on the current level of regionality on the Freeview HD mux (i.e based on the itv HD regions within England).
I can see the point in ITV having macro regions for advertising purposes but not for the BBC. They seem to have been very careful to block London regional news from the HD channel, so I don't see why they would suddenly start showing regional news from the wrong region. Leeds may be closer to Manchester than it is to London, but Manchester's local news isn't really any more relevant to the Leeds area than London's local news.
I can see the point in ITV having macro regions for advertising purposes but not for the BBC. They seem to have been very careful to block London regional news from the HD channel, so I don't see why they would suddenly start showing regional news from the wrong region. Leeds may be closer to Manchester than it is to London, but Manchester's local news isn't really any more relevant to the Leeds area than London's local news.
I agree I think it will be full regional BBC 1 HD coverage as soon as it is possible and nothing till then.
But it won't be like that forever - I went from about 3Mbps to 70Mbps when a fibre cabinet was put in my village, IPTV has to be the future.
But not for a long time for people in very rural areas. Give it at least 20 years before they get around to doing it.
They've only recently got around to providing FTTC in my home town of nearly 200,000 population.
My dad gets 2 meg down. I get 65 meg down and 20 meg up. He only got Channel 5 (Five) after switchover.
As for cable being installed to his area, forget it. Not for at least the next 50 years, the way things are going. Read, probably never, as it is just not financially feasible.
Not even the water supplier has laid mains up to his house. For the last 200-300 yards, water is supplied by a private pipe and some of the (nearby) neighbours are not even connected to the mains, having to rely on wells to get their water, for example.
And my dad is not living in a particularly remote area of the UK, compared with some parts of Wales and Scotland.
I'm guessing you haven't been on the forums for very long or don't remember the aggro when they cut the bitrate in half or remember what picture quality was like before then. Including the period of use of 1440 rather than the full 1920 pixels..
Raw bitrates are not the be all and end all. What also matters is the quality of the encoders and the algorithms used.
Indeed, the reason why the fifth HD space became available last year was down to the better encoders that the BBC used, allied with improved compression algorithms
But I have no intention of being drawn into any bitrates or resolution discussion.
I can see the point in ITV having macro regions for advertising purposes but not for the BBC. They seem to have been very careful to block London regional news from the HD channel, so I don't see why they would suddenly start showing regional news from the wrong region. Leeds may be closer to Manchester than it is to London, but Manchester's local news isn't really any more relevant to the Leeds area than London's local news.
Yes, but my point is that the BBC could easily switch on some regional variants based on the current regional set up of the HD mux. I can't see every region being HD enabled that quickly.
Would viewers be prepared to wait until the infrastructure is ready everywhere? Until full regionality is applied to the Freeview HD mux? Can the BBC fund an HD regional roll out in one go? Or should the BBC get rid of the red screen as soon as it can and just show something, with the original roll out of regions on DSAT a decade ago as precedent?
The commitment to platform neutrality and involvement with Freesat would suggest that option 3 would be the most likely. If possible, option 2 would be preferable, multiple HD streams carrying the same content most of the time wouldn't be very efficient.
.
Platform Neutrality may be not held over the transition period -so option 3 for DSAT is not likely and expensive...
so DTT May have English regions in HD (and SD)
while DSAT may have them in SD
.. but then (Say 2020) all platforms will have them in HD..
And over the next years not every region will have the same others.,.
Yes, but my point is that the BBC could easily switch on some regional variants based on the current regional set up of the HD mux. I can't see every region being HD enabled that quickly.
Would viewers be prepared to wait until the infrastructure is ready everywhere? Until full regionality is applied to the Freeview HD mux? Can the BBC fund an HD regional roll out in one go? Or should the BBC get rid of the red screen as soon as it can and just show something, with the original roll out of regions on DSAT a decade ago as precedent?
The BBC could just use the temporary red button service on BBC1 HD on freeview, to switch to the SD version of BBC 1 they receive for their area. The good thing about this is, the viewer could just press back up to get back to the HD channel!
On Dsat it would be more complicated, but it could be done by the postcode ether set by the owner on freesat and the viewing card on Sky to get the right SD switch like that.
On Dcab Virgin, BT or whatever company operating would have to make the right SD version work when doing the switch.
You seem to be jumping to conclusions here. You are aware that plenty of content on all platforms is 1080p/25, right? It's just usually in a 1080i/25 wrapper - any half-decent TV will recognise the lack of motion between fields and display the content progressively (at full vertical resolution).
The only difference with Freeview is that the encoder can recognise progressive content and encode it directly as such. Image quality isn't affected at the user-end (except maybe with certain TVs that have broken deinterlacing algorithms), it just reduces bandwidth requirements.
I probably haven't made myself clear. I'm referring to 50Hz motion. 1080i will show it if the source is 50Hz, but true 25P or sent as 'segmented frame' will not. Many occasions when motion is portrayed one either gets bad smearing or inter-frame flicker on pans.
Either this is bad coding or shutter control or poor panning. Film camera crew and directors only panned cameras at certain rates because they knew of the LIMITATIONS of low frame rates.
25P motion is a retrograde step. At the receiver, it cannot be shown in native 25 frames per second. it is usually shown refreshed at 50Hz or higher.
People may prefer it because they are merely used to it, but it is not a better system. It's like saying AM is preferable to FM.
25p is a editorial decision ... It may look crap. But that's the image the direction wants ...
HD should have a frame rate of at least 100/120 Hz .
.. But we have lost that ... Once because of the then available display technology,the second was that the advertising people liked a large number of lines .
Sadly there was not enough weight to get BT 2020 to have either 100hz or any thing higher than 120hz ... The right answer is300 Hz ....
But from this mistake many are lobbying to get thse rates added ....so there is some hope
25p is a editorial decision ... It may look crap. But that's the image the direction wants ...
HD should have a frame rate of at least 100/120 Hz .
.. But we have lost that ... Once because of the then available display technology,the second was that the advertising people liked a large number of lines .
Sadly there was not enough weight to get BT 2020 to have either 100hz or any thing higher than 120hz ... The right answer is300 Hz ....
But from this mistake many are lobbying to get thse rates added ....so there is some hope
I agree. The freeview blue book as you know didn't include 50Hz at 1080 for freeview at the HD launch.
It's a shame an additional rate to 72Hz (or 144 or 288Hz) wasn't mooted to synchonise/converge with film (it was trialled) an opportunity missed for a second Common Interchange Format. (CIF)
The trouble is, the editorial decision for 25P was based on either the use of older technology (because we've always done it this way) or the apparent perception that big budget film = expensive = better, or artistically, 25P is 'dreamlike' in an unreality valley (unproven.)
Yes, Cable ie Virgin still uses MPEG2 but they can switchover to MPEG4 as the newiest V+ boxes the Samsung ones and the TiVo boxes have MPEG4 hardware in them
I am still wondering why BBC Parliment is not going to be in HD like the other channels - as this is the channel I would watch mostly in HD along with Sky Altantic and the Sky Sports and Sky Movie channels
I cannot wait for DSO Part 2 to happen as HD was first launched in March 2006 , 7 years ago - nearly 10 years - 3 years away from being a decade, it is now time that all SD channels are switched off
I'm a keen viewer and supporter of BBC Parliament and have often defended it against attacks on these forums, but why anyone would want it in HD is beyond me! I'm happy with it as it is now.
I probably haven't made myself clear. I'm referring to 50Hz motion. 1080i will show it if the source is 50Hz, but true 25P or sent as 'segmented frame' will not. Many occasions when motion is portrayed one either gets bad smearing or inter-frame flicker on pans.
Either this is bad coding or shutter control or poor panning. Film camera crew and directors only panned cameras at certain rates because they knew of the LIMITATIONS of low frame rates.
25P motion is a retrograde step. At the receiver, it cannot be shown in native 25 frames per second. it is usually shown refreshed at 50Hz or higher.
People may prefer it because they are merely used to it, but it is not a better system. It's like saying AM is preferable to FM.
Ah, so you're talking about the use of 25p by directors, not anything specific to Freeview HD. In that case, I generally agree that 1080i/25 looks better than 1080p/25.
24p and 25p are extremely common to give a "film-like look". This may change in the future if 48 fps films take off but I kinda doubt it.
Ah, so you're talking about the use of 25p by directors, not anything specific to Freeview HD. In that case, I generally agree that 1080i/25 looks better than 1080p/25.
24p and 25p are extremely common to give a "film-like look". This may change in the future if 48 fps films take off but I kinda doubt it.
You may be right about 48P. Other directors such as James Cameron are thinking in terms of 60fps too.
Maybe I'm being cynical but I suspect that many programmes too are also made in 25P so they can be sold to the export market in both 50Hz and 60Hz markets.
I think the reason some people are so hot and bothered under the collar about HD picture quality on Freeview is they expect it to be as good as Blu Ray. This is unrealistic in my opinion given the massive bit rate available to Blu Ray. I've found that Freeview HD gives significantly better picture quality than DVD whereas SD is a bit poorer than DVD on the BBC and C4 and a lot poorer than DVD on all the other channels (including ITV1). To my mind that makes Freeview HD picture quality very good, it's what Freeview should have had in the first place but couldn't achieve due to bit rate limitations.
Now if only ITV HD would get a clue about sound and provide 5.1 on films and premium drama (eg. Poirot) we'd be sorted, but it's not going to happen on ITV "lowest common denominator" TV. On C4 I've been hugely impressed with the 5.1 sound on films even when I have the same film on DVD, at the bitrate used AAC sound is superior to the somewhat iffy Dolby Digital 5.1 we get on most region 2 DVDs (I have a lot of Region 1 DTS DVDs as a result of this).
One of the best things about these extra HD channels is it means we're going to get 5.1 sound on BBC4 as well as HD picture. During the last year of BBC HD some of the Scandi-Noire imports in HD had 5.1 sound and were fantastic on my home cinema system. The loss of the 5.1 sound was to me a bigger loss than the HD picture when BBC HD disappeared.
Yes, but my point is that the BBC could easily switch on some regional variants based on the current regional set up of the HD mux. I can't see every region being HD enabled that quickly.
Would viewers be prepared to wait until the infrastructure is ready everywhere? Until full regionality is applied to the Freeview HD mux? Can the BBC fund an HD regional roll out in one go? Or should the BBC get rid of the red screen as soon as it can and just show something, with the original roll out of regions on DSAT a decade ago as precedent?
It's one for the BBC really, if they decide to roll-out nationally, when all infrastructure is enabled, viewers will have little choice other than to wait. As for funding, presumably that decision rests with the BBC Trust. It will be interesting to see how this develops.
Platform Neutrality may be not held over the transition period -so option 3 for DSAT is not likely and expensive...
so DTT May have English regions in HD (and SD)
while DSAT may have them in SD
.. but then (Say 2020) all platforms will have them in HD..
And over the next years not every region will have the same others.,.
Ultimately HD will replace SD and simulcasting will end, so yes, it will happen eventually. It's probably better not to try to predict what will happen and wait for the BBC Trust to make their decision.
Also note that ITV HD still uses CBR (@ 10 Mbps) on satellite, which is ridiculous. No wonder fast moving scenes sometimes break up.
ITV are rubbish and actively pursue being rubbish. It's a good job ITV have no control over the encoding of ITV1 on the HD mux, if they did then they'd insist on reducing the bit rate.
We still had to fight to get BBC Parliament full screen on freeview, It does seem to be the forgotten channel.
The Parliamentary authorities retain a strict control over broadcasting issues, allied to which I seem to recall that ITV Studios provides the actual coverage (possibly Millbank Studios, which have no HD facilities currently).
Therefore, permission would have to be sought in order to change any cameras, and such work could only be done at certain points in the year (during recess). It is also possible that any such work would be carried out in conjunction with the refurb of the House which is planned to take place at some point:
31 October 2012
The House of Lords House Committee yesterday agreed to publish a Study Group report on options to undertake the essential refurbishment of the Palace of Westminster, including a possible temporary relocation of Parliament.
The House Committee also decided to ask officials to commission a fully costed appraisal of all the options that retain the Palace of Westminster as the long-term home of Parliament and as an iconic building for the nation. They ruled out the idea of a new permanent Parliamentary building elsewhere.
Comments
The cheap, interim way would be to use a function similar to the BLUE button red button stream changer. When the regional news starts on satellite, up comes the blue button which offers a list of English regions switching to the relevant SD streams. Yes, users could just go and switch to the BBC One SD channel no (as they can with Red Button streams), but I reckon a lot of people would lazily use the blue button function.
On Freeview, it would be easy to implement BBC One HD regions initially based on the current level of regionality on the Freeview HD mux (i.e based on the itv HD regions within England). Earlier this year, there was a fault with an encoder at Winter Hill, which affected BBC One HD all over the area served by itv HD Granada on Freeview HD - including Yorks, Lincs. So there is currently one version of the Freeview HD multiplex for all of Northern England based on the current coverage area of itv HD Granada on 103.
To begin with, you would then have BBC One HD London, West Midlands, North West and South on Freeview HD using the current regional structure of the multiplex. North West and London already have HD facilities. I'm not sure how Birmingham fares - a lot of production has recently moved away from The Mailbox.
Then over time, the additional regions would come on line as each regional centre was HD-enabled. (It took a while for all of them to go true widescreen, if you remember). Some of you may also remember how the BBC One English regions initially appeared as a red button service on satellite, with only five main regions to begin with. It's a bit like that all over again!!
having the BBC 1 regions linked by blue button would probably also mean that the receiver stays in 1080 mode on Dsat, as it currently wouldnt if you leave it in automatic and switch bettween SD and HD channels,
The Freesat function was based on MHEG, also used by Freeview, so Freeview could also have a blue button prompt/stream changer. In this plan, viewers in the parts of England where no regional version in HD was yet available would be able to switch to the locally transmitted SD version by pressing blue. An MHEG prompt would pop up, triggered off by the EPG time for regional news, advising viewers "outside of this region to press BLUE for their regional news programme in standard definition." An explanatory page on Red Button Text would advise viewers that "this is a temporary solution until your regional version of BBC One is available in HD."
So, in practice: You turn on BBC One HD. At 6:30pm, up comes North West Tonight. You live in Yorkshire, see the prompt for viewers outside of "this region" - i.e. North West and press Blue, and get taken to BBC One SD Yorkshire. This would be the interim solution until BBC Yorkshire was available in HD. Lazy option yes, but then if everyone just pressed the channel numbers, you wouldn't need the Red Button stream changer either!
well it would be an anoyance for people to have a resolution change as well as a pause for stream change! it really needs to be instant otherwise we may as well carry on with what we have now!
In practice, the aforementioned Red Button stream changer was no different in speed to someone manually flicking from an HD to a SD channel.
I can see the point in ITV having macro regions for advertising purposes but not for the BBC. They seem to have been very careful to block London regional news from the HD channel, so I don't see why they would suddenly start showing regional news from the wrong region. Leeds may be closer to Manchester than it is to London, but Manchester's local news isn't really any more relevant to the Leeds area than London's local news.
I agree I think it will be full regional BBC 1 HD coverage as soon as it is possible and nothing till then.
You can't even get decent 2G coverage in many places around where my dad lives, let alone 3G/4G etc.
But not for a long time for people in very rural areas. Give it at least 20 years before they get around to doing it.
They've only recently got around to providing FTTC in my home town of nearly 200,000 population.
My dad gets 2 meg down. I get 65 meg down and 20 meg up. He only got Channel 5 (Five) after switchover.
As for cable being installed to his area, forget it. Not for at least the next 50 years, the way things are going. Read, probably never, as it is just not financially feasible.
Not even the water supplier has laid mains up to his house. For the last 200-300 yards, water is supplied by a private pipe and some of the (nearby) neighbours are not even connected to the mains, having to rely on wells to get their water, for example.
And my dad is not living in a particularly remote area of the UK, compared with some parts of Wales and Scotland.
Raw bitrates are not the be all and end all. What also matters is the quality of the encoders and the algorithms used.
Indeed, the reason why the fifth HD space became available last year was down to the better encoders that the BBC used, allied with improved compression algorithms
But I have no intention of being drawn into any bitrates or resolution discussion.
Would viewers be prepared to wait until the infrastructure is ready everywhere? Until full regionality is applied to the Freeview HD mux? Can the BBC fund an HD regional roll out in one go? Or should the BBC get rid of the red screen as soon as it can and just show something, with the original roll out of regions on DSAT a decade ago as precedent?
Platform Neutrality may be not held over the transition period -so option 3 for DSAT is not likely and expensive...
so DTT May have English regions in HD (and SD)
while DSAT may have them in SD
.. but then (Say 2020) all platforms will have them in HD..
And over the next years not every region will have the same others.,.
The BBC could just use the temporary red button service on BBC1 HD on freeview, to switch to the SD version of BBC 1 they receive for their area. The good thing about this is, the viewer could just press back up to get back to the HD channel!
On Dsat it would be more complicated, but it could be done by the postcode ether set by the owner on freesat and the viewing card on Sky to get the right SD switch like that.
On Dcab Virgin, BT or whatever company operating would have to make the right SD version work when doing the switch.
I probably haven't made myself clear. I'm referring to 50Hz motion. 1080i will show it if the source is 50Hz, but true 25P or sent as 'segmented frame' will not. Many occasions when motion is portrayed one either gets bad smearing or inter-frame flicker on pans.
Either this is bad coding or shutter control or poor panning. Film camera crew and directors only panned cameras at certain rates because they knew of the LIMITATIONS of low frame rates.
25P motion is a retrograde step. At the receiver, it cannot be shown in native 25 frames per second. it is usually shown refreshed at 50Hz or higher.
People may prefer it because they are merely used to it, but it is not a better system. It's like saying AM is preferable to FM.
HD should have a frame rate of at least 100/120 Hz .
.. But we have lost that ... Once because of the then available display technology,the second was that the advertising people liked a large number of lines .
Sadly there was not enough weight to get BT 2020 to have either 100hz or any thing higher than 120hz ... The right answer is300 Hz ....
But from this mistake many are lobbying to get thse rates added ....so there is some hope
I agree. The freeview blue book as you know didn't include 50Hz at 1080 for freeview at the HD launch.
It's a shame an additional rate to 72Hz (or 144 or 288Hz) wasn't mooted to synchonise/converge with film (it was trialled) an opportunity missed for a second Common Interchange Format. (CIF)
The trouble is, the editorial decision for 25P was based on either the use of older technology (because we've always done it this way) or the apparent perception that big budget film = expensive = better, or artistically, 25P is 'dreamlike' in an unreality valley (unproven.)
As you say, there is hope....
I'm a keen viewer and supporter of BBC Parliament and have often defended it against attacks on these forums, but why anyone would want it in HD is beyond me! I'm happy with it as it is now.
24p and 25p are extremely common to give a "film-like look". This may change in the future if 48 fps films take off but I kinda doubt it.
You may be right about 48P. Other directors such as James Cameron are thinking in terms of 60fps too.
Maybe I'm being cynical but I suspect that many programmes too are also made in 25P so they can be sold to the export market in both 50Hz and 60Hz markets.
Now if only ITV HD would get a clue about sound and provide 5.1 on films and premium drama (eg. Poirot) we'd be sorted, but it's not going to happen on ITV "lowest common denominator" TV. On C4 I've been hugely impressed with the 5.1 sound on films even when I have the same film on DVD, at the bitrate used AAC sound is superior to the somewhat iffy Dolby Digital 5.1 we get on most region 2 DVDs (I have a lot of Region 1 DTS DVDs as a result of this).
One of the best things about these extra HD channels is it means we're going to get 5.1 sound on BBC4 as well as HD picture. During the last year of BBC HD some of the Scandi-Noire imports in HD had 5.1 sound and were fantastic on my home cinema system. The loss of the 5.1 sound was to me a bigger loss than the HD picture when BBC HD disappeared.
Also note that ITV HD still uses CBR (@ 10 Mbps) on satellite, which is ridiculous. No wonder fast moving scenes sometimes break up.
It's one for the BBC really, if they decide to roll-out nationally, when all infrastructure is enabled, viewers will have little choice other than to wait. As for funding, presumably that decision rests with the BBC Trust. It will be interesting to see how this develops.
Ultimately HD will replace SD and simulcasting will end, so yes, it will happen eventually. It's probably better not to try to predict what will happen and wait for the BBC Trust to make their decision.
ITV are rubbish and actively pursue being rubbish. It's a good job ITV have no control over the encoding of ITV1 on the HD mux, if they did then they'd insist on reducing the bit rate.
The Parliamentary authorities retain a strict control over broadcasting issues, allied to which I seem to recall that ITV Studios provides the actual coverage (possibly Millbank Studios, which have no HD facilities currently).
Therefore, permission would have to be sought in order to change any cameras, and such work could only be done at certain points in the year (during recess). It is also possible that any such work would be carried out in conjunction with the refurb of the House which is planned to take place at some point:
http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/lords-select/house-committee/news/restoration-westminster/
And all of that ignores cost and bandwidth issues that the BBC might have