Cumbria will be the first region in the UK to lose its analogue TV signal, paving the way for digital mobile TV services.

Resident of Cumbria will lose BBC Two on October 17 and the other three analogue channels on November 14.

Dates for the digital switch over in other parts of the country are yet to be announced, although the entire country is expected to have switched to digital by 2012 at the latest.

On Wednesday, UK communications regulator Ofcom said that already 48.5 per cent of the UK’s 60 million television sets were connected to a digital device.

A number of mobile operators already have their eyes on the soon to be vacated analogue spectrum, with a view to using the frequencies for broadcast mobile digital TV platforms using such technologies as DVB-H.