Grumpy_Mike:
No the government want to sell off most of the spectrum that used to be occupied by analogue TV. I know, I was involved in lobbying our government (UK) and went to give them a demonstration and got very drunk on free Champagne as it went on into the night. So it's my fault!
Whatever the true reason, there was no real reason to force a switch that would have occurred over time naturally, other than likely due to greed by some party or another.
Grumpy_Mike:
What you mean to say is that a lot of Americans claim to have invented stuff that was made years before in Europe.
Now you're just trying to bait an argument, aren't you? 
Grumpy_Mike:
Yes but it was colour TV was it not. It is just that because someone else came up with a different way of doing things doesn't mean he invented it. He just invented a different way of doing the same thing as was already invented.
Alright, I'll concede that "color TV" was invented by Baird first, but mechanically scanned TV was ultimately a dead end (well, at least until TI's mechanical mirror arrays were developed); the speed and resolution just couldn't be done (though I will say that some of the later mechanically scanned systems that used faceted mirror wheels and such came real close to decent resolutions and framerates). Farnsworth's system (which was ultimately "stolen" and popularized by RCA et al) was the first -completely electronic- color TV system; more or less what we know as "television" today.
/also, when are you Brits going to drop those extra U's, anyhow?