The novice said:
Can anybody give me some basic information on the options available to access French TV channels in the UK.
Depends what you want in the way of French TV. The simplest option is to connect a Sky digibox to the existing dish. This gets you all the BBC and other 'free-to-air' satellite channels plus with a card the 'free to view' channels such as ITV, CH4 If you now set French as the default language, you will get the free channels Euronews, MotorsTV and FashionTV with a French language soundtrack. This is OK for a bit of French listening practice. Mind you there's not much speech on FashionTV.
The next step up is to take out a Sky TV subscription which gets you the French 'best off' channel TV5. A lot of money to pay if you're not interested in the other Sky channels.
The cheap alternative, as others have pointed out, is to get an analogue satellite receiver and dish. The French DIY sheds (e.g. Leroy Merlin) are selling a new receiver, 80cm dish and LNB for about €30 at the moment. You just have to buy a bit of cable and install it yourself. You could possibly reuse your existing dish. This gives you the French terrestrial TV stations in mono. If you don't reuse the Sky dish be aware of possible problems with two dishes on the house because of planning law.
Next you could get yourself a digital receiver with or without hard disk. Most French digital satellite channels are encrypted so this poses an immediate problem. TV5 (mentioned above) is still free on some satellites but for the rest you could take out a subscription for the French bouquets TPS or Canal+ You have to overcome the same hurdles as expat Brits who want to sign up to Sky. (Either you provide a French address or you go through a middleman who rips you off). If you do take out a subscription, consider the sort where you pay a year in advance (as offered by some of the last few independent French satellite retailers). Contracts in France where you pay monthly by direct debit are notoriously difficult to cancel.
TPS is generally cheaper but CanalSatellite is supposedly better according to the critics. TPS gets you TF1 and M6 which aren't in the CanalSatellite package because of commercial rivalries. You need to make sure that your receiver has a Conditional Access module that decrypts the desired bouquet or at least a Common Interface slot where you can plug-in the right sort of CAM. By the way, TPS uses a notoriously weak encryption system which has encouraged pirate viewing in and outside of France.
Going further, you could get a motorised dish. This would allow you to use the same receiver to watch your French channels at 19°E or 13°E and the free-to-air British channels at 28°E. You can't watch one satellite and record another at the same time with this set-up. Rolf has for a long time recommended getting a Sky digibox and mini-dish for the British stuff and a separate receiver and dish for 'playing with'. These days, even a cheapskate like me would have to agree especially if your budget is big enough to stretch to a hard disk receiver.
Some places to look for info:
www.lyngsat.com (you can check what channels are available free or by subscription and what size dish is needed to capture the signals at your location).
the French satellite newsgroup fr.rec.satellite or something
the French Tele-Satellite magazine's website (which also has links to some of the satellite dealer sites in France)
PS I would have replied sooner but I was out at work and then I had my Dutch class.