Biggins: BBC Kowtowed to Savile and Let Him Do Whatever He Wanted

Actor and television personality Christopher Biggins has claimed that the BBC allowed Jimmy Savile to do whatever he wanted.

The 67-year-old Celebrity Big Brother star, famed for his role as Lukewarm in BBC situation comedy Porridge, claims that BBC bosses viewed Savile as a commodity and consequently turned a blind-eye to widespread rumours of misconduct.

Speaking prior to entering the Celebrity Big Brother House, Biggins said: "We were amazed that Jimmy Savile got away with what he got away with.

"Because there were rumours and things you heard. But no-one seemed to do anything about it.

"You have to remember, he had two huge television series which brought the BBC in a lot of money. So he was a commodity.

"And sadly they all kowtowed to him and allowed him to do what he wanted to do.

"It was all very unfortunate. He was a terrible man and not very nice in lots of ways."

Savile was one of the most prolific child sex offenders of the twentieth century. A joint Metropolitan Police/NSPCC report, Giving Victims a Voice, concluded that the disgraced Top Of The Pops presenter committed no less than 23 sex crimes on BBC premises, predominantly Television Centre in West London.

A predatory paedophile, Savile used the cover of his TV shows to groom and molest children and vulnerable adults involved in their production. His youngest victim was an 8-year-old boy.

On at least one occasion Savile committed sexual assault in full gaze of the camera, right under the noses of his BBC paymasters.

Curious then that Dame Janet Smith, whose investigation was bankrolled to the tune of £7m by the BBC, concluded that senior managers were unaware of Savile's crimes.

Based on the evidence available, we doubt we'd reach the same conclusion.

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TV Licensing Fudging the Figures

"We have a 99 percent conviction rate", according to a TV Licensing PR harlot quoted in today's Sunday Express article about the (alleged) £283m cost to the BBC of TV licence evasion.

And 99 percent of TV Licensing goons have a 12 inch penis, if you start measuring from the crack of their arse. And that's just the female ones.

You see how easy it is to make totally meaningless statistics appear impressive and meaningful? The BBC and TV Licensing practise the dark art of figure-fudging on a very regular basis, particularly when it comes to exaggerating the effectiveness of their very ineffective TV licence enforcement regime.

Let's take a historical example that we find particularly amusing. Capita Court Presenter Chris Christophorou, who plies his immoral wares in the Kent area, laid on oath the following statement: "When the detector camera was pointed at the window of the Premises a positive signal was received indicating a TV receiver was in use receiving a possible broadcast with a confidence factor of 97%."

That statement no doubt sounded very convincing to the Magistrate receiving it, but if you delve a little deeper you'll notice how TV Licensing's legal wordsmiths have cleverly used the term "possible broadcast". Even if the confidence factor of a possible broadcast had been 100%, that is no evidence whatsoever that an actual broadcast was being received.

We find today's 99 percent conviction rate claim equally amusing and wholly implausible. We know, as a matter of fact, that only half of people TV Licensing claims to have evaded the TV licence fee are actually convicted of doing so.

According to BBC logic, anyone who gives a "Code 8" prosecution statement to a TV Licensing goon, is considered a TV licence evader. The recently released TV Licensing Field Performance Pack for March 2015 (read more here) indicates that there were 337,945 "Code 8"s taken in the 12 months to 31st March 2015, ergo the BBC reckons it nabbed that many TV licence evaders.

Skip forward a few pages of the same document it reveals that 174,643 people were convicted of TV licence evasion over the same 12 month period. In other words, TV Licensing only managed to secure the conviction of just under 52% of all those it accused of evading the fee. How can that be reconciled with their claimed 99% conviction rate? With great difficulty is the obvious answer.

Suppose TV Licensing was only considering those cases that actually made it as far as court - would that then support its claims of a 99% conviction rate? No it wouldn't, remains the answer. Of the 202,292 cases brought before the court there were still only 174,643 convictions. That equates to a conviction rate of just over 86%, which is still nowhere near TV Licensing's claimed conviction rate of 99%.

Remember these are TV Licensing's own figures, carelessly released by the BBC when it recently botched the redaction of a Freedom of Information disclosure document.

However much you squint and however much you play with the figures, you just can't get TV Licensing's claim of a 99% conviction rate to stack up.

We wonder why that is?! Could it be, perhaps, that TV Licensing's claims are, in the words of a well-known confectioner, pure imagination? It certainly wouldn't be the first time.

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Get Your Violins Out: TV Licence Dodgers Cost the BBC £283m

Or so the BBC says anyway, so take that with a massive pinch of salt.

According to the BBC between 6 and 7 percent of households evaded the TV licence fee last year.

With the annual cost of a TV licence currently standing at £145.50 (although set to rise in line with inflation from next year) the BBC considers that it has lost up to £283m as a result of these ne'er-do-goods, most of whom do not legally require a TV licence.

As a result of the TV licence fee being frozen for the past six years, the BBC has had to do some serious economising - or start to live within its means, as most right-minded people would say. The Corporation is seeking to make £800m in savings by 2021-22 and, to that end, it has already swung the axe towards several services, including "yoof" channel BBC Three.

A TV Licensing spokesman said: "Between April 2015 and March 2016 we caught almost 300,000 people watching TV without a licence.

"Evasion costs the BBC between £243million to £283million in lost income, so it's important we ensure everyone is aware of licensing requirements."

That £283m could no doubt be put to much better use by the BBC, such as:

• Paying adequate compensation to the victims of sexual abuse on BBC premises.
• Trying to digitally-archive the BBC's content and then giving up half way.
• Moving whole departments from London to Salford and then back again.
• Rehiring staff dismissed from permanent contracts on more expensive temporary ones.
• Sending twice as many staff to cover a news story as is necessary, because communication within the department is that bad.

You get the idea.

The same jobsworth went on to parrot one of TV Licensing's favourite lies - that it only ever prosecutes in the public interest. It should try telling that to the likes of Marcus Greenhouse and the thousands of single mums, disabled and unemployed people wheeled through the courts for allegedly evading the fee every single week.

"Prosecutions only proceed if they meet the evidential test" - who does this wise guy think he's trying to kid?!

With the BBC displaying utter contempt towards the paying public, there never has been a better time to ditch the TV licence altogether. Even with the imminent closure of the so-called iPlayer loophole, there are many ways to enjoy your favourite programmes without the legal need for a TV licence - Amazon Prime and Netflix immediately spring to mind.

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Imminent Changes to TV Licence Legislation

According to TV Licensing's PR harlots, only 1-in-5 households is aware of changes to the TV licence system that come into force on 1st September 2016.

Of course, given that around 95% of properties are covered by a valid TV licence (and most of the 5% that aren't, don't legally need a TV licence), the changing legislation will be of no relevance whatsoever to the overwhelming majority of the population. That isn't quite such a headline grabbing statistic, which is undoubtedly why TV Licensing's PR flunkies have chosen to ignore it.

As there appears to be confusion in certain quarters, we shall briefly (and simply) summarise the key changes in legislation from 1st September 2016:

If your property is covered by a valid TV licence:

• The changes in legislation will have no impact on you at all.

If your property is not covered by a valid TV licence:

• As is currently the case, a TV licence will be required for the property if equipment is installed or used to receive TV programmes (e.g. programmes shown on any channel at the same time as they are broadcast to other members of the pubic).
• From 1st September 2016 a TV licence will be required to watch BBC on-demand services (e.g. those on the BBC iPlayer). No TV licence is required to watch BBC on-demand services until that date.
• As is currently the case, a TV licence will not be required to watch non-BBC on-demand services.

As previously mentioned, we consider the changes in legislation to be confusing and unenforceable. It is poor legislation designed to fix a problem (the so-called iPlayer loophole) that didn't really exist in the first place, given the negligible number of unlicensed people that used the BBC iPlayer for catch-up only.

We anticipate that the tiny increase in revenue generated will be more than offset by the added difficulties in administering and enforcing the new system.

When it all falls apart, you can be confident that we'll be first in line to tell the BBC "we told you so!"

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New Style TV Licensing Threatogram: Will You Be In?

TV Licensing has just unveiled its latest letter designed to coerce the occupiers of unlicensed properties - at least 80% of which are correctly unlicensed - into buying a TV licence they probably have no legal need for.

Senior member 198kHz of the TV Licence Resistance forums (a marvellous community, as discussed here) received the new format letter a couple of days ago. As he also reads our blog, we hope he doesn't mind us reproducing his image above.

This threatogram is unusual in that features a red ink stamp-type mark indicating that an enforcement visit has been approved by TV Licensing uber goon John Hales.

The full text of the letter is as follows:

______________________________

Will You Be In On [Date]? 

As there is no record of a TV Licence at your address, you should expect a visit from an Enforcement Officer.

It may be on [date] or on another day. If you are caught watching or recording live TV, on any device, you face a fine of up to £1,000 plus any legal costs and/or compensation you may be ordered to pay.

We visit 10,746 addresses a day.

Our Enforcement Officers visit an address every 5 seconds. Day. Evening. And even weekends. And if no one answers, they can come back.

Stop a visit before it's too late.

• Buy a TV Licence at tvlicensing.co.uk/pay with payments starting from £5.60 a week.
• Or, move an existing TV Licence to your current address at tvlicensing.co.uk/moving.
• Or, tell us you don't need one at tvlicensing.co.uk/noTV

For help with any of the above, please call 0300 790 6077 or turn over for more information.

If you do not do any of the above, you can expect a visit soon.

Yours faithfullly,

[Name]

Enforcement Manager, [Location]

______________________________

All very scary. Not.

In common with every other TV Licensing threatogram, if you read carefully you'll say a generous splattering of the words "may" and "if" and very little of substance.

The simple fact of the matter is that TV Licensing probably won't visit on the date mentioned at the head of the letter. Even if they did, the occupier would be well within their rights to ignore the knock at the door. If TV Licensing want to waste their time returning to knock for a second time, then so be it.

Remember that a legally-licence-free person is under no obligation at all to TV Licensing. Simply ignore their letters and keep the door firmly closed on any TV Licensing goon that calls.

Don't be one of the unfortunate innocent people who makes the mistake of trusting TV Licensing and ends up accused of an offence they haven't committed.

TV Licensing are complete and utter scum and cannot be trusted.

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BBC Blasted for Having 5,000 Job Titles

Strangely enough, "Bad News Burier", "Freedom of Information Obfuscator" and "Public Money Pisser" don't currently feature.

An article by The Sun (ex-DM) journalist Paul Revoir reveals that the bloated BBC has five times more job titles than a company its size should have.

Five years ago the BBC was slated for having 4,500 job titles, but in the intervening years it has somehow managed to acquire an extra 500, including:

• Senior Change Manager
• Solution Architect
• Reward Project Analyst
• Thematic Research Manager
• Lead Platform Architect
• Talent, Learning and Organisation Development Manager
• Jupiter System Specialist

Jonathan Isaby of the TaxPayers' Alliance said: "Transparency at the Beeb is absolutely crucial to make sure these countless job titles don’t end up masking duplicate roles at the expense of hard-pressed licence fee-payers. Far too often people have no idea what these fancy titles actually mean. That cannot be right."

A BBC spokesman said: "We’re creating a simpler, leaner BBC which means we need fewer senior managers and can focus as much money as possible on programmes and services rather than everyday running costs."

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The Role of G4S in TV Licensing Sales

"We called", goes the menacing tone of a TV Licensing calling card.

But did they really?

The BBC TV Licensing operations contractor, Capita Business Services Ltd, is responsible for the majority of customer-facing TV licence administration and enforcement work. Part of its role is to visit unlicensed properties and "encourage", by fair means or foul, the occupiers to purchase a TV licence, irrespective of their legal need to do so.

With only 300 TV Licensing visiting goons across the UK it is a bit of a struggle to get around the 1.5 million homes without a valid TV licence. To that end Capita sub-contracts security giant G4S to perform a significant proportion of the donkey work on its behalf. G4S, as you might remember from its abysmal handling of the London 2012 Olympics and private sector prisons, is utterly incompetent in the same manner as Capita.

Thanks to information recently released by the BBC, we know that G4S carried out 843,497 of these visits in the 12 months to 31st March 2015. Only 1.9% of G4S visits generated a TV licence sale, which compares to the 16.1% sales yield achieved by Capita-employed goons.

So why do G4S goons sell far fewer TV licences than their Capita counterparts? Well, in our opinion there are three main reasons:

• Firstly, and very significantly, Capita-employed goons are expected, as a basic condition of employment, to drum up as many TV licence sales as humanly possible. Indeed they can earn lucrative commission payments by doing so, which we suggest results in them hard-selling TV licences to people who don't legally need them.
• Secondly, G4S goons only engage in passive TV Licensing visits. This means they sneak up to the front door of the unlicensed property, surrepticiously slide a calling card through the letter box and then immediately slink away in retreat. They do not engage with the occupier in the same way Capita-employed goons do, so are far less likely to scare the occupier into buying a TV licence they don't legally need.
• Finally, a Capita-employed goon is able to generate a sale immediately at the time of visit, whereas a G4S goon cannot do that. A TV licence sale can only be attributed to G4S if the occupier, having received a G4S dropped calling card, subsequently buys a TV licence as a result of that card. For obvious reasons people are far less likely to act on the receipt of a calling card than they are the aggressive threats of a TV Licensing goon on their doorstep.

Supposing a G4S goon does visit your unlicensed property, then rest assured they are only there to drop off a calling card. They are not in a position to gather evidence for TV Licensing.

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Enjoy the Rio 2016 Olympics TV Licence Free

With just over a fortnight until the Rio 2016 Olympics gets underway, we thought it would be a prudent opportunity to remind everyone how to enjoy the coverage without a TV licence.

Rio 2016 kicks off, appropriately enough, with women's football on 3rd August 2016.

As sure as eggs is eggs TV Licensing's massed army of PR harlots will be poised ready to issue shit-scary (not) threats about the consequences of tuning into the action without a valid TV licence.

You can be fairly confident they'll talk about £1,000 fines (that never happen), enforcement officers that call anytime of the day (when they don't) and criminal records (that aren't really recorded anywhere). They might even mention the menacing (not) prospect of search warrants (that are hardly ever used) and detector vans (that are used even less).

As always, we remind readers that a TV licence is required for any property where they intend to receive "live" (as broadcast) coverage of any of the Olympic events.

Fortunately, there remains a myriad of perfectly legal ways to enjoy the coverage licence-free.

Here are just a few:

1. Watch it non-live on a catch up service: You do not need a licence to enjoy previously broadcast non-live coverage on the BBC's iPlayer for example. Be aware that from 1st September 2016 a TV licence will be required to watch non-live coverage on the BBC iPlayer, but not the online catch-up services offered by other providers.

2. Watch live at a friend's place: If they've got a TV licence you could go and watch their telly instead. If you didn't want to impose you could take your laptop around and stream live TV via their broadband connection.

3. Watch live at the pub/club: I'm reliably informed by student friends that you can nurture a soft drink for at least two hours if you sip it slowly. That's just enough time to see the marathon.

4. Watch live at your local electrical retailer: Electrical retailers do not need a TV licence for their display sets. If you're a bit of a cheapskate you could visit Currys and watch the best events there.
5. Watch online somewhere with free wifi. The business providing the free wifi service is probably covered by a valid TV licence, but even if they aren't there's no reasonable prospect of being pounced on by a TV Licensing goon that happens to pass by. They're all far too busy harassing soft targets like single mums, the disabled and the unemployed.

6. Become a TV engineer: If you're a TV fixer-upper then you do not need a TV licence to test equipment you're working on.

7. Visit the big screen: Big screens will be showing live Olympics coverage in cities across the UK. Wrap up warm, take a few tinnies and watch 'til your heart's content.

In common with the London 2012, the BBC will be live streaming every event on its website. Don't quote me on this, but they have absolutely no way of knowing whether you really do have a TV licence when you're watching online.

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BBC Releases TV Licensing Detection Statistics

The BBC relies very heavily on the public perception that a TV detector van is rumbling along every other street on the prowl for TV licence evaders.

We know that because that's what the BBC told the Information Commissioner's Office when it was defending - successfully as it goes - its decision to refuse the release of TV detection statistics requested under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

In its Decision Notice (FS50154106) dated 16th October 2008, the Information Commissioner's Office said: "The BBC state that to release information which relates to the number of detection devices and how often they are used will change the public’s perception of their effectiveness.

"If the deterrent effect is lost, the BBC believes that a significant number of people would decide not to pay their licence fee, knowing how the deployment and effectiveness of vans and other equipment will affect their chances of success in avoiding detection."

The BBC's position has not materially changed since then. It still refuses to provide any information about the number of TV detector vans or their deployment, on the grounds that doing so would be prejudicial to law enforcement - namely the BBC's ability to nab TV licence evaders.

Imagine then our delight when the BBC inadvertently let the cat out of the bag with its recent Freedom of Information blunder.

According to the TV Licensing Field Monthly Performance Pack for March 2015, there were only 116 detection requests across the whole UK in the 12 months to 31st March 2015. Of those, 115 were in England and one in Northern Ireland. There were no detection requests at all made in Scotland or Wales.

The Performance Pack does not state how many of those requests were successful but we know, from comments made by previous Office of Surveillance Commissioners' reports on the BBC, that not every request is granted. Indeed the OSC has previously complimented the BBC on the way it meticulously examines every detection request before authorisation is granted.

It therefore follows, we suggest, that a significant proportion of the 116 detection requests were refused, thus reinforcing our firm belief that TV detection is neither routine nor widespread as the BBC would have people believe.

Remember also that TV Licensing only uses plain white high-topped VW Transporter vans for detection purposes. The vans have a windowed sliding door on the nearside, which has a second smaller window above it. The offside of the vans has an identical large window, but no sliding door.

You can read a bit more about the myth of detection in our earlier post on the subject.

The TV Licensing Blog is grateful to the BBC for its help in researching this article.

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Worcester Man Has TV Licence Conviction Quashed

A Worcester man has won a Crown Court appeal against his wrongful conviction for TV licence evasion.

Nick Thomas only watches catch-up services on his TV set, which does not legally require a TV licence.

But that didn't deter TV Licensing from prosecuting the 43-year-old for an offence he hadn't committed, on the most questionable of evidence.

Fortunately Nick's conviction has just been overturned by a judge at Worcester Crown Court.

We are hoping to track him down for some comment on the case, so stay tuned for updates.

In the meantime, you can read more on Nick's story here.

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Only 300 TV Licensing Visiting Officers Cover Whole UK

Figures released by the BBC confirm that there are only around 300 TV Licensing visiting officers covering the entire UK.

The TV Licensing Monthly Performance Pack for March 2015, which was inadvertently released by the BBC without proper redaction, confirms that there were 440.5 full time equivalent goons engaged in enforcement activities, of which 305.8 full time equivalents were bog-standard door-knockers (which TV Licensing refer to as visiting officers).

The same document confirms that there were 388,754 visits made by goons in March 2015, of which just over 1-in-6 resulted in the sale of a TV licence to the occupier of the unlicensed property. The average door-knocking goon visited 1,270 properties per month, which works out at the equivalent of 8.5 properties per full time equivalent goon per hour.

Remember, as mentioned in our article about the "Unfairness of the TV Licensing Goon Commission System", that door-knocking goons are required to achieve at least one "Code 8" prosecution statement every hour of the working week as a basic condition of employment.

We stand by our earlier observation that the system of commission payments is wide open to abuse. The BBC has confirmed that several TV Licensing goons have fiddled the books in the past and we are of the firm belief that the system actively encourages dishonesty at the expense of innocent people who do not require a TV licence.

By far the safest option to avoid falling foul of a dishonest goon is to keep the door firmly closed.

TV Licensing should never be trusted.

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BBC Seeks to Mitigate Freedom of Information Blunder

Just as we predicted, the BBC is trying desperately to undo its latest Freedom of Information blunder.

Last Tuesday, in response to a Freedom of Information request, the Corporation released a swathe of information contained within the TV Licensing Monthly Performance Packs for March 2013, March 2014 and March 2015.

On Wednesday we examined the disclosure documents and quickly realised that the BBC had failed to redact some of TV Licensing's innermost secrets. We duly wrote an article on the BBC's embarrassing blunder, which drew its attention to the oversight and spurred it into seeking removal of the "leaky" documents from WhatDoTheyKnow.

By carelessly clicking the "send" button, BBC lawyer Katherine Leslie has undone decades of secrecy on the subject of TV Licensing search warrants. Try as it might, there is no way the BBC can undo that damage now the genie is out of the bottle.

WhatDoTheyKnow has asked the BBC to clarify its reasons for requesting takedown of its disclosure documents, but a source close to the website has confirmed that it's very unlikely any material will ever be removed.

It is widely believed that the BBC will cite "commercial sensitivity" and "law enforcement" reasons for the takedown, but WhatDoTheyKnow is under no legal obligation to comply with the request.

WhatDoTheyKnow volunteer Doug Paulley, made the following annotation: "The BBC has been in touch about their redaction failure, and we're seeking to establish if there is any material which we should remove from public view.

"We only remove material if we are legally required to do, or in exceptional, very rare cases of clear moral need to do so. Our legal obligations are not the same as a public body's.

"As far as we know at the moment, there doesn't appear to be any compelling reason for us to remove any information published on this request."

In the extremely unlikely event that WhatDoTheyKnow does succumb to the BBC's request, you will still be able to download the "leaky" documents from this folder.

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Edit (11/7/16): The BBC has been in touch to inform us that Katherine Leslie was not responsible for compiling or checking the "leaky" disclosure documents (before she emailed them out). The BBC also claims that she played no role in deciding which information should be released.

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Northern Ireland TV Licensing Search Warrant Execution

New video footage has emerged showing a pair of TV Licensing goons executing a search warrant in Northern Ireland.

The two goons, one of whom we recognise as Paul Bale (who we consider a pretty shady character, to say the least), are accompanied by two PSNI officers.

A copy of the warrant, shown in the image below, reveals that the information was laid by Paul Bale too. This is interesting because warrants are normally sworn by a Capita Court Presenter. We'd always considered Bale to be a bog standard TV Licensing door-knocker rather than a Court Presenter, so we can't quite work out how the job fell to him. Unless, of course, there are two Paul Bales working for Capita TV Licensing in Northern Ireland (a frightening prospect for justice within the province).

We do not know the full circumstances leading up to the execution of this warrant, so can't comment too much further. If anything new comes to light we shall add it to this article.

It does appear that the PSNI officers - particularly the mouthy camera-shy female - acted beyond their remit in assisting the two hapless goons.

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Edit (22/4/2017): We have just confirmed that the second TV Licensing goon pictured on the right of the image above is called Laurence Moore.

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Isle of Man Scraps Free Over-75 TV Licences

The Isle of Man Government will scrap "free" TV licences for the over-75s later this year.

From 1st September 2016 households with at least one over-75 occupier, which are currently eligible for a TV licence paid for the state, will have to pay the normal £145.50 fee like everyone else.

However, those in receipt of income support will still be eligible to apply for the concession under a local scheme.

Bill Henderson MLC, political member of the Treasury with responsibility for Social Security, said: "Since the beginning of 2002, anyone aged 75 or over has been eligible to receive a free TV licence, irrespective of their means. The same arrangement exists in the UK. However, the cost to the taxpayer of £700,000 a year is no longer affordable and cannot be justified."

"However, pensioners who receive income support are eligible to have the cost of their TV licence paid for through an existing social security scheme. We will shortly be writing to those who receive income support to tell them this and how to get help under that scheme. We will also be writing to the over 75s who don’t get income support, encouraging those on low incomes to make enquiries about their potential entitlement to income support, and therefore potentially accessing help with paying for their TV licences too."

The BBC, which will shortly take on full responsibility for funding the over-75 TV licence, is currently exploring methods to reduce the £750m annual bill incurred by UK over-75s. One proposal is to ask over-75s to voluntarily pay the TV licence fee; another option is to change the eligibility criteria, so that only those households consisting entirely of over-75 occupiers can benefit.

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TV Licensing Abandons 150,000 Customer Telephone Calls

The TV Licensing operations contractor, Capita Business Services Ltd, terminated almost 150,000 customer phone calls in a year without even bothering to answer them.

Just as you'd expect, that woeful performance is well below the expectations of Capita's service level agreement with the BBC.

TV Licensing has been widely ridiculed for the atrocious way it handles incoming calls. Anyone with the misfortune of having to speak to TV Licensing on the telephone - not that we recommend it - will first have to battle their way through a baffling array of up to 71 different menu options. Fortunately we know a shortcut, which you can read about in our earlier post on the subject.

Between 1st February 2014 and 31st March 2015 TV Licensing recorded the "forced abandonment" of 146,882 incoming calls before the operator had even answered. This equates to around 480 telephone calls being ignored every day that the call centre is open - that's 480 calls that the customers are still paying for.

Forced abandonment occurs at times of high demand, when the TV Licensing call centre is overwhelmed by incoming calls and pulls the plug to free up capacity.

This data was published on page 6 (of 18) of the TV Licensing Front Office Performance Pack for March 2015, which was recently released by the BBC in response to a Freedom of Information request. You can view that document here.

The same document reveals that a further 94,041 telephone calls were abandoned by customers who got fed up of waiting for an operator to answer. These customers abandoned their call after wasting, on average, 2 minutes and 30 seconds of their time.

In total 241,973 calls were abandoned, representing around 4 percent of incoming calls.

Anyone requiring information about TV Licensing is advised to visit the official TV Licensing website or, better still, try using the search bar above to see if we've already covered the topic.

The TV Licensing Blog is grateful to Nathan Gregory for his assistance in researching this article.

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TV Licence Legislation Extended to Cover BBC iPlayer Services

The Government has just laid new legislation before Parliament, which is designed to close the so-called iPlayer loophole.

The Communications (Television Licensing)(Amendment) Regulations 2016 will come into force on 1st September 2016.

You can read our opinion on the new rules in our earlier post on the subject.

Under current arrangements a TV licence is not required to view non-live, on-demand content via the BBC iPlayer. From the beginning of September a TV licence will be required to view this type of content.

The new legislation only covers the BBC iPlayer. Licence-free viewers will still be able to legally enjoy any non-live, on-demand content provided by other broadcasters. We would encourage people to view those alternative content streams instead.

We do not agree with this latest piece of legislation. It is worst type of legislation - confusing, unfair, unenforceable. It has been drafted by a weak Secretary of State to appease an institutionally-corrupt, cash-greedy BBC.

Far better, in our opinion, for the Government to force the BBC to live within its means. The BBC wastes millions every month through financial mismanagement, whereas closing the so-called iPlayer loophole will generate virtually no extra revenue.

You can read the new 2016 Regulations here.

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Man Spared Jail After Smashing Up TV Licensing Goon's Car

A Judge has spared a man from jail after he threatened a pair of TV Licensing goons with a baseball bat and smashed up their car.

Christopher Coulson, 26, appeared before Bolton Crown Court yesterday having previously pleaded guilty to two counts of assault, criminal damage and possession of an offensive weapon.

The court was told how TV Licensing goons David Smyth and Christian Platt had visited Coulson's home in the town on the evening of 20th April 2016. The pair had visited the unlicensed property to establish whether or not a TV licence was required.

Coulson's partner, Sarah Leatherbarrow, had answered the door and was engaging with the goons on the doorstep when he flew down the stairs in his underwear, swore at the goons and slammed the door closed. A moment later Coulson reopened the door and punched Smyth in the face, before grabbing a baseball bat and chasing both goons away from the property.

Nicholas Clark, prosecuting, told the court how Coulson then returned to his property, put on a hoodie and then managed to sneak up on the goons, who were further down the road. The goons fled and sought refuge in Smyth's VW Golf car, which Coulson proceeded to smash up with his baseball bat.

Coulson later handed himself into the police.

Martin Pizzey, defending, acknowledged that Coulson's behaviour justified a term of imprisonment, but The Honorary Recorder of Bolton, Judge Timothy Clayson, clearly disagreed.

Coulson was sentenced to eight months imprisonment, suspended for 18 months and must undertake 140 hours unpaid work. He also must participate in 30 days of rehabilitation activities focused on anger management and respecting other people.

The TV Licensing Blog in no way condones physical violence against TV Licensing goons. Indeed, we condemn Coulson's act of aggression on that evening.

Our advice to anyone who does not legally need a TV licence is as follows: Ignore TV Licensing completely.

Do not respond to TV Licensing correspondence, do not answer the door to TV Licensing goons and do not waste your valuable time communicating with TV Licensing's scummy operatives. Keep the door closed and keep TV Licensing out.

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Capita TV Licensing Awarded £120 Million in Prosecution Costs

Data released by the BBC reveals that TV Licensing operations contractor, Capita Business Services Ltd, is awarded £120m in prosecution costs every year.

This information appears in the TV Licensing Field Performance Pack for March 2015, which was released by the BBC in response to a recent Freedom of Information request. Unfortunately for them, the chimp they hired to do the redactions wasn't very effective at its job.

Part of Capita's role as operations contractor is to prosecute those individuals accused of TV licence evasion. Those convicted of the offence are normally fined and ordered to pay a contribution towards prosecution costs. In TV licence cases the true prosecution costs are minimal, but that doesn't deter Capita from making an inflated, in our opinion, standard costs request of £120 per case (at time of writing, for cases dealt with at the first hearing). In most cases, the court will succumb to that request.

The BBC has previously confirmed that prosecution costs awarded by the court are retained by Capita and are intended to "reimburse the prosecutor and not enrich them". Given the massive sums involved, we suggest that Capita has a clear vested interest in dragging as many people to court as possible, however tenuous the evidence against them.

The overwhelming majority of those prosecuted for TV licence evasion are financially disadvantaged, which makes it particularly galling that Capita, a FTSE 100 company that made £639m in profit in 2014-15, generates such massive revenue at their expense.

Data obtained by the TV Licensing Blog reveals that Capita was awarded £118.2m in prosecution costs in the financial year 2014-15. Of that, some £73.8m was actually recovered by the court and paid to Capita. The BBC has noted that these figures should not be released publicly (oops) because the revelation that the courts are sluggish at collecting prosecution costs might encourage evasion (oh dear).

View the TV Licensing Analysis of Court Activity 2014-15 here.

The data confirms that Capita routinely withdraws about 10 percent of all cases laid before the court. Bear in mind that TV Licensing prosecutes very few of the people it accuses of TV licence evasion. Ministry of Justice data indicates that only about 40 percent of those TV Licensing claim to be evading the fee are actually convicted of the offence (see this earlier post).

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BBC Releases TV Licensing Search Warrant Statistics

The BBC has inadvertently released TV Licensing search warrant statistics for the whole of the UK.

Yesterday the BBC released a copy of the TV Licensing Performance Pack for March 2015 in response to a Freedom of Information request by Nathan Gregory (see request at WhatDoTheyKnow.com).

The Performance Pack, just as the name implies, contains all manner of data about TV Licensing's performance at administering and enforcing the TV licence fee.

Page 29 (of 32) of the Field Performance Pack, which you can view here, contains data about the number of search warrant applications made by TV Licensing in the 12 months to 31st March 2015.

A cursory glance at that page seems to suggest that the key statistics, which the BBC always refuses to divulge, have been redacted, but the data is still available if you drill down into the finer detail of the document.

We have reproduced the key data in this table, which we'd encourage you to download and share.

For your convenience, the edited highlights for 2014/15 are as follows:

• Just as we suspected, there were no search warrants applied for in Scotland. We attribute this to the fact that the Scottish legal system would be far more robust than its England/Wales and Northern Ireland counterparts in analysing every TV Licensing search warrant application.
• In the whole of the UK there were only 351 search warrants requests made by TV Licensing's Field Enforcement Division to the TV Licensing Legal Team. Of those TV Licensing made 256 search warrant applications to the courts, of which only 167 were actually granted.
• Of the 167 warrants granted, only 115 of those were executed (97 successfully, 17 unsuccessfully, 1 unknown).
• In London, there were only 2 search warrants granted by the court.

One can only imagine the BBC's immense frustration that these figures - which the Corporation has sought desperately hard to keep hidden for years - have finally been released publicly due to its own incompetent oversight (not unlike this earlier case actually).

These statistics finally confirm, once and for all, that TV Licensing search warrants really are rarer than hen's teeth.

Certainly anyone who does not legally need a TV licence, should not be unduly concerned by the threat of a search warrant.

The TV Licensing Blog would like to thank the BBC for its assistance in researching this article.

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Edit (6/7/16): You can now download the complete unredacted documents here.

Edit (9/7/16): As we predicted, the BBC has been making attempts to undo its mistake. It has contacted the WhatDoTheyKnow website to request removal of the "leaky" disclosure documents.

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