The BBC has proposed that the much maligned TV licence could eventually be replaced by a monthly broadband levy.
In its response to the current Government consultation on decriminalisation of TV licence fee evasion, the national broadcaster said that it favours the retention of the current system of criminal enforcement.
Under the current legislation a TV licence is required for every property where equipment is used to receive TV programmes. The rules apply irrespective of the channel a person is watching, even though the TV licence fee is used exclusively to fund the BBC.
Additionally, from 1st September 2016, a TV licence is required for any property where equipment is used to receive BBC on-demand programmes via the iPlayer.
The BBC generates almost £4 billion a year from the TV licence, which it collects and enforces under the guise of TV Licensing.
In the longer term the BBC has conceded it would be willing to consider an alternative funding model "linked directly to an existing common household bill" such as an internet connection, council tax, or electricity supply.
"This would be a significant change for the UK and we are not, at this stage, advocating it," the corporation said in its submission.
"It does however raise an interesting question as to whether the current system could be made much simpler, more efficient and more automated. We are open to exploring this further."
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the BBC wants to retain a mandatory funding model. It wants to avoid, at all costs, giving people the free choice of paying for its abysmal content, as it realises that millions of viewers simply wouldn't bother.
"The BBC is a universal service - one to which everyone contributes and everyone receives something in return," the BBC bleated. in its response to the consultation.
"Any system based on a universal contribution must have a sufficient deterrent and sanction to ensure that principle holds up and the system is fair to those who do pay, as well as those who don't."
Like the BBC, as an organisation that wrongly criminalises thousands of innocent people every year, would know anything about fairness!
The consultation closes this evening at 5 pm.
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1 comment:
I have been license free since about 2008 when I started working abroad full-time and since my return in August 2015 I simply haven’t got the patience to go back to broadcast TV or put up with BBC propaganda.
Being in an area of Perth which doesn’t even receive broadcast signals (only cable) also helps, since I have no desire to contribute to Beardie Weirdie Richard Branson and his local Virgin Media monopoly.
Hopefully they will realise that doing this will be stringently opposed by the Internet companies as it will be a dampener on Broadband expansion.
There is the other point that people who don’t have a broadband connection will effectively get BBC for free. I’m sure that will go down like a cup of cold sick as well.
What about the places like Perth that have a free WiFi connection available? At 1.5 Mbps it isn’t much, but what will happen to those? Will they just terminate the service or simply block BBC content (hopefully the latter)?
It sounds like an easy win for the BBC propaganda machine to guarantee their river of Danegeld, but hopefully it will be refused by those they are effectively using as a platform (the Internet companies) for a modern day reworking of the Telly Tax.
Moving to a subscription only service is the only way of doing this fairly, then the luvvies can see how much their beloved Auntie Beeb is actually “loved” by the country. Doubt it will raise the 4 billion quid a year that the license fee does, which is why they are averse to doing it.
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