Guardian Readers Respond to TV Licensing Exposé

Guardian readers have responded to Zoe Williams' recent exposé of the TV licence fee scandal.

The TV Licensing Blog contributed towards Zoe's article.

Below we reproduce reader comments and add a few of our own:

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Regarding Zoe Williams' article, I still pay my licence fee despite not watching any live TV. I watch videos of all sorts on YouTube and livestreams several times a week on Twitch, and listen to music, often from internet radio stations with subscriptions. I refuse to leave myself open to the risk of prosecution for non-payment of a stealth tax that should either be rolled into ordinary taxation or made into an optional subscription. To prosecute someone for not paying £159 when those at the top are squirrelling away millions in offshore tax havens is the height of unfairness.

Paula Williams

Bar Hill, Cambridgeshire

TV Licensing Blog comment: This is a damning indictment of the way TV Licensing does business - coercing legitimate non-viewers into paying for a TV licence they don't legally need.

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In the 1950s, there was only one thing you could do with a television set, so there was a valid argument for everybody who possessed one paying for our only broadcaster via a licence. But it's not the 1950s any more. Now we have many more sources of TV material, and not all of them from broadcasters. So it no longer makes sense for one broadcaster to be paid by everyone regardless of whether they watch its programmes. It's not even clear what a "public service" broadcaster actually is any more, and I'm fairly sure the public have never been asked if they want one.

I can't think of anything the BBC does nowadays that isn't done at least as well, if not better, by others. And there are plenty of alternative payment methods that would be fairer than the BBC continuing to be paid more than £3bn every year regardless of what it does.

Roderick Stewart

Liverpool

TV Licensing Blog comment: As Roderick has identified, the TV licence is an outdated throwback to a bygone era when there was only one television service - that provided by the BBC. Nowadays, with hundreds of non-BBC channels available at the push of a button, it is peverse that people are coerced, on threat of criminal conviction, into paying for a BBC service they might not use and probably don't want.

It is the TV Licensing Blog's position that if the BBC's creative output is as good as it seems to think it is, it should have no problem in adopting a subscription funding model instead. In reality, despite regularly declaring its editorial brilliance and value for money, the BBC knows, deep down, that people simply wouldn't pay if given the choice. That's why it will continue fighting to the death in support of the TV licence fee.

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Zoe Williams' article was shocking - the prosecutions appear to be a bit of a moneymaking machine for the BBC. However, it should be pointed out that the single justice procedure (SJP) is only used for those who plead guilty or those who do not respond to the initial notice within 21 days. If the person receiving the notice pleads not guilty, their case will be transferred out of the SJP process, and listed for an in-person court hearing with a prosecutor and, if the defendant so wishes, a defence lawyer. One assumes that those being prosecuted are told this.

Dr Dolf A. Mogendorff

Leeds

TV Licensing Blog comment: Dr Mogendorff is absolutely correct that anyone receiving a SJP notice can either plead guilty and elect a sentencing hearing, or deny the offence and require a trial hearing. However, attending court is probably not as straightforward as he seems to think. TV licence cases are now dealt with at regional hubs, which may well mean a court hearing many miles away from the defendant's home. As TV licence evasion is a summary, non-imprisonable offence it is ineligible for legal aid funding. This means defendants would need to pay privately for legal representation, which may well cost far in excess of any penalty that might be imposed were they to be convicted.

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