Is it time to defund the BBC ?

[Nomorefees]

Just that - is it time to defund the BBC (Biased Broadcasting Corporation) and make it subscription only?

Discuss

People in different parts of the world can access the BBC free of charge. Its only us mugs here who have to pay.

I very rarely watch the BEEB and I believe its public funding should be scrapped and made a subscription service

Now what's she said? Tbh I stopped watching Questiontime after she was a knob to Sir Robert Winston. I had vicarious embarrassment and The Rage simultaneously, which is no use at 10pm.

The BBC are not impartial at all over sorts of matters, eg important debates around sex and gender, and won't respond to complaints properly. And Laura Kuenssberg nearly disappeared up Boris Johnson's backside when he was PM. They cover up a lot of dodgy behaviour from staff and presenters.

So because you don't like a few news stories, you want to get rid of the BBC?

Yeah, sod the rest of it! How bloody short sighted and narrow!

I'd like to see it treated like any other content provider. Because that's all it is.

^ This. I never watch it.

Subscription or optional. It should be easier for people who don't use it to opt out. We must be the only country in the world to pay for a TV Licence.

Makes me laugh how half of the thread is calling them lefty woke and the other stating they need to stop electing torosa at the head. Genuinely hilarious.

It should be subscription, so those who want it don't lose it.

I'd there a venn diagram of people who want to defend the BBC and who want to privatise the NHS?
What commercial channel would give us Detectorists?

I don’t think it’d survive as subscription only

I wouldn’t care about most programmes, oddly given pp we started The Detectorists last night and found it twee, I wouldn’t miss it, not sure we’ll even bother with it.

My big problem would be if radio went, R6 in particular as it grows bands in U.K. and also I like Wimbledon etc on BBC

But mostly the music scene

Well they would need to separate radio and TV.
There's so many radio channels including Radio Scotland/ Wales / the World Service/ Radio 3. All quite specialist, I doubt people think they should go.

Radio (inc Local & World service) News/current affairs, documentaries, nature programs, sport, comedy, all would go & once gone, gone forever, inc the huge indie TV Radio program making sector the UK has.

For less than a coffee a week, we get some pretty amazing TV/Radio

It seems its those mostly on the right of politics who want it gone, i wonder why? though listening to a R4 on GP services yesterday, i can see why they'd want this hidden :(

Thankfully, its not Labours plan to defund it & the Tories couldn't even manage to sell off Ch4, such is their idiocy, so hopefully (BBC and Ch4) safe for a while now.

I don’t want the BBC gone; I want it to find its way back PDQ to reporting on and presenting politics with impartiality. The News, Questiontime … all captured by a disastrously biased editorial line that allows nonsense to be spouted by (eg) Fiona Bruce to Sir Robert Winston.

Some of its news website is biased too, on any given day. There’s actual misinformation.

I want also want the BBC to sort out its shonky complaints & comments system. It isn’t the bloody Guardian - it’s a public, tax-payer funded broadcasting corporation.

I don’t want the BBC gone; I want it to find its way back PDQ to reporting on and presenting politics with impartiality. The News, Questiontime … all captured by a disastrously biased editorial line

Agree and on the news sites too

The BBC has to try and ride many horses, i think their news output, across 24hrs, is very good, possibly a little Govt biased but then i would say that wouldn't i ?

What i don't agree with is their obsession with balance, 99% of experts agree with X but they will present the 1% with equal importance.

If we got rid of the licence fee, then ITV and Channel 4 will also get rid of their regional news and local programming. They only do them because they are also being funded by the licence fee.

Re Detectorists, you should keep watching. I think it's a beautifully observed, gentle comedy. I would never describe it as twee, but each to his own.
Mackenzie Crook'a Worzel Gummidge was wonderful too.

@beguilingeyes love the Detectorists! It bears a second try I think…

Get a life

That’s in response to OP - not The Detectorists!

What would happen if all, or the majority of the people stopped paying and still watched either the live as show programs or used the iPlayer to watch the programs? The BBC couldn't take millions of people to court for non payment of the licence fee.
They have so few salespeople to visit homes that their threatening letters about visiting an address every 6 or 8 seconds is another lie that the TV Licensing, Capita, spew out, they couldn't visit an unlicensed address that often because they have under 300 people to visited unlicensed addresses.

I believe in Japan they have a licence fee but 92% don't pay and still watch live as shown programs. It's time the BBC took advertising or went behind a paywall and then people could watch live as shown content from ITV, CH4 and CH 5 plus any other channel that had a free to view website.

This.

I don’t and won’t pay for the bbc.

the fact that when I moved into my new house within days they sent me letters which haven’t stopped - threatening a prosecution for a crime I am not guilty of. It’s constant at least one letter a week. At least a 100 letters. The assumption being I am guilty.

I don’t have it - I have Netflix, prime and Disney and I choose these. Between them they come to less than a license. So they can jog on.

Good thinking Terminator. What do you think would happen if 'everyone' stopped paying? How would you continue to watch productions when you've removed their funding? Is everyone going to work unpaid for your pleasure?

I think if the majority stopped paying they would have to find a way of funding themselves, be it a subscription behind a paywall or by advertising. If they didn't get enough people paying for a subscription service they would likely go under.
If they tried the mass prosecution route without any evidence they would be likely to lose as the people could ask for all the evidence they had to prosecute the case, if they came back with a lame excuse like you have a Sky or Virgin TV subscription then they would have to prove that the person actually watched the live as shown content and not any on demand programs that the service provided.
They could only get the details of a person subscribing to a service like Sky TV if they got the details from the bank and that would be in breach of GDPR regulations, even a dish on the outside of a building doesn't mean you have a Sky TV subscription.

The lack of advertising is a good enough reason to keep the BBC IMO. The endless, ever-lengthening ad breaks drive me nuts. Also the 'Cupra (or whoever') sponsors films on four'.
If you don't want the BBC don't have it.

I also wonder why Huw Edwards was virtually publicly lynched and all over the media and Dan Wooton is still broadcasting and nothing is in the news at all.
I know licence fee, state broadcaster blah, blah, but the accusations against Wooten are far worse that the ones again Edwards.

Right wing media and the rest scared to upset Sunak in case he threatens them or worse... look how he has sided with Farage and ensured one of the few women CEO's in a ftse 100 company is forced to resign.