To think the BBC really should be shut down?

[Loeri]

After the child abuse scandals, and now this where BBC execs have been given payments far beyond anything they were required to be given, isn't it time that the BBC was just shut down? It can't really be said that it makes the best TV in the world anymore, the best TV programmes come from the US and have done for well over a decade now. I just don't see the purpose of the BBC in 2013. It is arrogant, bloated beyond belief and seems only to exist to provide cushy jobs for the Guardian set.

Boffin, I decided my original posting with paragraph number references and shit was probably a bit too geeky.

Poppy, that is indeed true and I knew that but had forgotten the term.

friday16, you are a repository of knowledge about broadcasting history! I am very impressed!

(I was so tempted to say 'suppository of knowledge' there as a nod to our Australian cousins).

I love BBC radio and for that alone it earns a fee - there is nothing like it

Point against.Trouble is, it got to be biased somewhere along the way.
I dont like news that is obviously biased.

Point for. I have a nasty suspision that tv in general would dumb down even more without the BBC.

friday that is an interesting (skim)read. But compared to similar documents I have read from plenty of private companies there is nothing particularly shocking.

The Beeb is a sitting duck. It's not perfect but there is a lot worse. It is well known that they always get mauled by any Parliamentary Select Committee, so can expect one next week.

But other than usual company politics, is there anything really of significance there?

As I said, I skim read it (it's late Friday evening, so forgive me); it's interesting but not all that bad. If anything the finger can be pointed at the BBC Trust - let's not pretend that that is made up of people who have the core values of the Beeb at heart... Patten, for example?

BBC news pisses off the left and right in equal measure, to the point that they reflect majority public opinion on the whole, so slightly to the left on some issues, but to the right on others. (Remember here the Daily Mail isn't actually representative of public opinion, OP ) They're not at all biased in comparison with, ooh, any other news organisation in the world.

Indeed, I saw much worse happen when I worked in the magazine industry, and during my brief sojourn in an actuarial firm (who did all the enhanced pension calculations).

come on boffin, driving is something everyone has to do, enjoyment of the bbc is subjective

i for one do not find it worth the money they are asking. the entertainment offered is poor and aims most of it's tv to the blue peter audience

it should be paid for by subscriptoin NOT licence

I would also argue that having to make a programme that could be sold worldwide would be a driving artristic force to do so

why did so many programme on the bbc feature that bore alan yentob?

it just reeks of jobs for the boys

LaurieFairyCakeFri 06-Sep-13 07:48:20

No... It still makes the best tv and radio in the world - it's news reporting is the finest

Really? that will be why they did that MASSIVE report this week on the fact that DPAC were protesting outside their HQ about the way disability benefit claimants are portrayed on their network ..........oh wait thats right they DIDNT report on this!!!!!

"Indeed, I saw much worse happen when I worked in the magazine industry"

Sure. But they aren't empowered to levy, with criminal sanctions, a fee from anyone who reads any sort of magazine.

I couldn't care less if ITV spends all its money on beer and bonuses, because they're a private company and they're answerable to their shareholders and, to an extent, their advertisers. If ITV (or more precisely one of its constituent franchises) went bust tomorrow morning, not a lot would happen; although pre-switchover their UHF spectrum was a valuable asset, having a few channels in the DTV multiplexes makes them each about as significant as Rabbit TV.

The BBC is a large recipient of public and tax money (the license fee is about £3.5bn out of £5bn, isn't it?), is deeply embedded in our civil society and is not answerable to anyone in particular. Some might care to call the BBC Trust an effective mechanism of governance, but the BBC Trust is what you find in the dictionary when you look up "regulator capture". If the BBC Trust is supine in the face of misbehaviour, then it's people like the PAC that get to instead provide some oversight. Messy and unfair though it may be.

Its news reporting is, IMO, very far from the finest. I've ranted earlier in the thread already. And the BBC news website is now very tabloid-esque in style. Couldn't possibly be dumbed down any further.

Very little money is truly private. Most of it is associated with our pension funds and other investments, so I think there needs to be a sense of responsibility there.

the pbs epics, has been on par with what (or more) the bbc would produce

i just don't get this adulation the bbc gets, its daytime tv still consits of home under the hammer and that awful heir hunters

OP, is your main gripe with the BBC (apart from corruption) the licence? In the U.S PBS is funded by taxpayers. Every taxpayer regardless of whether or not they even own a television never mind if they watch it. The same goes in Australia with the ABC. I agree with you that as a publicly funded company the BBC should have a clean house and be able to prove it but to say it should be got rid of is BVU. I'm in Australia and we watch a lot of BBC stuff that we download. I love it. And I miss Pointless!

How would a subscription work? Would it cost more than £15 a month? Would over 75s get a free subscription?
I very much doubt they could afford to make many programmes based on subscription.
I don't know anyone who watches all their TV online, although some people on this thread do, they are in the minority. I agree that the media presents us all as watching catch-up tv on our iPhone and watching the iPad in bed etc but not many people live like that.
I'd rather not watch Homes under the hammer etc but my in-laws like it. I don't like Strictly but millions do. I'm able to afford a TV licence, I couldn't afford to pay much more.
The websites, radio, documentaries and dramas are worth more than £150 per year.

"i for one do not find it worth the money they are asking. the entertainment offered is poor"

In your opinion. Loads of people would disagree with you.

Many of seem to miss the point that without the licence fee the BBC would only make populist programmes and not take any risks. We would then end up with another ITV.

"I'm able to afford a TV licence, I couldn't afford to pay much more. "

I think you can make rational arguments for subscription, and for funding it out of general taxation (given that take-up of BBC services is probably higher than many other things that are funded from general taxation). When I'm channelling Adam Smith and being all free market, I veer towards subscription, when I'm clutching my Guardian vouchers and berating people for voting Lib Dem in 2010 and thus keeping Labour out I favour general taxation.

What I can't see the argument for is a flat-rate, essentially compulsory, levy. It's a regressive tax, of the sort that anyone of the left should be very nervous about (because of its effect on the poor) and anyone of the right should be nervous about (for a whole stack of market distortion arguments I can't quite recall before my first cup of coffee). It's precisely the people who can pay, just, who are penalised: I can mutter about the iniquity, but 150 quid a year is neither here nor there and therefore it's a theoretical argument, but for all too many people it's a significant chunk of money for something which, for practical purposes, they can't live without. It's crazy that a TV license costs someone on benefits a week's income or more, while for others it's an hour's income. The TV License is a tax. It should be related to the ability to pay. Like (almost all) other taxes (let's not do Vehicle Excise Duty, eh?)

The free for the over-75s thing is precisely the sort of crap that made the last Labour administration (for which I voted, and would still vote) the intellectually incoherent shambles that it was (it was a typically ill-thought out policy from Brown's chancellorship). Few people are worse off at 76 than they were at 74, and not all people aged over 75 are poor; indeed, they're the prime "defined benefits" generation, and quite a lot of them (not all, perhaps not many, but more than a few) are well off. If the BBC is going to be state funded (on balance, I think it should be) then messing about with discounts and freebies for ill-defined groups who may or may not struggle to pay the levy is a waste of time and money: just give the BBC the money out of general taxation and have done with it.

"Many of seem to miss the point that without the licence fee the BBC would only make populist programmes"

You mean like HBO? Oh, wait...

Is Dave related to the BBC?

That's Dave the channel on freeview, not any other Dave.

I have never seen any HBO programmes so I can't make a comparison.

Many of seem to miss the point that without the licence fee the BBC would only make populist programmes and not take any risks. We would then end up with another ITV.

That is what you have BBC is just reality programs with a couple of programs a week that might have been made without the general public being involved (homes under the hammer, bake off, escape to the country, wanted down under, the list goes on), the same as ITV. Why would anyone want 12-14 + reality programs which is what the BBC is showing every day of the week. I can't see the difference between ITV and BBC when you look at the show listings for the day?

But who actually sits down and watches TV all day every day?

I don't want the TV to have wall to wall programmes I want to watch otherwise I would never get anything done.

The only reality TV I watch is the GBBO and Strictly. I have found loads of non reality TV programmes on the BBC that interest me - comedy, crime drama, cookery shows, period drama, documentaries, music programmes. There are more programmes that don't interest me than do, but I'm fine with that.

Bunbaker - there is a growing part of society who are elderly and don't get out, they do watch TV all day and there are several hundreds of thousands of them.

You may not want wall to wall tv programs as you would never get anything done - but for some they can't get anything done and the only real life human they see is the meals on wheel person when they deliver their lunch.

Reality tv is excessive on both ITV and BBC,

Value for money would be fine if it was an equal amount of programs but it is not it is 80% reality shows and 20% a few other programs that is a balanced showing of programs