To think the TV License should be scrapped

[Hedgehogbrown]

Hear me out. I love the BBC, grew up on it, and want it preserved forever. The Television License is such an outdated and inefficient way to pay for the BBC though. Most young people don't have a TV, they have computers and they don't see why they should get a TV License, regardless of the law. They don't have a TV License. Most Millennials I know don't pay their TV License. When you are poor it is another stressful expense.

How much does it cost them to try to enforce? It seems so old fashioned and wasteful. In Australia they have a state run channel but it is paid for through general taxation. If the government grew some balls and taxed all the Tech Bros who are trying to destroy the world, they can ring fence some of that taxation for the BBC. The BBC is actually good at making money, it exports it's stuff around the world. Their profits can go to the Treasury. No more paying for people to go round in vans trying to catch people out for not having a license like it's the 1970s.

I think it would be such a vote winner for people to not have to pay this.

It should be a monthly opt in and pay for subscription like all the others. How it is operating is absolutely archaic and they need to move with the times. If that doesn’t produce enough revenue for them then clearly they aren’t for for purpose. Threatening and giving criminal records to those vulnerable and naive enough to talk to them is utterly disgusting.

I happily pay the license for bbc sounds, iPlayer, radio and the rest. If it became a subscription service I think it would cost more annually than the current license. I could afford this, but lots of people couldn’t.

I cancelled mine years ago.

I don't watch any live TV and I think the BBC lost its independence and impartiality years ago.

I refuse to contribute to the salaries of people like Laura Kuenssberg for example who is so biased it is embarrassing to the BBC that she is still employed by them.

The idea of criminalising people for watching TV is just outdated and bizarre.

Its not criminalising people for watching tv, its criminalising people for not paying for a service that they use. You can't ride on a train for free.

I absolutely want the Italian TV license scrapped. It’s whacked onto my electricity bill and is seemingly impossible to opt out of.

Rai doesn’t even have The Glory Days that the BBC had.

We couldn’t even watch it if we wanted to. The app is so shite it crashes if you so much as breathe hard around it. The old antenna is defunct. The new “plug into your TV” boxes don’t appear to work when you live in the middle of nowhere.

I get pissed off every time the electricity bill lands and I see the extra TV licence charge.

It is criminalising people who don’t watch BBC, your analogy is the same as banning bus travel unless you also have a train season ticket.

Ok fair point, but I find people that say the 'never watch the bbc' do actually, it turns out, do.

Can sky, disney+, Netflix, Prime, Paramount etc also be included in with council tax? If you're going to force people to pay for a tv service, then include them all.
And no, I have not paid the bbc licence fee in years as don't watch that rubbish service.

Exactly

How do you know it's rubbish if you don't watch it 🤔

It is a charge per household. Collect it with the council tax and have a system of opting out if you have no tv. Cost of collection and enforcement would be almost nil, and the charge could probably be reduced by 10 per cent at least.

The BBC don't help their cause by not knowing when to end a series (flogging dead horses so to speak) and the three word argument for licence fee abolition, Mrs Brown's Boys.

Because I used to watch it when I paid the outdated licence fee.
Plus I travel a lot and come across bbc, which is free outside of the UK

It's not about whether you have a tv or not. It's about watching bbc or live tv.

There's many tv service providers that support themselves without old fashioned scare mongering. Bbc need to move with the times... or disappear

I tend to think of the £12 as a subscription to the BBC as I would Netflix etc.

If you're considering evading it, be aware it carries a criminal conviction, which can be a lifelong problem, and not totally unlikely as 50,000 people found out last year...

I didn't renew my TV in Jan/Feb. I've been sent about 20 letters and I must say they are pretty threatening. We've had one chap come to the house and told him we don't watch TV. They then sent another letter.

I did watch Strike on BBC when I had a licence and will want to watch the new series when it comes out. But that's £40+ an episode when it's the only thing you will watch. I'll just go somewhere with a TV licence and watch it there.

The nature of the letters makes me determined to never watch TV again. I've paid for years without getting my monies worth and they've never asked if I think I get value for money, or what would make it more worthwhile, just threats of investigation. They won't get a penny out of me for that alone. The wording on the website is also ambiguous and I feel attempts to trick people in buying it when they probably don't need it.

Because they were stupid enough to answer the door and admit to.it.....

@x2boys

Golden Rule - never engage with a Crapita Goon

This is nonsense.

At no point has the BBC ever operated any sort of "detection" equipment.

@XDownwiththissortofthingX
yes it is a myth, but they rely on some people being gullible, sadly.

there are some photos of the vans, the ones that aren’t scrapped are in museums, literally museum pieces 🤣

There are lots of things you get taxed for but don't use. How often do you use an ambulance or fire brigade?

I'm happy to continue to pay tax to fund these things for contingent use. I do not use the BBC and never will, and I refuse to pay to have hilariously biased regional news piped into my home.

Lots of people enjoy and need the BBC

Cool, they can continue to fund it then...

Also, you do need a license for BBC iPlayer by the way, those of you who think you don't need one

and ffs, it's "licence".

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow

Also: Capita have just been fined £14m for a data breach. I object to the BBC using Capita.

"Opting out" means I have to go on the BBC website to give them (Capita) my name, address, email address and IP address just to tell them I don't use the BBC's service

It needs to be subscription only. It only speaks to the well off. Nearly all BBC journalists have been to private school. The minority that haven't, have been to very prestigious grammar schools.

They think they are diverse but they are totally unrepresentative of the UK in terms of class and opinion. They think they know what's going on, but they only know how life is for the well off. If people want to subscribe to that, they're welcome to.

I never watch the BBC. It seems to be nothing but cooking, gardening, and dancing shows, and Eastenders, none of which I am interested in.

I do enjoy ITV dramas, but unless I am willing to pay for a service I do not want or use, I can't watch them without being criminalised by the BBC or waiting for them to hit Netflix/catch up.

How is that fair? Once people have to start paying for Disney Plus, so that I can watch Netflix, I will start paying for a TV license, until then I will put up with the shitty letters telling me I will go to prison and expecting me to prove that I am not commiting a crime (for all other crimes, the onus on the state to prove a crime occured not the accused to prove they didn't).

They've lost a potential customer in me, because if it were a subscription service, I would pay for it when Dr Who is showing.

The BBC has an immense back catalogue of decades of content that it ought to be able to monetise, particularly overseas, to at least significantly subsidise its current services. I've never fully understood why it's never really succeeded with that.