Licence Fee To Be Abolished

Kids also learn to read, and draw, and still ‘sculpt’ with play-doh.

Back in ‘my day’ kids would be chucked out into the garden (which many don’t now have) or the streets (which are now too busy with traffic) to play when parents needed some peace and quiet. And that was back when women left work when they had kids more or less by default.


Nowadays mum is probably working at least part-time, and you put them in front of CBeebies while you have a work meeting over Teams.

My mother was working at least part time from the time my little sister and I were in school. My grandmother who was a headteacher took care of us through the school holidays.

I cooked the family meal every night from the age of 13 because both parents were out working full time.

The 70s and 80s were not just stay at home mums by any means.

Yes, the BBC did step up with some educational content during lockdown. That is to be applauded.

The link with the OU is far more imprecise than it once was.

But in a multichannel era with a range of delivery platforms, do we need two dedicated BBC channels for younger viewers? I am not sure that we do. I am quite happy to see a reduction in repeat of Homes under the Hammer or other things to see more BBC 1/2 programming for younger people.

I am not saying we need to return to the days where C4 only started broadcasting at 4pm with Countdown or the BBC shutting down at midnight with the National Anthem.

But it is right to look at the whole of the BBC operation to see what is essential, what is desirable and what could be delivered by other broadcasters in other ways.

Do we need BBC3 to return as a broadcast channel? I am not convinced.

Do we need so many local radio stations? Again my experience of them is that a more regional approach might be more appropriate

Asking questions allows proper consideration. It doesn't amount to prejudging thr outcome or seeking the destruction of the BBC

There is nothing wrong with asking questions but you must listen to the answers. A number of people here have commented how the BBC children’s output is essential and you’ve still come along and said you don’t think it is.

But therein lies the grander problem - too many people think they know best based on nothing but their personal opinions.

The BBC offers a vast array of content that not everything is going to appeal to everyone and everyone is going to suggest we lose what they don’t mind losing (e.g. Homes Under The Hammer) as a way forward.

My personal preference would be for the BBC to give up coverage of all sporting events. It will free up a big budget, Gary will be gone and Eastenders won’t be moved around to accommodate yet another football match. But clearly that isn’t feasible as sport has a huge audience and I accept that.

This is why I don’t believe the license fee will be abolished - there isn’t really a workable alternative. No other service caters for people of all ages.

The Radio Times posted a breakdown of the license fee back in 2018 (per month):

Television: £6.92
Radio: £2.17
BBC World Service: £1.24
Other services and production costs: £0.80
BBC Online: £1.08
Licence fee collection and other costs: £0.33

£7 is comparable to other online services and it’s worth noting that ITV does in fact offer an advert free subscription at £4 a month on its catch-up service. £2.17 for radio is an utter steal frankly and BBC4 is easily worth that.

www.radiotimes.com/tv/how-much-does-each-bbc-tv-and-radio-channel-cost-to-run/amp/

The BBC continues to dominate actually:

www.thinkbox.tv/research/barb-data/top-programmes-report/

In Week 01 it had the top three most watched shows in the UK, with Death in Paradise pulling in an audience share of 41% and 8.1m viewers. If you look through the list of the 50 most watched shows, you can clearly see just how diverse the BBC’s output continues to be.

Soaps used to get 20m viewers back when you could count the the amount of tv channels you had on one hand. They may not be the water cooler topic of choice anymore, but most BBC drama is - I’m sure most people have heard talk of ‘Four lives’ over the last week.

And moreover what would become of Elaine Paige on Sunday. That is worth every penny of the 43 pence a day.

They tried that. It launched as The Parliamentary Channel and went bust, resulting in its takeover by the BBC. All the original programming has been cancelled from it now so all it shows is live and recorded footage of the Commons, Lords and devolved parliaments. Maybe Parliament should pay the BBC to broadcast it as a public service but I can't see that happening in this environment. (Nor can I see World Service funding going back to the FCO given it was this government that said the BBC had to pay for it)

BBC Parliament doesn’t need broadcasting live, but it costs so very little I don’t see the harm in retaining it. But it could move online and be replaced by a live radio broadcast instead I guess.

What I will say is that I never used it until Brexit happened, and watching as debates and votes happened around the deals did justify its existence somewhat.

Everyone's going on about whether the BBC is broadcasting precisely the right balance of programming and missing the point, which is that this is the Conservatives punishing the BBC for being the BBC and not Pravda.

Other democratic objectives of this government:
Mandatory ID for voting, despite there being no significant voting fraud.
Strict control of protests.
Banning strong encryption on the Internet so anything you do online can be monitored.

Lots of the classic childrens series were shown for generations and still are. But the educational children's programmes are certainly valuable. 

I wonder if the government have failed to take into account that they'll want the BBC on side during the next election, well before 2027 rolls around. Of course they haven't, Boris Johnson rarely thinks beyond the end of next week, if that far.

The BBC has a big problem that it has lost its historical advantage of being able to underpay British talent because of a lack of competition. Once they led the world in TV drama. Succession with its British head writer would have been theirs in days gone by but they can't compete for talent with HBO. Instead they have to pretend that Peaky Blinders or Line of Duty represents prestige drama whilst the Americans look on with pity.

When was the last good sitcom on the BBC? What's changed is that today top British stand-up comics can make £20m a tour and the talent follows the money. Over many years sitcoms were just about the most popular thing they did creating characters and memories that became part of the national fabric. Apart from Bob Mortimer's appearances on Would I Lie to You what have they done in the past 10 years? And that's a cheap panel show that would exist without them.

I am old enough to have a lot of affection for what the BBC used to be but they may have signed their own death warrant when they abandoned Reithian high-minded principles of trying to put out work of genuine cultural merit and instead attempted to justify their existence by chasing ratings. Apart from the BBC website for basic news I don't regularly consume any of their content. Most of the stuff they do could easily exist on ITV or Channel 4 so what exactly is the point of BBC1 or BBC2? And how do you justify a regressive and antiquated tax to fund them? The cost doesn't bother me personally and I am happy to support a great British institution. But I'm not actually sure it is that any longer. And teenagers today have more emotional attachment to YouTube as a brand than the BBC. A change is inevitable, we just have to hope it will come from a more thoughtful government than we have currently.

ITV would have always had the ability to pay more than BBC but BBC always had the better sitcoms and entertainment shows. Stars were always happybto do the TV series so they could keep up a TV presence and then do live work from it. Some comics were more TV based than others and now these panel shows have replaced the older comedy stand up series.

Ironically comics now sell more tickets despite having nowhere near the audience reach that 70's and 80's primetime stars did with viewing figures. But there are bigger arenas today also.