BBC and The TV Licence

As well as owning series two of "Bewtiched" on DVD, one would imagine

Got it already US import. and seaons 3,4,5,6 on japanese import.....(see my siganture)

I pay for schools and libraries but don't use them..... in fact we all pay for a lot of things through tax that we don't want or use, but they are good things for society to have and souldn't be provided for free by the commercial sector

Having a license fee works in a similar way, we all pay whether we use it or not to provide public service programmes that otherwise the audience wouldn't have access to.

Exactly. I don't know ONE person who has NEVER used at least one of the BBC's services. For example, five national radio stations (four more digital ones), World Service, 8 television channels, the best website on earth, varied television and music programmes on a range of subjects that would be of an interest to virtually every person at some time, sports coverage that is comprehensively covered, Outside Broadcasts the world really admire, programme support lines, superb regional news programmes that are more important to the network driven BBC than the regional driven ITV, education departments, childrens departments, religious and moral departments, unbiased political platforms.....the list is exhaustive. All for 34p a day! Of course, this tax may be considered unfair to a small amount of people who claim to be the silent majority, but without the BBC the country would be worse off! I mean, can you imagine the days news without the BBC. "The World According to GMTV". Heaven forbid!!!!!

It's a tough one the licence fee these days. But in real terms, it's amazingly cheap for what you get back in return. Many see the licence fee as just BBC One and Two. But that £9 a month or what ever it is pays for a massive organisation.

8 TV channels (including 16? regions and the nations)
8? National Radio stations and all regional radio stations
Endless websites which are updated constantly to the highest of standards.
Many events across the UK which are free to attend.

I personally feel if we lost the BBC in its current form, tv in general would die. If Sky became the lead broadcaster, no one would be able to afford tv anymore. There is a reason why Sky charge so much although they probably would not admit it. Also if you have ever tried to cancel your Sky subscription god help you. I could happily rant on for hours about this but i wont. In short my opinion is the BBC is excellent value for money.

If you are the same user as before then I think we pretty much established you live with your parents and don't actually pay for a TV Licence.

When you are older, pay taxes, satellite or cable subscription and generally cover the cost of your existence, then come back and tell us whether you think you get value for money out of the Licence.

Until then you have no frame of reference to decide whether we should have one or not; so frankly, your opinion is irrelevant.

I agree with what Owan said. I think the Licence gives the best value of any of the things I am required to pay for. I would sooner pay £10 a month for the wealth of ad-free services than see my shopping bill increase - which is the logical conclusion to a commercial BBC.

I'm sorry, but of you scrap the license fee, then the BBC would becom privatised, and they would probs turn into ITV (produce anything to get good ratings), and if the goverment funded it, they could black mail the BBC, for doing a bad story on them (eg: Hutton Inquiry), and they might cut back on education programmes.

I challenge any licence fee opponents to come up with a workable proposal that will

1. Maintain the FULL range of programming on offer in the UK.
2. Allow universal access to public service broadcasting.
3. Not lead to closures amongst the existing free independent services and the pay for sector.
4. Ensure editorial impartiaility of broadcasters.
and
5. Lead to growth in the UK broadcasting sector.

If we get rid of the so called 'unfair' tax for culture then with it should go all the other unfair taxes such as NI contributions yes lets privatise the NHS and let Murdoch run that too - to get medical help you could ring a nice scottish call centre on a 0870 number and be kept on hold for 10 mins whilst they make more money on the call. Then supplied with a load of second hand American treatments.
If we wan a civilized society with protection for culture we have to pay a bit towards it.

I'm more than happy to pay my license fee. The amount of services the BBC provide is worth hundreds of times what we pay. Apart from the TV Channels, radio stations etc they also give us the biggest website in the world. Who on here can say that they have not used the BBC website this week whilst they have been on the internet?

They also provide services unrelated to broadcasting. As I mentioned in the last thread which had this argument, one example is they run free Internet learning classes for the over 50s in the South of England. I'm sure this is one of many things they do for the community.

If the license fee in it's current form were to dissepear, the UK would be a lot worse off in my opinion.

I find it funny listening to local radio sometimes where people phone up and complain to the presenter that they are not broadcasting EXACTLY what they want them to broadcast and they don't see why they should pay their license fee. It's always old people that do it....

in scotland we do that already.

The BBC is a bit like the NHS, some people may never need to use it, but its still there for the public good. The United Kingdom is not like America where every channel has its on local affiliate which provides the area with regional programmes, We have the BBC, ITV and a few RSL, and for me the BBC offers the best service, without the adverts.

For 34p, it's worth it.