Tories: We would shut down BBCi & Three

What, you mean Ariel? (Well, almost free). And it's not a tax, it's a license fee.

I'm afraid I don't agree with you at all, SE. BBC Three provides entertaining programmes; which nobody is forcing you to watch if you don't want to. Perhaps they just need to tweak their presentation slightly.

But close down BBCi? What is IDS on!? Many (well, all) of his ideas in the past may have been no-brainers; but this just cuts it like a pair of spiked running boots on a fresh cow-pat. As many people have stated above, it is an extremely useful website, in most aspects. I find the Bitesize section especially useful for exam revision, and the News site for research on old stories as well as breaking news when I haven't got access to a TV.

Mr Blair may not be my favourite person, but he's a damned site better than that incoherant twát.

And yeah, James, he's a right laugh in PMQ time. Some times I tune in especially to hear his hilariously crap anti-PM quips. Such gems. The tories haven't got a cat's chance in hell of getting in with IDS 'in control' (and I use the term loosely).

Quite agree, wasn't it the BBC who promoted the use of the Internet in the first place with the Webwise series? And now they're touting broadband and the access to the back catalogue of stuff - and then this Tory guy turns up and wants to shut down the BBC website? Oh yes, vote winner that

BBC Online is, indeed, one of, if not the, most used UK sites. Even better if you poke about a bit it's got old archives for stuff that hasn't been on the air for months on end, was quite pleased to find that Science Shack was still there after a repeat run on the Learning Zone at least eight months after it was first built.

Mind you of course this comment comes from a member of the same party who introduced the 1990 Broadcasting Act and then went crawling on hands and knees to "apologise" when TV-AM lost its franchise 15 months later. But of course the Tories won't win a 2005/6 election (unless Tony really screws stuff up) so its pretty safe that this "gimp"'s comments won't be applied.

Oh dress it up, call it what you like, it is a poll tax on owning a television.



No, they may not be forcing me to watch, but they are forcing me to pay for them and the rest of the BBC empire, regardless of my useage of the service.

Oh God, here we go again, lap number 9 million of the Ever-resurfacing Licence Fee debate.... militant ITV fanatics versus the rest of us.....

Why don't you shut your big trap, at least it's not lap 25 million of how fabulous Look North is. Talk about a one trick pony

You're forced to pay every year for road tax if you own a car; regardless of how much or how little you drive. You're forced to pay to watch high quality programming with no advertising every year on the Beeb if you own a TV; regardless of how much you watch it. Life is unfair.

But SE makes an excellent point - if all you watch is Eastenders, is your £116 worth it? Not at all - you would want to get value for money.

It is not a licence fee - it is a tax, as SE has stated. Even if you only ever watched commerically funded networks, you still have to pay it. Just so happens that this tax all goes straight to the BBC to make their programmes.

The licence fee really needs to be thought out else I'll break the saturation control on my TV and pay for a black and white licence.

You know perfectly well that isn't true. Why should I be forced to watch third-rate advert-ridden F1, that means I constantly run an un-necessary risk of missing vital action? Why should I be forced to have a television with ITV on it?

Indeed; I have removed ITV from the configuration on my TV and DTT box. If I MUST watch it (only twice a week now) then I can do so downstairs. Why should I have to put up with F1's constant ad breaks and ugly DOG/graphics.

A nice time for a signature change, too.

But the point is that YOU personally are not paying for the service. Thanks to advertisers paying, you don't have to pay anything - whilst the BBC receives money every single year to make more clones of commercial programmes and more of their fab "digital programming" when most people are interested in something decent on a Saturday night!

The BBC may produce a **** version of the F1 coverage for all you know. In fact much of the ITV F1 production IS done by the BBC - so aside from the adverts, what complaints have you got? Can you really not deal with a short 3 minute break? Whenever I have watched F1 coverage on ITV, I have always found it to be more than sufficient.

No doubt the BBC could produce a load of poo, but because it hasn't got adverts, it must be good. Oh well, that's OK then. No doubt it'd cost twice as much and we'd end up with an F1 Bursary and a camera shot of an F1 vehicle, 24 hours a day on BBCi.

And it's all thanks to the unique way the BBC is funded.

Well, you see the thing is dear, you don't have to. And what's even better is, you won't get a knock on the door, a fine or a potential prison sentence for not paying for it.

Oh god yes. Someone really needs to tell them that "Currys" and "prices" don't actually rhyme.

I saw the most awful advert on the ITV News Channel the other day with this chubby DIY American-looking bloke really poorly dubbed with a British accent trying to flog a multi-use powertool thing, which is just AWFUL.