Tory TV Licence Plans

N

net1

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Proposals from a Tory expert panel could allow television viewers to opt out of the BBC.

The move would see the compulsory £116-a-year licence fee being phased out within a decade.

Viewers would pay only for the channels or services they wanted, forcing the corporation to compete for customers with rivals like Sky.

Julie Kirkbride, Conservative shadow culture secretary, will unveil the plans tomorrow.

She will publish a 70-page report by the Broadcasting Policy Group, a group of senior industry figures set up by the Tories and headed by former Channel Five chief David Elstein.

Leaked details of the report reveal that the expert panel's 19-point action plan says replacing the licence fee with voluntary subscriptions-would bring "a more equitable form of distribution".

Public funds would be made available for public service broadcasting such as arts, current affairs and education programmes.

However, this would be spread around different channels so that the BBC would share the funding with ITV, Channel 4 and others. The BBC would be forced to sell off some of its commercial arms.
 

PaulR

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Hmmmm

This worries me. One of the geat strengths of the Beeb is its independance from the need to compete for money.

It may make the occasional errors, as the recent Hutton enquiry pointed out, but at least it has the freedom to make those mistakes.

PaulR
 

rolfw

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It would concern me as well if it had any likelyhood of happening.

replacing the licence fee with voluntary subscriptions-would bring "a more equitable form of distribution".

That's a laugh in itself, how are they going to monitor that then? :)
 

war head

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The Conservatives probably see it as a potential vote-winner.

How would they do a subscription service for BBC channels, now so many people have bought Freeview boxes (digital terrestrial).

Could be another BSB Squariel-type fiasco
 

rolfw

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LOL, it's a little like John Prescott's idea to put a toll on local motorway use, to stop local users using the motorway for shortcuts. Good idea, drive local motorists back onto the rat runs that they have been trying to close off over the last few years. :rolleyes:

Perhaps we ought to have a thread in the chitchat forum, asking everyone for their favourite loony idea. :)
 

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knob heads the lot of them

i absolutely despair for the future of British TV and our country in general
 

rolfw

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You're not alone. :)
 

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Well Rolfw is a similar age to me...and I am about to jog his memory! When most of you out there where a twinkle in the eye's of sexual urges of your parents reaching puberty in the playground. The licence fee was to fund the BBC as they did not have revenues for advertising like ITV or ATV as it was then known, the BBC programs if you remember rolfw used to have white tape stuck over the products of known labels sold on the high street. Today is a different story to make things more realistic (so they say!)....but now there is a twist as the TV licence we know of today is to own a set and not to view or fund the Beeb...Yet another con by governments and yes we have let them do it!...Unlike the French who would have years ago gone out on a national protest against being ripped off by another sham to fund government coffers that are today being stretched to the limit, we will just sit there as couch potatoes and let them have their own way yet again!
 
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