BBC licence free: name that figure
LenzieDotOrg's going for £40 (TV), £30 (radio) and £30 (internet).
Silvertopsy reckons £12 per year is about right and wants it to go toward radio only.
The generous canterburysmethy's willing to pay £500 (per year) and nicoff thought £15 per month, before realising the current fee was actually less - care to re-consider?
If you haven't already done so - go, on, put a figure on it. What are you willing to pay each month?
We'll take the average figure and explore what kind of BBC you'd get for your money.
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I would gladly pay up to, or possibly more than I am at the moment for the BBC, although I am less than impressed with some of BBC3's and R1's output (and yes, I am in the age range, but programmes about fat dogs do not impress me). I still think that the BBC is (mostly) a shining light as to what public service broadcasting can produce. Some thinning around the waste and cropping of bloated and expensive 'talent' could be carried out where the commercial stations could justify huge pay as a fraction of the advertising revenue, the BBC however, can not.
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i would be happy to pay 10 pounds a month. if for no other reason, just to be able to drift off to the dulcet tones of sailing by...
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I would not pay a penny towards the BBC. It should become a commercial operation. The licence fee is a poll tax plain and simple.
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I live and work in Lagos, Nigeria. The BBC both TV and especially the radio (via the Internet) makes life here much more tolerable. I think bbc is worth to me at least 5 pounds a week or even more..one pound a day.
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I would happily pay £300/year JUST to avoid the adverts on commercial channels . Anyone who has seen American TV or heard recent discussion about decreasing the intervals between our advertising breaks , must surely agree ?
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We pay over £600 p.a. to Sky for movies but also for the privilege of receiving HD and time-shifting. We watch a lot of BBC TV content and listen (again) to Radio 4&7.
The BBC offers the highest quality programming available on the whole.
We would happily pay £250 p.a. for the existing BBC service and a little more if we could download iPlayer content onto our Macs!
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I would happily pay £390 which is about a cinema ticket a week and as that includes TV and Radio is great value for money.
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I would pay up to £700 a year for Radio 4 alone. I pay about £600 for my phone contract and I know which gives me more pleasure. My live would be hugely poorer without the BBC. The most important British institution today, it must be protected at all costs.
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i would pay NOTHING (£0.00) for BBC TV
i do not have a tv
tv is mentaly chewing gum.
what programs i do happen to see are very dummed down - slow and boring.
I do not agree with the licence fee inprincipal - it should be free as in N.Z.
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I have no objection whatsoever about the level of the license fee as it is at the moment, and would be reasonably happy if it increased. I only listen to radios 1-4 and the main terrrestrial TV channels. I cannot get 5 and I understand that when we go digital, I will not get the full whack as we are on a relay station. BBC needs to be aware of this in programming. At the moment, there is a lot of good stuff on digital which we do not get at all.
However, I can think of far worse ways to spend my £15 per month (50p per day). This probably works out at about 10p per listening or watching hour. Nothing in fact.
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If the license fee is roughly 38p a day, try looking at it like this :
If you only listen to, say Radio 2, for one programme (say 2 hours) a day, every day. Would you pay 38p for it. If you would, then you could argue that everything else you get from the BBC that day is absolutely free. On the BBC, that's 2 hours of programming, not 1 hour 36 minutes of programming plus 24 minutes of adverts. (Which is the main reason I don't listen to commercial radio).
Within the scope of what the BBC offers within the UK, I would challenge anyone not to find something on a daily basis that is worth 38p. Even if the majority of programming is not to your taste or you have to pay an extra subscripton to Sky or Cable because they've big megabucks so they can have exclusive rights and sell their services.
It's like the health service, you may not use it for years at a time (but you're still paying for it though National Insurance) - you can choose to go private (it Sky/cable - but you still have to pay for the NHS). Either way there might be an absolute gem of a programme that will suit you at some point, which you will find invaluable.
The BBC does have it's faults - I do have a problem with large salaries being paid to stars who have minimal audience share, or poaching stars from another channel and then not knowing what to do with them.
38p a day - less than a pint of milk and less than a newspaper, the BBC is undoubtedly great value for money. The present cost feels about right and if the BBC Trust ensures we ARE getting value for money it will continue to be a great public service.
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If I buy or rent a video that would cost me between £3 and £15. So working off that:
The only things I'm enjoying little Dorrit at the moment and Strictly. So if I only paid 50p to watch them each. That's £1 per week.
My kids loved Robin Hood, Young Merlin and Dr Who so I guess if that was worth 50p a week to me.
Then I guess my TV watching comes out at £1.50 per week.
As for Radio, I'm a Radio 4 junkie. I can't live without Today and I get serious Cold Turkey when In-Our-Time is not on. So Radio 4 has got to be worth at more to me than BBC TV. So that's got to be at least £2.00 per week.
That means BBC is worth £3.50 per week to me.
Getting out my trusty calculator I find that BBc is worth £182 per year to me. Which to be honest I would be prepared to pay.
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BBC licence free: name that figure?
BBC1 £0
BBC2 £0
BBC3 £0
BBC4 £5
BBC Radio4 £5
BBC Radio7 £15
BBC World Service £5
Other BBC Radio £0
BBC Radio Test Match £5
TOTAL £35 pa
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The main problem wth the BBC is pc censorship, including this BLOG
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Nothing. The BBC is a fatcat bloated organisation which spends money like water. Get rid of the arrogant overpaid presenters like Ross and Eddie Mair. If the Beeb must have adverts/trailers between programs, they might just as well accept paid adverts.
If not stop spending money on stupid trailers and just concentrate on producing quality programs. Services like World Service are brilliant and fascinating but much of the BBCs mainstream output is overpaid lovies admiring themselves on an ego trip.
I'm also fed up with paying the BBC to send ten times as many people to cover world events compared to rival organisations. Why does each channel send its own staff? Cut BBC budgets by 50% and tell the staff to live within that budget. The rest of us are having to cut back; the BBC should be made to do likewise.
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I would be willing to pay double the current license fee to keep the BBC. I want qualitybroadcasting, free from advertising.
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I would like pay as you view. I get to pay twice as I suscribe to a cable provider as well as having to pay the licence fee. The reason I do that is because most of the programmes on offer are not worth watching. I watch about 5 hours of BBC programmes a week. So I think the payment to the cable company is enough. The BBC get money off them, and on that basis I should pay the BBC nothing.
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I pay about £15 per month for the Sky Movie channels. The wide and varied output from the BBC – radio, internet and TV – makes it easily worth the same amount. Frankly I’d pay £15 a month for Radio 4, BBC 4 and the website alone. If the BBC was Sky it would probably charge upwards of £25 per month for its output without making any original programmes. When you think about it like that it shows what remarkable value the license fee is. Yes, I am sure the BBC can be wasteful and much of its TV output is of questionable value, but it remains one of the great world brands and no international news service can be more trusted, respected and necessary.
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I do not own a TV. I listen, in order of time, to Radio 4, Radio 3, Radio 2, and occasionally to BBC 7. I would be willing to pay about £50 a year for the radio service, but only If part of that fee was used to fund a speech radio (not talk radio!)service independent of the BBC. Radio 4 has become moribund, it seems to be stuck in the 1980s. Its audience doesn't seem to help, any small change being vehemently opposed. So a new independent service is required that will challenge R4 and force it to change - hopefully for the better.
I'm certainly not anti-BBC, As an institution it is still a, (if not the), backbone of modern British culture, and I have been disturbed by the wave of anti-BBC sentiment generated by the Brand/Ross fiasco. But the BBC needs to take a good hard look at itself and return to its original Reithian ideals. It needs to "give us the things we didn't know that we wanted".
Peter
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I spend 3 to 4 quid a week on newspapers. No, not 25 copies of the Sun. £150 to £200 a year.
I'd dump that for Radio 4, World Service (I know that's not part of the license fee), the net site and iplayer. And that doesn't start on the stuff my 10-year-old gets out of it, much of which I thoroughly approve of (hello Bill Oddie).
So if I can't afford both, you can have the £200 and the Grauniad will have to get a bit leaner.
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The license fee represents excellent value for money. The range of radio programs by themselves are worth the 37p a day.
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I have not watched live T.V. since last April and even prior to that mostly watched programmes I had videod, i.e, racing, (horse) recorded mostly from Channel 4. I gave up buying the Radio Times as each week I would study the programmes I wished to watch or record and they became fewer and fewer!
My TV is faulty, I have no great desire to replace it and consequently have not renewed my licence. I consider that the licence fee is extremely expensive especially as so many of the classics, i.e. Dickens etc. continue to be remade even though there are perfectly good adaptions that could be reshown. Why is this necessary? New versions seldom match up to previous ones.
I would not be without Radio 4 which is informative, intelligent, funny (with the exception of Just a Minute) which makes me immediately turn off and I am now beginning to miss the racing. So what do I do, replace the TV and fork out another large sum of money which I will not receive the full benefit of or forgo watching the racing?
I will not pay for a licence by direct debit as my income is variable but when licence stamps were sold at a Post Office, this definitely lessened the pain. This option has been taken away.
What about a TV meter, is this such an impossibility? Probably a daft idea but would suit me.
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Generally I think the BBC's output is good value for money - this excellent website is just one example. Although I am not convinced that so called 'edgy' comedy or the propensity for swearing at all times of the day are required.
To answer the question I would pay upto £200 p.a.
However I would like to see a curb on the huge sums curently being paid to some presenters and entertainers.
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I would happily pay 200 quid per annum if I could take only BBC1 and BBC2 and Radios 2 and 4 and forget the rest.
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The licence fee is a voluntary payment. (the poll tax was compulsory) and as such is democratic because you choose. However we pay for comercial broadcasting whether we like it or not or indeed watch it or not because part of the price of the goods we buy that are advertised provides for the cost of advertising. This is undemocratic because there is no choice
I would pay £150 per annum for BBC and another £150 to have programmes on commercial TV that are not continuosly interrupted - especially films
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Radio- £52 per year, TV £208 per year, Internet, £pay per item for stuff on the back catalogue at £0.50 radio and £2.50 for TV
Free for students, Under 18s, Over 60s and unemployed
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The very thought of not having Radio 4 and BBC 4 fills me with dread - I'd pay £1 a day for just those two!!
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Two things particularly irk me The first is that BBC television, like Britain's "quality" newspapers, seems to me to have declined in quality in recent years.
The second is that people like me, who find about 7 hrs a week worth watching, pay the same as, say, sports fans, who have much more time devoted to them.
The best answer, I reckon, would be pay as you view.
But could this worsen the situation, as low grade programmes might bring in more money?
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£300, maybe more. I listen to no other radio and mainly watch bbc ( I sometimes I watch channel 4). I don't know what people pay for sky and the likes but bbc tv and radio are superior to this. I suspect the all tv, the UK and the world would be very different if the bbc did not exist funded by a licience fee.
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I forgot to say I'd pay more if they would support their staff - Jonathan Ross in particular. If I or a colleague at work made a mistake I would expect my employer to offer support.
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The BBC cannot possibly be perfect, but overall, it is such a very good addition to our cultural lives. I'd happily pay five hundred quid a year for it. I read once that the proportion of what we pay in our shopping baskets that goes to advertising on commercial channels comes to more than the BBC licence fee. And I hate watching ads.
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I think that the BBC is well worth the current licence fee. Where in the world can you get such an excellent range of programmes? I have to use Sky because I live in a rural area of Wales and the transmitter has not yet been up-dated. There are hundreds of channels and most are utter rubbish with endless repeats. We do watch channel four and five occasionally and the sci fi channel, but the BBC meets most of our needs. MOST of all, we enjoy watching TV without the commercials! If someone could come up with a way of eliminating those it would make a difference!
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I think I would pay probably twice as much as I do at the moment so around £20 a month.
I think the BBC is over criticised and needs all the support it can get to survive in over commercial times such as these. I cannot enjoy a film or sporting event continually interrupted by adverts.
Why does everything nowadays have to be viable in every department. We must all pay for bits of the BBC that we don't like in order to maintain the bits we do. If we all only paid for the bits we liked then none of it would be viable. We all pay for the whole lot so that people who have different tastes to us, perish the thought, can enjoy their preferred corner of the BBC.
The BBC is a real jewel and we need to remember that before it is too late.
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I'd definitely prefer a separate Radio and Television fee, £24 quid a year for the radio, and maybe £48 for the telly? Regarding the internet, there's no way in hell I'd pay for iPlayer, as brilliant as it is, I'm already paying for my internet connection, I'm not paying for the content of the net.
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I pay about £19/month for Broadband and the bits of the BBC I enjoy are worth that fee. So about £250 per year seems reasonable.
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I think the licence fee is one of the best value for money things you can buy. I wouldn't want to see it changed. I watch the BBC channels use bbc.co.uk for my news ( or BBC news 24) I listen to BBC London or radio 2 or 4. I listen to Local BBC radio on the internet for football. I use iplayer ALL the time and haven't videoed anything for ages. I haven't watched or used ANY of the commercial free to air TV's stuff in ages. I hate their websites with adverts wizzing around all the time. I have only ever downloaded one of their TV programs but have to sit thought the ads so have never done it again. And as for Sky I would never pay any money to watch anything from them. So how much would I pay? £150 would be about right.
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Oh - as for a figure - If it WERE even possible - as an international accessing the BBC from abroad over an internet connection via Iplayer. I'd pay the full licence fee of 38 pence per day.
Hardly crippling is it.
38 pence....
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R3+R4 = £130. TV = 0
I would pay the licence fee for R3 + R4 alone, but do not think BBC TV is as good value.
Paul Kennedy, Herefordshire
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It seems anyone who benefits from any particular tax wants everyone else to pay.
The BBC is mainly for the middle classes of the home counties. White middle aged. So it is them who want everyone who receives TV whilst being broadcast in the UK to pay the Tax. Regardless weather they watch the BBC or can afford it. It is way out dated. The BBC will have program after program to help students, but not one for young people who are not in work or training. The very people who would surly need the public broadcasting remit to include them. No the BBC will only belittle any of the employment open to them. Death to the BBC for a more equal country. £0 TV tax.
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£1 per week from every household in the UK should be ample to cover the cost of programming on TV and Radio.The BBC must stop paying out astronomical sums of money to people with no talent.If personal contracts demand indecent salaries then do without that person.Give up trying to compete with commercial stations with idiotic reality shows because they are rubbish.Drop coverage of Song contest, its a no-brainer.BBC just needs to clean its house of extraneous matter and people and go back to producing quality programmes and introduce a realistic payroll.
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I would gladly pay £50 per year for Radio 4 alone.
The majority of the BBC television output isn't worth pennies.
Give Jonathan Ross the push and divert his ridiculous paypacket to Radio 4.
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£52 ought to be plenty. I wouldn't expect to get trashy dance shows or watching celebrity paint dry. I'd even have to go without the undefined "talents" of J Ross. One of the great marvels of my new computer dongle for getting internet radio is that it isn't yet more, more and more bloody BBC, there are other providers, other views on the world, different propagandas.
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Considering the only BBC service I use is this website, £2 per month.
It doesn't mean I *WOULD* pay it but that seems a reasonable amount to me considering the amount of moderation and lack of any real freedom of speech imposed here.
But at least if I had the CHOICE to pay it or not then £2 seems reasonable to me.
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I would like to go for pay per view,as I watch very little television,and when it goes digital we are going to do without.
But as for payment I would be quite happy to pay for a radio licence .Its difficult to say how much,but if £139 gets everything,I think radio on its own would be worth £50 you can't buy much for a pound a week,and I do use the BBC news website most days so I would pay something for that as well if the £50 didn't cover it
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I've been a big fan of the BBC's television output over the years but have found the standards have dropped. I now spend most of my time watching channels from Channel 4 family and therefore don't feel that i'm getting my money's worth from the beeb. An annual charge of about £20 per household would be the most I would pay (if anything at all) as the choice of channels is much greater these days and therefore people shoudl not have to pay for a channel they very rarely watch or radio they don't listen to. This may mean standards drop further, however I feel that sponsorship rather than advertising would be a fair compromise to help fund the BBC and maintain their position of a quality broadcaster.
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I'd pay a small national licence fee to maintain the broadcast network and BBC News service: £30 per year.
Then I'd pay to subscribe to broadcast channels individually, with unlimited internet access to old material broadcast on those channels. Pick a number: £2-£5 per month per channel.
Also make the BBC content available on iPlayer with a subscription for a certain number of minutes viewed per month, or a pay-per-view system, or a combination (where the subscription discounts the pay-per-view items).
I'd also be willing to pay a top-tier price for unlimited access to a DRM-free media archive -- I'd accept a 50% premium to be able to do what I like with the media. but how would you sell that to the program producers? Have it watermarked with my account details at point of delivery so that you can identify it to me if it ends up on a file-sharing site, and have the terms of use make me accept liability for the infringement.
Please consider any new model, but don't let the great news service of the BBC or the great original programming be swamped by having to pander to market forces. Because of the unique way it's funded: Poldark on Mopeds.
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I think 38p a day: half the cost of a (proper) daily newspaper is pretty good value for the use I make of BBC radio news in the morning, BBC radio on and off during the day, BBC website several times a day, PM at 5, TV news in the evening and the vast majority of programmes I watch in the evening when I have the chance: actually a lot better value than a daily newspaper. I'd be prepared to pay double that.
Daily newspapers, like commercial TV stations also rely on advertising, but you can skip the adverts and the bits of the paper you don't want to read.
Some discussion points:
Why do people complain that the entire output of the BBC isn't tailored to their personal tastes? Why should it be?
For everybody who objects to paying for the BBC: who do they think pays for the adverts that support commercial broadcasters?
Would the standard of television generally be improved if everybody was chasing the same dwindling advertising budgets?
With a subscription service for the BBC the cost of producing the programmes would remain the same (with the addition of the costs of collection) so the average cost of buying the service could never be less than the licence fee, could it?
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I work at home and apart, obviously, from when I listen to PM, I have Radio 3 on nonstop (apart from when it's too atonal or some chamber music), so since it's as vital to me as broadband I'll go for something like £15 a month. Actually, since I watched Spooks last night on my iPlayer (wow, gosh Harry, what next!!) I think I may be being a bit mean but widow's mite ...
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I think it is important to realise that the BBC has many commercial arms and do make a considerable amount of money this way.
The licence fee is compulsory, therefore I have no choice, if I wish to watch any television then I have to purchase a licence.
To say the BBC do not advertise is ludicrous watch any sporting programme and they are continually advertising because of the very nature of commerical support for sport. Example The Coco Cola Football Championships.
Saying all the above, I do not like programmes interrupted by advertisements, but maybe a step towards having adverts between shows rather than during shows would be a way forward.
In my opinion if we have to pay for a licence to watch BBC then we should pay for that exclusively and it should not be compulsory to purchase a licence if you wish to watch any TV. It is then down to my choice.
I also agree with many comments on here that suggest that many BBC shows are quite poor, but then are very lavish i.e. Strictly Come Dancing.
I would like to suggest a £1 a week which would be £52 per year. A potential income of £832 million a year, this together with its commerical arm should be more than enough to fund the BBC reasonably.
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Keep the licence fee.
Tie it to twice the price of the BBC's most ardent critic: The Daily Mail.
Allow viewers and listeners to add a voluntary top-up to the fee to fund a "Rebuttal Fund" which exposes and publishes any untruths printed by the Mail, any examples of its anti-intellectualism and its scientific illiteracy etc. etc.
Publish the total compensation of all the DMGT Executives.
Publish its shareholders' register and its shareholdings in media that compete with the BBC.
WE, the viewers and listeners of the BBC, are the real Silent Majority. Let's stand up and be counted before we lose one of the few things we possess that make us the envy of the world culturally!
BTW, I didn't enjoy the Brand-Ross idiot 'joke' but I personally find it considerably less offensive than Jeremy Clarkson, Melanie Phillips, Richard Littlejohn and other well-educated anti-intellectual poseurs, not to mention the bilge that is pumped out by commercial radio.
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I reckon I would pay whatever it went up to. I don't actually know how much I pay now. I pay by monthly direct debit but don't know how much I pay a month. Perhaps I should check. I can't live without the radio and the rest of the family can't live without their fix of 'Stricly Max Factor in the Jungle' or whatever they are called so I'll just go on paying. I'd be prepared to pay more if cricket returned to the BBC.
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I am happy to pay the current license fee in order to be able to watch programmes without adverts, for Radio 4, BBC4 and BBC7. I would be even happier if I didn't have to put up with adverts for the following programmes over the credits for the previous ones, endlessly repeated trailers for forthcoming programmes (and I have noticed that the more hyped and over-the-top the trailers, the lamer the actual programme), and if the BBC didn't pay ludicrous salaries to unfunny egotists claiming to be "entertainers" and "comedians". That aside, overall the BBC's output is the best in the UK, which I'm happy to pay for.
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I'd be happy to pay up to 30GBP per month, but would want to be able to access all the BBC web content when abroad, especially ListenAgain, iplayer etc.
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I think it's absolutely vital that we keep the BBC, but it has to remain impartial and I do think the topbods need to revisit the whole reason for the BBC. It't NOT just about ratings, it's about quality broadcasting.
I'm happy to pay the same price as for a daily quality paper so around 50p a day.
I don't think they should be paying out the ridiculous salaries to presenters like Jonathan Ross, if he can't get by on £150k a year he needs to get a reality check and sell a few dogs.
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I would pay the BBC an annual subscription fee equivalent to the current licence fee charge but in doing so I should be able to specify to a reasonable degree what I would like that money to be concentrated on.
This could be achieved via highly publicised and cleverly devised online and postal surveys perhaps.
Maybe the BBC could also tour the country all year round, showing programmes in public spaces and inviting members of the public to offer feedback about them and the company's products in general.
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I would happily pay £15-20 just for BBC radio and iplayer - and we don't even have a TV!
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I don't have a TV right now, but depend on Radio - 4, 3, World Service, and occasional forays on to the iplayer for a bit of video. The web content is also very good. For all that I'd pay £10 a month without a second thought, and believe it's worth a lot more. I've been considering buying a TV license just for the hell of it, in order to feel that I'm contributing something towards it. Although that has happened in many other ways over the years.
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are the BBC trying to justify a rise in the tv license fee here by any chance - under the guise of a "how much would you pay" so they cane gauge responses?
ABOLISH THE FEE AND REPLACE WITH SUBSCRIPTION SO THOSE WHO WANT THE BBC CAN HAVE IT AND PAY FOR IT AND THOSE WHO DON'T WANT IT, AREN'T PAYING FOR SOMETHING THEY DON'T WANT!! There, did I make my voice heard?
*BBC replies: Yes but why would be cut off a potential £2 billion a year when we can just continue to FORCE it on people.
Normal person IGNORED AGAIN as usual.
Booo BBC
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Hi, badger_fruit,
I cetrainly believe and hope that's not what the BBC is doing and, if they did, I would be the first to point out the lack of validity in suggesting that a self-selecting sample should in any way be considered representative.
Out of interest, how representative do you think the people were who 'complained' about the Ross/Brand thing? Or do you perhaps think they may represent a self-selecting group whipped up by media that cater to the Hard-of-Thinking?
According to my own RANDOM (and thus more scientific) sample they were not representative of
a) the British public
b) BBC audience
and certainly not representative of
c) educated people
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I think that the TV licence should be abolished and a BBC subscription introduced. Its not like the BBC own 50% of the airwaves anymore like they did when it was introduced.
I would pay around £3-5 a month for the BBC service, or £2-3 if they had subsidised with adverts. Considering other companies media packages, I think that would be a fair price for the extra channels. Also, as a student, I simply could not afford more.
For my money,I would want no more than: News, Horizon, Top Gear, Spooks, Hustle, Dr Who and Coast. Considering it is completely possible for me to get all of this without a licence currently, I think I'm being generous.
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Comment 39: "The BBC is mainly for the middle classes of the home counties. White middle aged. "
Nonsense. I am 32, working class, mixed race and from the north and I love it.
I currently pay £40 per month for Sky and I only really get that for the footy, so I would guess the BBC must be worth at least double that.
Not that I am trying to encourage them to increase the licence fee of course.....
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Peronsally, I'd pay £0.00
I don't mind a bit of advertising on the website and as that's literally all I use I would love to make the £140 a year saving.
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After watching tv in the USA, I'd happily pay as much as a Sky or Virgin package. In fact I probably pay as much to Virgin for advert breaks as I pay for BBC.
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On the basis that the licence fee is for all BBC services, and I would not be subjected to adverts for sofas or laxatives, an annual fee of £200 would be cheap indeed.
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I would not pay. I consider the BBC to be politically biased, sometimes subtle, sometimes overt.
The only BBC content I listen to is radio 4.
The television is so awful that I just can not bear it.
News readers that sound like they are reading an episode of Jackanory. Documentaries that seem to be aimed at children, with narrators that talk very s-l-o-w-l-y, repeating the point just made by the guest just in case you are too stupid to comprehend the first time; meanwhile the cameraman has some fascination with the nose or ear of the guest, and is probably drunk since the camera shakes and goes out of focus so much.
Endless, cheap and crass reality shows ... etc etc etc.
Not that the commercial channels are better, but I am not forced to pay for those with threats of fines and/ or prison.
Then there is the very aggressive manner in which the TV licensing company 'deals' with the customers.
Sure, there are some gems here and there, but with things as they are I just can not be bothered to seek them out.
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The BBC license fee represents exceptional value, and I have access to some exceptional programmes, both on TV and radio. Yes they make mistakes, but frankly the Jeremy Kyle programme is more consistently abusive of its participants than ever Ross or Brand are.
I would very gladly pay £250 for the range of programmes currently available, and an additional £150 if all the sports programmes currently available only on Sky were repatriated to the BBC. I currently pay over £600 per year for Sky, and resent every penny of it, as I really just want to watch our National sports teams play.
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I would pay £250 per year for the BBC. It would be good to have more input on programming, and I would expect that Thought for the Day is either abolished, or opened up to people without religious beliefs.
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I'd pay £20 p.a. for the BBC services that I use.
While I listen to a lot of BBC radio, I rarely watch BBC TV and so I don't see why I should be paying for something that I don't use.
I also object to having to the increases in the licence fee to fund the regeneration of Salford and the provision of digital equipment to the elderly (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6274061.stm). If the government wants to do this it should do them through proper taxes, and not a fake tax like the licence fee.
If I have to pay a tax, then I should also be able to vote out those who are imposing the tax, i.e. BBC management. That way I might be able to get some value for the money that I have to pay, i.e.
- some choice over the level of the tax;
- drama programmes that I want to watch, not the stuff that we get at the moment that generally needs to go through another 2 or 3 drafts to get them into shape;
- journalists who are prepared to follow Eddie's lead and ask politicians the intelligent, hard questions and not just listen to the talking points that they've brought along that day;
- a basic financial awareness in all journalists and presenters;
- a balance of right and left leaning journalists and presenters rather than the significant left wing bias that we get at the moment;
- quality science coverage on the radio like the "Science Show" in Australia and "Quirks and Quarks" in Canada; and
- better European news coverage.
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Interesting: Is the question "What would I pay for BBC each month?" or "What should the lience fee be?"
I personally would pay a great deal more for the BBC, just for the pleasure of a) Today programme on the way to work, b) PM on the way back, c) almost anything else that comes my way on R4 in between, d) the news quiz. e)knowing there are BBC journalists out there.
On the other hand, the licence fee should be affordable for all. Arguably on a means tested basis. So maybe just funded centrally but hey, not a good moment to even nominally increase the tax burden...
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How many comments has the BBC censored. I haven't seen one that I know has been posted.
As the comments reflect peoples ability to pay. ie wealth. The BBC wont be asking this question to low income people who it drags through court. Their crime to use an electrical appliance that the own. A nasty regressive TAX.
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Actually most of these £500 etc. comments are probably astroturfing by BBC staff. I admire many things about the BBC but it is also bloated and the licence fee is highly regressive (not tied to ability to pay). I live in East End and know that the current 'licence' is food for a month for some people, why should they be forced to go without food to hear Ross swear?
It's the government really, so let's pay for it out of general taxation. The 'independence' is an illusion unless it's via pure voluntary subscription. The BBC trust are the 'great and good' who probably don't actually know how to use a TV, their servants turn it on when necessary. They are not connected to the licence payers by any common experience.
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Anyone who objects to the licence fee has obviously not watched television in the USA.
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Hugh ( 71 )
If, and it's a big if, you are right - then I would have expected more white boxes like this than grey ones. I see no white boxes.
Rupert
( iPM Ed )
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If the BBC was to go commercial I will throw away the TV. I would pay up to £250 per year purely for the news, costume dramas, classic dramas, Dr. Who and Torchwood alone. Then there is Top Gear, Mock the Week, Have I got news for you, Never mind the buzzcocks, Gavin and Stacey, Outnumbered, Coal House (BBC Wales) and the new series Wallender which I am looking forward to. We very rarely watch commercial channels.
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Oh and I live in a low- income household.
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I would pay up to £150 p.a for the BBC.
I love the fact that we can watch films and other programs without advertising breaks.
However, I do think that the BBC should concentrate on spending the money on good quality programing e.g. nature programs (which are some of the world's best) and dramas and quirky programs such as Red Dwarf. Also what happened to Sunday night family viewing of programs such as; The Borrowers and The Chronicals of Narnia?
Ditch the all to common "phone in and vote" type programs and bring back what you are best at.
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I think the current fee is fair and good value for money when you look at what you get. the BBC has somthing for most people wich is how it should be. we are all diffrent with diffrent prefrences and the BBC is doing a good job of catering to all of these needs, it may be that an individual dosent agree or like ALL the services offered but you dont have to watch or litten to the thing you dont like. if you went to a restraunt and didnt like some of the food on the menu you wouldn't complan, you just wouldn't order it, and if there was a narrow choice on the menu then it wouldnt cater for all customers, the BBC has to cater for all and so i think the licence fee is fair.
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Like many other organisations the BBC may have its managerial problems. Nevertheless it saddens me to see it attacked so nastliy by those who have a vested interest in undermining it. I have spent many years living in various parts of the world and have thus had the opportunity to compare the BBC with other national broadcasters from the USA, Europe, the Middle East, the Far East and China. The fact of the matter is that in terms of comedy, drama and the delivery of impartial news around the world there is absolutely nothing out there to rival the BBC. I think the present licence fee delivers real value for money and I would even be prepared to pay another 20 pounds a year. To those individuals who miss no opportunity to complain about it I have message: stop whining, you don't know when you're well off.
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"I just can't think how anyone can object to paying a mere 38p a day for all the BBC provides."
Because we are FORCED to pay it.
I think the BBC is worthy, and would voultarily pay a max of about £10 per month, I already choose to pay more for Sky
But, that's the point, I can make a choice about sky, or virgin, or whatever else, I have NO choice but to pay for the BBC.
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Jon_Cornwall - ah, choice!
Supposed choice that is.
You can choose anything you want from Sky, provided it suits Rupert.
It's not a choice, it's a pretend choice. I want the real choice that comes from having a public service broadcaster.
Yes, it is not perfect - but it's MY BBC.
We have no choice about paying taxes - it's the entrance fee to living in a civilised society.
If someone did a brand valuation on BBC, especially The World Service, they would discover that it is absolutely priceless to Britain.
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I would happily pay the current fee for radio 4 alone. 300 pounds p.a for the entire BBC output would not be unreasonable.If there were no licence fee and the BBC was a commercial operation sticking to "quality" productions (rather than having to cater for everybody who is a compulsory licence payer) , I would happily pay even more as a subscription.Perhaps the BBC would be free of political interference if this were the situation.
Is there a sufficiently large number of people like me out there to make this a viable option, I wonder?
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Around £15 a month seems more than fair. That said I can see the need for a system that you should be able to opt out of paying at the price of not being able to view or listen to the output.
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Once, when I was out of work and bored, I timed the adverts .
Surprise, suprise, BBC's were longer by far than ITV's.
Endless long adverts for programs they were desperate for people to watch, shown all day between programs with no regard for the fact that programs are running late already.
The BBC's lead ins, leads out and constant presenters passing us on to other presenters adds a new dimension to boredom.
If the BBC want to earn their licence fee they should drop long adverts.
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The answer is not a great deal, I'm afraid. Lately, the BBC has not shown anything that I've really wanted to watch bar the occasional documentary (such as the excellent elephant camera thing).
I'm watching a bunch of other channels, just not the BBC. I don't watch soaps or game shows, I don't watch a lot of documentaries. I like cop shows, but British cop shows lack the spark and pace of their American counterparts. So the BBC channels don't have a great deal to offer me.
I realise that the BBC does provide other services - radio (which I don't listen to), this very internet portal (which clearly I do use from time to time) and production services for shows airing on other channels (such as Band Of Brothers which originally aired on HBO, but I'm pretty sure that's paid for by the production partners).
However, the TV Licence has to go, no question about it.
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Presumably someone has already mentioned the (mostly mythical) disaster of the commons. If not, I just did.
Anyway, for a 'free' to all service I would pay around £5 a month.
For a service that could only be accessed by subscribers I would pay around £10 a month.
If I was allowed to unbundle I would pay around £5 for Radio 4 alone.
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I would pay whatever it takes to prevent all tv channels being sponsored by advertising. Having some public service channels keeps advertising on the other channels at a more moderate level as, hey, we might notice the difference! Have you ever watched TV in the U.S.A.?
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The explosion in the number of channels (and I willingly pay for them) means that there's almost always something better on telly elsewhere. It's that simple.
Hence I'm sorry about this but:
TV : zero or perhaps a fiver.
Radio: Don't really listen to it ( see below) so £5?
Website: £50 for a password if it included Radio 4 interviews. Ignoring the usual liberal cultural bias, this for me is the quality element in the Corporation.
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Suggest BBC keeps the cream and hive off the rubbish to commercial organisations and keep a small core of Reith style programmes on TV, including Proms, Shakespeare linked to GCSE & A level curriculum, state occasions whilst retaining Radios 3 & 4.
Cut down the trailers on Radio 4.
Employ a small core of permanent staff and use a system of contracts. This system has worked for The Archers actors for many years.
Then have a licence for about £52 per annum.
PixieMum
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HoldThemToAccount wrote:
You can choose anything you want from Sky, provided it suits Rupert.
It's not a choice, it's a pretend choice. I want the real choice that comes from having a public service broadcaster.
~~~~~~~~~~
you miss my point, I wasn't talking about programming choice
I can choose to pay for Sky, or not
I can choose to pay for Virgin TV, or not
I can choose to pay for NTL and Telewest, or not
I cannot choose re the BBC, I have to pay
or have no TV and be hassled by the license office for the rest of eternity
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I couldn't imagine life without the BBC. I would pay £600 a year and when I asked my husband, he came up with exactly the same figure. It's what we pay for gym membership and we use the BBC a lot more!
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89. At 7:50pm on 28 Nov 2008, Jon_Cornwall wrote:
you miss my point, I wasn't talking about programming choice
Sorry, Jon_C- you miss my point.
I'll try to explain it better.
What you call 'choice' is not a real choice - it's a bit like the 'choice' that the supermarkets brought to the High Street that ended in the homogeneous, lowest-common-denominator retail all over the UK.
You can have what you 'want' - provided you want what Big Business wants you to want.
Culture doesn't emerge from Capitalism.
We all need to wake up before it's too late.
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Richard D North said the licence fee is "unfair", and he is right. It is unfair to those competing to make a living from broadcasting to us. The trouble is, the profit motive is in conflict with good quality programming. For all its faults, the BBC could not exist if it were dependent on voluntary subscription, only the name would survive but within 10 years the service would not be recognisable as 'BBC'. Commercial broadcasting is a slave to consumer demand, but consumers don't always know what they want (myself included) and I think the BBC can provide that better than the commercial sector. It may be unfair to the businesses, but they manage, and the consumer benefits.
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I like to download from iplayer for entertainment on long train journeys. As a licence fee payer, I wonder why I can't register my licence details for my downloads? This would mean that people who don't have a licence, or people in other countries could choose to pay per download, or even buy a licence if they used the service a lot. I would have thought it would be a simple way forward?
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I would pay £200 per annum. I would like to see those on minimum wage and benefits get it free
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"trappistic wrote:
I would pay ?200 per annum. I would like to see those on minimum wage and benefits get it free"
But presumably, not if they can afford a Sky subscription each month? If they can afford Sky they can afford a normal TV licence.
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£139.50, to someone on Jobseeker's Benefit, is over two week's income; more than 3 week's if you're young enough to be on the lower rate. Sorry, no way: it's hard enough living on that pittance, there are more important things to spend money on.
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I gather some people use monochrome sets and pay a reduced licence. Does anyone know where to get new monochrome sets? Digital ready?
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I'm happy enough paying the current £139.50. However, that's the upper limit. That works out around two pounds sixty eight a week. I have to have a licence, even though I NEVER watch BBC television. I pay around £500 a year for cable TV, and the additional £139.50 is irksome.
The most annoying thing is that, having paid all this money, I can still sit down and find nothing on TV I want to watch. Thank God for radio.
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I would pay £5 per month for Radio 4 and for the small part of BBC TV that appeals to me, including Andrew Mair Show, the News, Horizon (hardly shown these days), Antique Road Show. Don't see why I should have to contribute for the rest. BBC should focus on doing much less and doing it much better -- then I'd be willing to pay more. Best solution: scrap the license fee, and let people pay for what they choose.
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The 'TV' license fee pays for the radio and internet services as well and I feel it offers incredible value for money. I listen almost exclusively to R4 and on the occasions when I watch the TV it's invariably BBC2 or C4.
The BBC is the Global standard by which other broadcasters are judged and it is the one thing for which people around the world give thanks to the UK.
I for one am happy to pay my share to support a Global service, provided not for profit but in the interests of the greater good.
In common with many others I would like more for less but I recognise the advantages of the license fee system. The license would still be great value at twice the price, however if the government spent less on bailing out bankers and more on informing and educating then there wouldn't need to be any license fee increases for years.
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I would abolish the license fee altogether. The BBC has become arrogant in its exercise of power. It is immune to all influence, either from the market or from politics.
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Why should I pay anything? I get all the BBC channels through my Sky box, which I pay for monthly. Shouldn't the cost for that include the BBC portion?
I haven't watched terrestrial TV in years as the signal here is terrible, can't get Freeview or Cable either, so Sky is the only option. I can watch/listen to all the BBC channels through Sky, so why have an extra charge. Most BBC TV passes me by, I'm afraid.
The licence fee is an anachronism. If a separate payment is abolished, that would reduce the costs to the BBC of the separate payment process for the licence (they give loads of money to Capita every year to administer it) and people could then pay for what they use.
Having said all that, while I don't watch a huge amount of BBC TV, I do listen to Radio 4 a lot. Comparing this with the cost I currently pay for my satellite channels, I think that's worth £2.50 a week.
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The level of the licence fee is less crucial than the value one gets from any given amount of fee.
There are so many worthy things about the concept of public service broadcasting that a belief has developed within the BBC that it can operate by a self determined right rather than win the consent of its customers or governors.
Lack of accountability leads to inefficiency and cost escalation.
To introduce some market related mechanisms into such a cumbersome organisation is not easy but I would suggest that the level of licence fee should be determined by the BBC's ability to raise its own funding from other sources. In other words for each pound raised it should receive a pound(or some other predetermined ratio), from the public licence fund. The more cost effective the BBC operations are , the more they will raise themselves and the more they will receive in licence income.
This "matched funding" concept does operate in some other countries and although not perfect would be the catalyst for change to the present unsustainable structure, drastically in need of radical restructuring and efficiency savings, while safeguarding the quality programming not supported by fully commercial companies.
Best guess, on where the new eqilibrium fee might be --- around £100
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I agree entirely with Tintin_the_boy. Those who urge the BBC to become commercially funded are extremely short-sighted, in my view; the BBC is a shining jewel which will never be recreated, should it be lost to commercialism. It is the one place where one can expect to watch a programme in its entirety, without interruption or the assumption that the viewer can only absorb information in 5 minute chunks between adverts.
As it has Public Service Broadcasting as its core function, I would like the BBC to have the right to broadcast, live, all mainstream sporting events where any of the UK nations are represented. This on the basis that all citizens should have the right to view such events regardless of whether they can/choose to afford Sky/Cable. The Government could insist on this if it was so minded, as (I believe) happens in some other European countries.
If that were the case, I would be willing to pay £500 a year to keep this treasure. Bearing in mind the (still relatively) high quality of reportage and documentary making and comparative cost of Sky/Cable for repeats, I still believe £350 is reasonable.
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