as I took it off their hands, I had plans, I had plans
The dear old British Broadcasting Corporation has been much in the news today.
If you live in the UK and you own a television, or 'any other device set up to receive and record TV programmes' (so things like a video recorder, a set-top box, A DVD recorder or a PC with a broadcast card), you are legally obliged to buy a TV licence. £121 for colour or £40.50 for black & white.
You don't have a choice: if you get caught without one, you are liable for a fine of up to £1000 and, if you don't pay that, jail. Apparently 200,000 people a year are prosecuted for non-payment of the licence fee.
All of this raises about £2b a year for the BBC. From this (and from the money raised by programme sales abroad, DVD sales and things like that) they produce:
"8 interactive TV channels, 10 radio networks, over 50 local TV and radio services and bbc.co.uk. These provide local and national news, documentaries, arts, drama, entertainment, live music and children's programmes. The BBC also runs social action, education and minority language programmes. Its considerable investment in British programmes supports production and craft skills throughout the UK."
(Apparently BBC World Service is maintained by a government grant)
Where is all that money spent?
Well, the licence fee works out as about £10 per month:
£5 Terrestrial TV (BBC1 £3.50, BBC2 £1.50)
£1 Digital
£1.20 Radio
£1.50 Local TV & Radio
£0.30 Online
£1 Transmission & Collection of licence fee
I don't know about you, but I think we get a pretty good deal. I pay double that for NTL to provide me with the dubious pleasures of Sky TV. I think the quality of the BBC is remarkably high. Yeah, sure, there's some shite on there (the lottery is my particular bugbear, but I'm sure everyone hates something), but there is also some really important tv - where else would that recent documentary series on Auschwitz have been made?
Actually, I think that the TV is the part of the BBC that I use the least. I wake up every morning and drive to work to BBC Radio 5 Live, and I think that C. would cease to function without her daily dose of Radio Four. I can only imagine where we would be as a nation if summers didn't bring Test Match Special, with its cast of eccentrics and lashings of ginger beer and chocolate cake.
All of that for £1.20 a month? Bargain - and if you don't think so, have you ever listened to commercial radio?
What about the website? This is one of the finest websites in the world and I'm sure you are all familiar with it. It is usually my first port of call for snapshots of the news, the weather, sport... all sorts of things. 30p a month?
I'm interested to know what you all think about the BBC - especially those of you that don't live in the UK. What do you think of when you hear the phrase "BBC"? Would you be prepared to pay a licence fee if it meant you could have the same sort of service?
I'm not saying that I think the licence fee is a good thing, or indeed that it is the only way to fund the BBC. I have just been slightly taken aback by the vehemence with which some people have spoken out against it, and how they have attacked the BBC and all that it stands for. It seemed to me that they wouldn't be happy until they have abolished the licence fee, and ideally had the Royal Charter for public broadcasting taken away entirely.
I just have a sneaking feeling that we British take it for granted.
---
There can't be many better feelings in the world than finishing a book and luxuriating in the knowledge that the world is your oyster when it comes to choosing what to read next. So many books, so little time.
I finished "The Invention Of Solitude" on Sunday night, and I spent a lot of Monday afternoon with a big smile on my face.... and when I got home, I made a start on "Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell" by Susannah Clarke. This is a particularly satisfying book, because it is a huge (800 pages) hardback, with a little ribbon built into the binding to act as a bookmark. Very pleasing, and so far... so good.
In fact... that's what I'm off to do now.......
If you live in the UK and you own a television, or 'any other device set up to receive and record TV programmes' (so things like a video recorder, a set-top box, A DVD recorder or a PC with a broadcast card), you are legally obliged to buy a TV licence. £121 for colour or £40.50 for black & white.
You don't have a choice: if you get caught without one, you are liable for a fine of up to £1000 and, if you don't pay that, jail. Apparently 200,000 people a year are prosecuted for non-payment of the licence fee.
All of this raises about £2b a year for the BBC. From this (and from the money raised by programme sales abroad, DVD sales and things like that) they produce:
"8 interactive TV channels, 10 radio networks, over 50 local TV and radio services and bbc.co.uk. These provide local and national news, documentaries, arts, drama, entertainment, live music and children's programmes. The BBC also runs social action, education and minority language programmes. Its considerable investment in British programmes supports production and craft skills throughout the UK."
(Apparently BBC World Service is maintained by a government grant)
Where is all that money spent?
Well, the licence fee works out as about £10 per month:
£5 Terrestrial TV (BBC1 £3.50, BBC2 £1.50)
£1 Digital
£1.20 Radio
£1.50 Local TV & Radio
£0.30 Online
£1 Transmission & Collection of licence fee
I don't know about you, but I think we get a pretty good deal. I pay double that for NTL to provide me with the dubious pleasures of Sky TV. I think the quality of the BBC is remarkably high. Yeah, sure, there's some shite on there (the lottery is my particular bugbear, but I'm sure everyone hates something), but there is also some really important tv - where else would that recent documentary series on Auschwitz have been made?
Actually, I think that the TV is the part of the BBC that I use the least. I wake up every morning and drive to work to BBC Radio 5 Live, and I think that C. would cease to function without her daily dose of Radio Four. I can only imagine where we would be as a nation if summers didn't bring Test Match Special, with its cast of eccentrics and lashings of ginger beer and chocolate cake.
All of that for £1.20 a month? Bargain - and if you don't think so, have you ever listened to commercial radio?
What about the website? This is one of the finest websites in the world and I'm sure you are all familiar with it. It is usually my first port of call for snapshots of the news, the weather, sport... all sorts of things. 30p a month?
I'm interested to know what you all think about the BBC - especially those of you that don't live in the UK. What do you think of when you hear the phrase "BBC"? Would you be prepared to pay a licence fee if it meant you could have the same sort of service?
I'm not saying that I think the licence fee is a good thing, or indeed that it is the only way to fund the BBC. I have just been slightly taken aback by the vehemence with which some people have spoken out against it, and how they have attacked the BBC and all that it stands for. It seemed to me that they wouldn't be happy until they have abolished the licence fee, and ideally had the Royal Charter for public broadcasting taken away entirely.
I just have a sneaking feeling that we British take it for granted.
---
There can't be many better feelings in the world than finishing a book and luxuriating in the knowledge that the world is your oyster when it comes to choosing what to read next. So many books, so little time.
I finished "The Invention Of Solitude" on Sunday night, and I spent a lot of Monday afternoon with a big smile on my face.... and when I got home, I made a start on "Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell" by Susannah Clarke. This is a particularly satisfying book, because it is a huge (800 pages) hardback, with a little ribbon built into the binding to act as a bookmark. Very pleasing, and so far... so good.
In fact... that's what I'm off to do now.......
posted by swisslet @ 21:19
16 Comments:
At 3:04 am,
OLS said…
I know nothing about BBC radio, what I know is BBC television, because they sell so much of it to our ABC. In particular, my favourite comedy and drama programs always seem to come from the BBC.
Friday night crime on the ABC seems to nearly always be BBC programs - at least, according to the credits at the end. Dalziel And Pascoe is a favourite of mine.
- OLS
At 4:38 am,
Michael said…
Living in the US, and not being much of a television viewer, my only experiance with the BBC is the news website. I read it daily. Its become my favorite source of world news, since the British press tends to report the facts, and not put as much of a political slant on news as the American sites tend to.
At 5:22 am,
Aravis said…
I like the BBC too, but not this licensing system. I had no idea you were legally obligated to buy a TV license. I felt that this was wrong when I read it. Then I realized that we pay more than that for cable television here and I started to wonder why the TV license bothered me. I came to this conclusion: cable is optional, your license is not.
There is no choice in the matter for you. Whether you love the BBC or hate it, you're stuck paying this fee. If I don't like my cable service or any of the others, I can cancel them. I don't have to pay a licensing fee to use a VCR or a DVD or my PC. I will not be fined for their use, or jailed for refusal to obtain a license.
So no, I don't think you're getting a deal because you aren't given a choice in the matter. But I do agree that the BBC has some of the finest programming and news to be found.
At 9:15 am,
Mark said…
the BBC is one of the best things about Britain.
At 9:19 am,
LB said…
there are millions of people who disagree with you here.
My mum is one. She is absolutely livid about having to pay a licence fee and would gladly lead a huge protest on the streets against it.
She only has terrestrial TV, a non-digital radio and no internet access. Now I am living with her, our choice of viewing for the last fortnight has been the five terrestrial channels and I can count the number of things I have actually wanted to watch on one finger. It is awful. She listens (rarely) to Radio 4 and so quite rightly argues why she should pay £10 per month for the "privilege" of endless rubbish makeover programmes.
She can get drama and news from the three non-BBC TV channels, but still has to pay her licence fee.
I am the same. I'd easily use other websites for news and sport, listen to other radio stations and watch other channels and save my £120 a year. That's not to say I dont think the BBC services are top class, they certainly are, but its a lot to pay when there are decent alternatives.
At 9:24 am,
swisslet said…
Mr Toolbox - "The British Press tends to report the facts". Hm. Have you ever had the pleasure of reading The Sun, The Daily Mail, The Mirror, The Express, The News of the World.....?? We do have some good press, I think, and I include the BBC in that (although the historian in me cautions against saying that anybody reports the facts!). We also have some of the most loathsome, intrusive, gutter press in the world.
As for BBC radio - something I forgot to mention was the fact that most BBC radio is now available online. In fact, the BBC is getting really good at making archive programmes available via their website on demand - so if you missed something, or you want to listen to it again, then you can. I think that's fantastic and they are really pioneering this in the UK.
Something else I thought of is that the British television viewer is therefore paying for the rest of the country (in fact the rest of the world) to have access to BBC radio and to the website. I'm not sure what I think about that, but it seems a bit odd. A lot of these people have probably never even looked at the website, as they won't have access to the internet. I suppose that's not all that much different from me reading the Guardian website for free and not buying the paper that funds it, is it?
Aravis - for what it's worth, I think you are probably right. The BBC is funded this way because it always has been, not because it is the most efficient or fair way of going about things. I think when the analogue signals are switched off and everything moves to digital, it will be easier for the BBC to control access to their tv channels - at the moment, if you have anything capable of picking up an analogue signal, you can get the BBC, which is why the licence fee is mandatory.
Apparently more women are in jail for failing to pay their licence fee fine than for a whole list of other things, including protitution....
ST
At 9:27 am,
swisslet said…
I'd pay a subscription to the BBC, without a second thought.
At 9:34 am,
Teresa Bowman said…
I agree with Mark - the BBC is excellent: diverse, well regulated, unbiased, unsullied by advertising. (I'd certainly rather pay a licence fee and keep the BBC than not pay a licence fee and be constantly bombarded by commercials.)
There is certainly something very special about Radio 4 (exceptions being "The Archers", which never fails to annoy me, and those political debates where they get Ann Widdecombe in a studio to argue pointlessly with someone), and 6 Music is currently my lifeline; if I wasn't able to listen to it over the internet at work I'd probably have gone completely mad by now.
(Less said about Radio 1 the better, though. Hmph.)
At 5:19 pm,
Anonymous said…
As someone else above has already mentioned..120 quid p.a. for an ad filter....bargain!
And, yeah I am leeching off all you licence payers when i get my daily dose of the beeb on the web....
cheers for that ST et al
Des
At 5:39 pm,
Erika said…
I have to admit, the telly tax was one of the key reasons I didn't up and move back to the UK when I finished grad school. It was, perhaps, more of a scapegoat than anything: concrete proof that Brits are an underpaid and overcharged people. The idea of spending money on simply owning a telly (not to mention local phone calls and council tax) won out over takeaway curries.
I'm a fan of the BBC, however, and a supporter of public funding for the arts, which puts me in the rather dangerous situation of preferring my taxes to be hidden, where I have no control over them, rather than laid out clearly. I should, perhaps, rethink my position.
At 5:46 pm,
Erika said…
Oh, and as a postscript - I dodged the telly tax the entire two years I lived there. Figured I'd pull the whole "oh, but I'm Canadian, I had no IDEA!" if they ever caught me. The stress of "what if" was not worth 120 pounds, in hindsight.
At 6:04 pm,
Michael said…
SwissToni - I have never read any of those publications, although I have seen covers of them in the news. All tabloids, which I don't consider them to be news. I completly forgot about the nortoriaty of the british paparatzi. They'll report on someone having indigestion.
At 9:16 pm,
Aravis said…
I forgot to mention that I read Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. Great book, though not for everyone. Looking forward to your thoughts at the end. :0)
At 10:38 pm,
swisslet said…
For about a year, C. didn't have TV. The TV Licence authority didn't believe her. They dogged her for months, sending her letters that essentially said
"we know you have a tv. you haven't bought a licence. we're going to bust you good"
They were amazingly persistent.
In the end, she bought a tv and purchased a licence... perhaps just to make them shut up.
They didn't send her a letter saying "We KNEW it! We KNEW it!", but damn, I could hear them thinking it.
At 12:21 pm,
The Num Num said…
Why I like the BBC and will pay the license fee:
1) Eastenders
2) Match of the Day
3) Newsnight
4) News (though C4 news is a touch better at times)
5) Top of the Pops
6) Football Focus
7) They showed two seasons of 24 without any adverts to spoil things.
8) FA Cup Final programs that let you while away the hours on a saturday waiting for what was a lovely day of football at Wembley.
9) Casualty
10) Repeats of Murder She Wrote
11) Showing BBC2 Saturday Detectives all afternoon :) (including the master Sherlock)
So you see, I think its ace. It could be better if:
a) They took the Cricket off C4 but kept the nice format of clever coverage without the ads
b) They showed 24 Season 4 without adverts
c) They stopped everyone shouting on the set of Eastenders (can't anyone hold a conversation without raising their voice?)
d) More football, like say Champions League
e) DONT SPOIL THE WEBSITE - I'm dreading when they take it all flash like and modern and absolutely lose the content over presentation :(
/rant
At 7:55 pm,
red one said…
Read your post and all the comments AFTER I'd posted a big rant about the beeb on my blog - and wish I'd read it before...
I do think public service broadcasting, a good website etc is important (tho not the rubbish article I slagged off in my blog, obviously). But £121 is a lot of money, especially when as people have pointed out, not everyone even has access to all the stuff.
A better way of paying for it would be through income tax, like other public services, so - at least theoretically - the rich pay more, the poor pay less.
At the moment a ridiculously large proportion of women in prison are there because they haven't got a TV license (they get jailed when they can't pay the fine).
RedOne
Post a Comment
<< Home