[ian@huth]

A point that shouldn't be forgot is that many of the channels that you may not want to watch on cable and Sky (shopping channels, etc) do not receive any of the subscription charges but pay to be on those platforms. Remove them from the package and it would probably put up the package charge and put many people out of work. You are not being forced to watch them but they are there if you do want.

My view is that they should abolish the TV licence fee and give the BBC the same revenue from direct taxation. Most households these days have TV so the cost of doing this would be spread across the entire population with people not earning enough to pay tax are not spending a higher proportion of their income on what most people consider an essential these days. Adopting this method of funding the BBC would result in huge savings as there would be no administration costs and no licence dodgers. How much of the licence fee goes to running the system?