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Originally Posted by Bill C
Sky News are reporting that it looks like we are going to have to pay the BBC TAX for another 10 years  . Only in this country can you be forced by law to pay for a product that you dont use or want . |
I don't want nuclear weapons and wars with Iraq but I still have to pay for them as part of my income tax. Nature of the beast. The direct link between the licence fee and the BBC is why it is such a political hot potato. One suspects if it was subsumed into wider taxation it wouldn't upset people such as you quite so much.
Whatever, I still think the licence fee represents extraorinarily good value for money and that we would lose so much in terms of creativity, quality and cost efficiency is we were to chuck the BBC to the commercial lions.
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Originally Posted by me283
That's exactly the point I was trying to make. The licence fee could be viewed as a tax. People will argue that nobody is forced to buy a TV, but then that really isn't the issue. If I buy a car, I only have to pay road tax if it's used the road; if I buy a TV I have to buy a licence regardless of whether I "use" the BBC.
I recall hearing two bits of info that may just be urban myth. One is that if you buy a TV that is de-tuned so that it cannot receive BBC channels, you don't need a licence? The other concerns someone who was taken to court for not having a licence but managed to prove (no idea how) that he only used the TV to watch pre-recorded videos. Perhaps someone could confirm/denounce/clarify these two points?
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Presumably you'd have to prove your household, car and portable radios couldn't get BBC channels either and that your PC can't access BBC online. Which makes me wonder why they call it the TV licence?!