[SMHarman]

Originally Posted by Defiant

Simple in the early years of Television

So now TV is risk free? No government support is needed? If it is risk free, why have Grananda and Carlton merged?

Originally Posted by Defiant

Do you really think I'm interested. Do you think the sun shine's outta their arse so much the private sector just can't compete with them. Sorry but your talking utter rubbish. The licence fee just gives the BBC a licence of there own to print money

And maybe try new televisual approaches, would startrek have come to be without Dr Who forerunning it or would SciFi have been too risky for a commercial outfit. Would the UK be a place where people come to make movies without the skills and training that the BBC provides? Would the private companies carry out as much training?

At least with the licence fee, it does what it says on the tin, you pay a fee, it goes (less collection costs and enforcement) to the BBC who spend it relatively well on television, radio and multimedia. In addition they capitalise on their archive to supplement this income and promote the past present and future of british television.

Now petrol tax and road tax, if only this all went on transport solutions (not just road, but rail, busses etc, we would not have the congestion we do, we would have a reliable consistently financed rail infrastructure (probably building maglev trains to glasgow).

If only national insurance all went to pensions and healthcare, we would have a state pension scheme that we could be proud of on the world stage.

Instead these are alternate revenue generation schemes, be gratefull that your licence fee does not go partly to central govt coffers.