Scum

Utter, utter scum.

Sir Keir Starmer is reportedly considering making people pay the TV license fee even if they only use streaming services.

The move would be part of the Government’s plans to change the way the public-service broadcaster is funded, Bloomberg reports.

I don’t use a streaming service. But even so, this is pure nastiness. No, let’s not look at why record numbers of people are cancelling their licenses; let’s just find another way of forcing people to pay it.

Other funding options reportedly include allowing the BBC to show adverts, making BBC radio listeners pay a fee, and taxing streaming services.

I don’t listen to the radio, either. Showing adverts or making it a subscription model is the way forward here, but they know that it will wither and die.

With a few minor adjustments and better enforcement, the license fee could also be left largely the same, according to a source who said it would’ve already been scrapped if there was a feasible alternative.

There is a feasible funding model. Those who want to view it, pay for it. The rest of us don’t. Simple. If it dies, it dies and good riddance.

15 Comments

  1. I don’t know why the government cares so much. They’re happy to increases taxes and minimum wages, then let private sector businesses die because of it, but won’t have the BBC function like any other business
    For some reason, we absolutely must have the BBC in it’s current form, just like the NHS. It’s like a religious belief

  2. It’s understandable that the socialists want a socialist propaganda outlet to continue to be funded, regardless of whether it’s by force or not.

    But why didn’t the Tories kill it when they had the chance?

    I can only conclude that the Tories are simply less honest socialists.

  3. This is how Germany works iirc. Everybody funds it whether you watch or not. Just another tax.

    I expect it will go ahead.

  4. They want to turn off the broadcast transmitters, and have TV only available via streaming.
    By 2030, supposedly.
    So this destroys any concept of a TV licence. Hence the efforts to make it compulsory and not linked to owning a TV. It’ll just go on general taxation as a propaganda fee.
    Only handed out to channels that toe the line, obviously.

  5. The more I hear about Starmer, the more I’m convinced that best part of him was the wet patch on his parent’s bed. Well, we don’t watch or record live TV in my house and we don’t pay for streaming services. We are legally licence free. We watch YouTube and DVD’s from our very extensive library, that’s it. The movies and TV shows of the past are a billion times better than any shite they put out today. I’m sure the BBC would love to include YT in its tax, but for now at least, they’re not touching it.

  6. “… a source who said it would’ve already been scrapped if there was a feasible alternative.”

    There is: shut it down, sell its assets, carry on with our lives. It’s totally unnecessary.

  7. I assume it would paid along income tax, like NI? If one doesn’t pay income tax then one wouldn’t pay, and there are many unemployed people in this country.

    Finland has that system. They don’t dump that tax on CGT or property tax, just income tax.

  8. Get rid of the licence fee. If you socialists want the Blacks Broadcasting Corporation you pay for it. I won’t.

  9. As I watch streaming services and a lot of YouTube content, I would like to think these providers could get a share of the revenue stream from an all-embracing telly tax.

    An idle thought as I know full well the BBC will swallow it all, even if my choice of viewing is (to me) far more entertaining and informative.

    • I watch You Tube a lot, it’s like citizen’s telly. I like the stuff about classic cars and motorbikes and stuff about music. Now I’m torn, nobody likes people posting their music choices but mentioning something without providing a link is bad form too. I always thought that doing a cover version that sounded just like the original was pointless. But then there is Tori Holub who gives me goosebumps.

      https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=J95lfJqo9VY

  10. Nasty piece of work our current dictator.

    Just been talking with wifey.
    If this comes to pass we’ll cancel Netflix and Prime and simply increase our library of DVDs.

    If they put it on general taxation there’s not much we can do about it sadly.

    I’ve not watched a single live broadcast for years now, one factory i go to they have a big telly on the canteen wall, i make sure my back is to it but its eerie seeing blokes staring blank eyed at the bloody thing, like something from the village of the damned.

  11. There are lots of TVs at the gym, mostly tuned to mainstream channels with the sound off and subtitles on. I don’t see many people paying attention to them, even on the step, treadmill, or elliptical machines which are right in front of them.

    On YouTube I forgot to mention restoration videos. There is something very satisfying in seeing something old and tatty being pulled apart, fixed and then put back together looking like new. The ones on pianos are really amazing.

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