The licensing laws cover watching TV on computers
Saturday 31st July 2010, 3:00PM BST.
From Pauline Gillingham.
FOLLOWING Peter Rhodes’ column (JEP, 27 July) in which he suggests that the UK Culture Secretary is considering an extension to the licence fee to include anyone watching TV on a computer, I would like to clarify that the rules for watching TV online are already the same as watching it any other way.
It doesn’t matter what device you are using – if you are watching programmes at the same time as they are being shown on TV, you need a TV licence. Only if you are watching or downloading programmes that have already been broadcast using the iPlayer or other internet services is a licence not required.
Fortunately, with the vast majority of households owning TVs, most people will already be covered by the licence they have for their home address.
For more information about when a licence is needed, visit our website at www.tvlicensing.co.uk.
TV Licensing, 77 Kingsway, London.
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I always believed the reason for a tv licence was to pay the BBC to put on vast amounts of C*** on the telly, I personaly belive if you have sky you are paying for the right to watch the shows there airing, So why pay a license for something your already paying sky for? So what exactly are we paying for when we recieve everything via a dish?
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What gets me is that this is classed as a UK TAX and that is why they can take you to court for its’ collection. Now the Channel Islands are outside the scope of UK taxation so it is fundamentally wrong that we are forced to pay such for the UK TV Licence in the first place. If there were to be a compromise then the taxation part of the licence fee should at least be refunded because nearly £150.00 a year for a such a basic service when I understand we do not get the full serivce anyway is just ludicrous and morally wrong.
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The television licence fee is under serious review in the UK. The new Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt recently attacked the BBC’s “extraordinary and outrageous waste”. It is expected that the fee – which in effect is a tax – will be cut back in 2012 to encourage the BBC to be more efficient.
The future of the public sector broadcasting service is subject to much discussion in the UK – as indeed regular listeners to Radio 4 will confirm. The most likely out come will be a complete rethink of a, licence fee funded BBC.
However, a commercial BBC is considered unlikely. The favoured system appears to be a broadcasting fund to be created which broadcasters from commercial stations as well as the ‘beeb’ can apply for funding to make programmes, demonstrate that they are operating efficiently and giving the public value for money. The need to apply for funding would create much lacking accountability in broadcasting.
Most people value a public sector broadcasting service and its traditions and would not favour damaging of destroying the BBC.
However, the BBC can not expect the licence payer to fund endless expensive soap operas, game shows and repeats which the commercial production companies could do so much more efficiently.
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It is almost unbelievable that the TV licence still exists in its archaic form which broadly goes back to the Reith era of one national broadcasting service.
The so called ‘Licence’ is little short of legalised extortion, under threat of criminal proceedings, carried out against the nominal householder in whose property a television set is installed.
Which programmes (if any) are being received is deemed to be of no relevance yet the government and the BBC go to great pains to explain that all these lovely BBC programmes are what you get for your money. They don’t even pretend nowadays that any of the income is used for sorting out interference problems, which was always one of the reasons put forward for needing a licence even if you never watched BBC channels.
A single occupier, who might only watch occasionally or selectively, pays the same as a square-eyed family of couch potatoes. Any of them might never want to watch BBC. What is fair or logical about that? Most importantly, why is non payment a criminal offence?
The whole organisation seems totally diverse. Is ‘TV Licensing’ the BBC, the government, Capita Business Services Ltd or a multi user gravy train? See http://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/about/who-we-are-AB4/
Yes it has to be paid for and if we need public service broadcasting it should be paid for out of general tax income. If it is predominantly consumer entertainment and a nice big earner for those on the payroll, then find a method of charging that relates demand.
A few more people should, like me, refuse to take part in their game. That’s how it got sorted out in Australia.
Believe me, there are plenty of other rewarding ways of enjoying life than watching telly. Especially when fighting for a principle.
The crowning cheek of ‘TV licensing’ is that if you opt to pay in instalments, they will take the full annual amount in the first few hits and then have you pay in advance towards the next year! Also, if you don’t have a telly, they expect you to bear the expense of telling them why you don’t need a licence! They really have got it sewn up in their favour. It surely won’t be long before they sew up the time delay loophole (conveniently skimmed over in the good lady’s letter).
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About 12 years ago, I had it on good authority from a serving Police officer that you could not be prosecuted for not having a TV license, and at the time, the TV licensing authorities had lost their database for Jersey so they had no idea who had a license or not. Hence I did not have a license for about 5 years.
In 2003, an inspector called at my house and spoke to my lodger, who spoke limited english. I traked down the inspector who was staying at a local hotel and asked him what the hell he was up to, and he responded that he was updating his database. That was actually a lie, because he had somehow obtained my lodgers bank details, and TV licensing started helping themselves to her money. I advised the inspector that I did not have a license and what was he going to do ablout it, and which Jersey court would be dealing with the case, and under which law etc etc. He could not answer.
I subsequently bough a license and sorted out the issue over my lodgers bank account. Since then, I have seen a few prosecutions in the Jersey courts.
At the end of the day, I saved a few quid over that period of time that I was unlicensed !
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Editor please use this rewrite, thanks ……
Jersey Tourism are calling for support to help end forecast ‘discrimination’ by getting Jersey mentioned.
Many people do not know how glorious the weather can be just a short trip away from the mainland due to Jersey not being placed on national weather forecasts.
I understand that a group of Jersey representatives, armed with signatures, are going to the BBC to demonstrate how serious an issue Jersey considers it to be.
Perhaps if they also demanded a reduction in the TV license fee in protest at the forecast neglect they might also get Jersey in the national news
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@Warren J:
They still don’t have a working database.
We have no TV, so we’ve had the standard threatening letters. We e-mailed them to say we hadn’t a TV, and got a very polite letter saying that they would leave us alone for two years.
Four days later, another aggressively threatening letter arrived. I looked at it very carefully. The address was very slightly different: it was ‘La Rue…” on one letter, and ‘la Rue…’ on the other. Same postcode and house name though.
If their database is that badly managed, they aren’t fit to run the service. It’s as simple as that.
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#3 Unfortunately the BBC are looking to the wrong areas to cut their costs, despite the big news stories about celebrities they are going all out to penalise literally thousands of people who regularly contribute to their profit-making and who are already extremely underpaid (this doesn’t make the headlines for some reason). I, for one, have no love for the BBC whatsoever and do not care for its continuance.
#7 I don’t even want to consider how many people they owe money to, people who don’t know to ask for it back. Like many licence payers with a direct debit I was always paying 6 months ahead, when I sold my house 9-years later and was put up by my parents for a few months I wrote and asked for my 6-months back (and got it). But they don’t remind you, and when you’ve paid it monthly for 9-years it’s easy to forget that they owe you.
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