Down with the BBC

There is a huge wave of media comment at the moment, mostly led by BBC journalists and workers (not that they admit this on Twitter etc), trying to defend the BBC license fee.

The new Government is they fear looking at the viability of the BBC and correcting the wrong of making it a jailing offence to not pay the annual licence fee.

As Capitalists, I have long detested the monopoly of the BBC. The government has in effect subsidies tv and radio in this country by force. A by-product has been historically a higher quality output than most countries, but at a price of forcing hundreds of people to go to jail every year.

In 2020 this can no longer be even slightly justified. Hollywood is being outcompetes by the likes of Netflix and Amazon. Quality TV is available in the market to buy at a reasonable price. The BBC gave up on live sports so we are all used to paying for that or choosing not to now.

There is no moral stance in forcing people to pay for the BBC. However once the government reduces the jail threat, there will be hundreds of thousands more non-payers and the model will collapse.

Hence the campaign now. Sadly for the BBC too the only public service elements like News have also been compromised in our new partisan era. If the Government does want to subsidise news for the general good it could auction this off to the already numerous providers in the market.

My hope though is that the end is nigh for this regressive and unnecessary tax.