The British government is reportedly considering extending the BBC licence fee to people who only use streaming services to pay for the faltering public broadcaster.
The government may soon force Britons who use Netflix, Disney+ or other streaming services to pay the annual licence fee that funds the BBC, Bloomberg reports.
The news outlet cited unnamed sources familiar with ongoing talks within the Department for Culture, Media and Sport as the end of the current 11-year charter for the public broadcaster approaches at the end of 2027.
The BBC has struggled to compete with companies such as Netflix as younger audiences have moved towards new media for content. Meanwhile, the left-liberal broadcaster has also alienated many of its older viewers with woke pandering to the youth.
Other options to prop up the broadcaster said to be under consideration would be for the government to levy taxes directly upon privately owned streaming services, to allow the BBC to start running advertisements, or to impose a licence fee on those who listen to BBC radio.
Under the current model, anyone who watches live television in the UK is mandated to pay a licence fee to support the BBC, whether they watch the public broadcaster or not.
The yearly fee, which increases annually in line with inflation, is set to rise from £169.50 ($211) to £174.50 ($217) in April.
Those who fail to pay the fee face fines of up to £1,000. While you can’t technically be imprisoned for failing to pay the licence fee, those who don’t pay the associated fine can be put behind bars.
According to the Daily Mail, 44,106 people were convicted and fined for failing to pay the licence fee in 2022, alone, making it the most common crime in the country. To enforce the fee, the TV Licensing authority employs alleged “detection vans” to “detect the use of TV receiving equipment at specifically targeted addresses within minutes.”
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has previously admitted that the licence fee is “regressive” as “it’s a flat fee that means that poorer people pay proportionately more than anybody else.”
Commenting on the reported proposals, Rebecca Ryan of the Defund the BBC campaign group said: “Is there anything this government won’t tax? Streaming is not broadcast TV. What next, YouTubers, gaming, podcasts? It’s a tax on entertainment. Opportunistic and desperate.”
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