Tv Licenses do not infringe people's human rights.

July 17, 2003 2:03 PM

Tv Licenses do not infringe people's human rights.Journalist and broadcaster Jonathan Miller refused to pay his license because it seemed as though the BBC had license to charge what they like raise the charge when they like; and that it didn't take into account the gulf between someone only receiving an Analogue service as opposed to digital. He lost the case. Serious implications.
posted by feelinglistless (51 comments total)

Excellent, Murdoch employee loses case against employers competitor.

I understand why people get upset over the license fee, especially with the most visible parts of the BBC often not being distinguishable from commercial television, minus the adverts of course, but anyone who puts Radio 4 in the slightest danger will have to deal with a one man terrorist campaign. I have enough Archer's Addicts newsletters here to put a nasty mark on your cheek if I bound them together and rolled them up.
posted by vbfg at 2:24 PM on July 17, 2003

Thank goodness this guy was sent right back where hew came from. Whilst not perfect by any yardstick, the BBC continues to deliver high quality output quite unlike anything coming from News International.

And incidentally, the government set the cost of the TV license, *not* the BBC.
posted by chrimble at 2:29 PM on July 17, 2003

But just think of the possibilities if Radio 4 were to get all of that 3 billion pounds.
posted by jamespake at 2:34 PM on July 17, 2003

£116 p.a. = £9.66 per month.

What does a basic sub to Sky cost? Without Radio 4, SixMusic, GCSE BiteSize, et al?

Murdoch knows the price of everything & the value of nothing.

O, btw - BritFilter (",)
posted by dash_slot- at 2:41 PM on July 17, 2003

Sorry, I'm spouting crap; whilst the government provide a charter to the BBC to collect the license fee, it's the BBC themselves that actually set it.

But regardless of anything else, TV is *not* a human right, and to suggest otherwise is frankly demeaning to those whose human rights truly are abused.
posted by chrimble at 2:46 PM on July 17, 2003

Human rights is stretching it - but imagine the furore if the government said that internet users had to pay £116 p.a. to access certain websites but you have to pay the same amount even if you only want to use the web to access other websites. That is not far off the situation with regards to tv here in the UK. The license-fee is essentially a subscription to the BBC but you have to pay it to receive tv, BBC or otherwise.
posted by jamespake at 2:58 PM on July 17, 2003

The human right is not "TV", but rather that one should be able to "listen" to anything broadcast into your personal space. In the U.S., the legal premise is that it is lawful to recieve any communication that someone beams to you, one just can't engage in cryptographical-analysis of said communications to get around a scrambling system.

In the U.K., you have no basic right of reception, which, from a legal perspective, is a bit harder to justify, since legally & scientifically, there's no difference between visible and invisible EMF. If one's government claims a right to regulate reception of one form of EMF, the slipperly slope argument says they're taking a step towards controlling all forms of EMF, etc etc.

Not saying I agree with him, just explaining his legal logic.
posted by nomisxid at 2:59 PM on July 17, 2003

nomisxid - so you're saying we could have a licence fee for seeing - can I patent that idea?
posted by jamespake at 3:07 PM on July 17, 2003

The license fee funds BBC TV and radio, but you don't need a license to use a radio.
posted by Blue Stone at 3:26 PM on July 17, 2003

What galls me about the case is that the TV License is an utter steal. I can't think of a day or week when I haven't seen or listened to something from the BBC which hasn't improved my knowledge of a subject or introduced me to something new. Or just something utterly entertaining.

If this was being paid for by advertising (as some advocate) it would inevitably cause everything to go down market and for the niche channels such as BBC4 to disappear, leaving a dirth of anything to watch.

I mean is anyone still watching ITV?
posted by feelinglistless at 3:36 PM on July 17, 2003

legally & scientifically, there's no difference between visible and invisible EMF

Visible light is clearly distinct from all other forms of EM radiation in that it can be detected by humans without the use of additional equipment. This provides a clear boundary between allowing the government to regulate reception and interfering with the ability to look at things. One case where this has already happened is in the restriction of police use of infrared cameras to detect people growing marijuana in their homes.
posted by yarmond at 3:39 PM on July 17, 2003

Good for him. The licence fee is a ridiculous pre-war relic that persists only because of government inertia. It's ridiculous that here in the UK support for the licence fee is seen as a left-wing position and opposition to it is seen as right-wing: as Miller points out, it's a flat-rate tax that's far more of an imposition on the poor than the rich. Just because critics focus on the licence fee as a way of attacking the BBC itself doesn't mean that defenders of the BBC should have to defend the licence fee. The two should not be logically linked.

The BBC should be funded - at whatever level the public via its elected representatives determines - through general taxation, just like any other public service. (And no, not by advertising.) Critics might still complain about paying for a service they don't use, but any one of us can point to public services we don't use, and at least they won't be able to point to a single fee specifically earmarked to support the BBC. And there'll be no more ridiculous waste of government time and money on policing the fee. I mean, honestly: detector vans? Wasting court time on this nonsense?
posted by rory at 3:51 PM on July 17, 2003

"I mean is anyone still watching ITV?" ~ feelinglistless

"The Bil" is about all I ever watch on ITV. Dull, safe monotonous lcd drivel, otherwise.

That whole 'serious' "Tonight with Trevor McDonald" is embarassing to watch. "Real-time-satire" is what I'd call it.
posted by Blue Stone at 3:56 PM on July 17, 2003

The BBC should be funded - at whatever level the public via its elected representatives determines - through general taxation, just like any other public service.

Which unfortunately would put the government and ministers at the heart of BBC budget decisions. In the light of recent and on-going events I'm not convinced that's where I want the air supply for this particular public service.
posted by vbfg at 4:00 PM on July 17, 2003

What vbfg said.
posted by dash_slot- at 4:09 PM on July 17, 2003

I am also anti "TV tax", but hopefully digital technology will be able to resolve the problem in future. After all, your box will KNOW whether you've watched a BBC channel at all, and if you haven't, you shouldn't have to pay the BBC. The current system is like having to pay a £1 toll everytime you use my car, just incase you happen to go over the Dartford Bridge, whether you do or not.

Pay for what you use, and not for what you don't. The BBC makes insane amounts of money from merchandising deals, and selling its shows to other countries (Weakest Link, Walking with 'X', The Office, etc.) If the BBC suddenly makes a whole ton of money from these deals, do we see a decrease in our licence fee to compensate? You bet my arse we don't.

And the lawyer's argument is vile:

"Non-enforcement of the licence fee could at a stroke cause a collapse of the funding basis for the BBC's home services."

This is as smart as the early 20th Century view of "I guess we shouldn't let blacks or women vote, because gee, imagine how that could affect society!" Justifying something simply by the fact that it'd cause a big change is really no justification at all.
posted by wackybrit at 4:11 PM on July 17, 2003

Well, I'm pro-license fee, and BBC.

It's a pooling of resources. It's not a huge burden on the poor, who seem happy to pay oodles for SKY World packages without the blink of an eye (about £400 per annum.)

Look at other countries. No one has anything that touches the Beeb, or the license fee. I'd assert that the two are inextricably linked.

General taxation as a means to fund the BBC seems a little naive. General taxation is at the hands of politicians. They don't fund schools properly, what makes you think they'd give a flying fig about the BBC? It would be on it's knees in no time at all, and we'd have telethons for funding. No thanks.

The "pay as you go" option would introduce commercial pressures and its distorting effects on programming output. All ready, people criticise the BBC when it's too commercial, and then again when it's viewing figures fall. It's plain stupid. Anything other than a politician & commercial-pressure-free solution, I think would be a failure.
posted by Blue Stone at 4:55 PM on July 17, 2003

For those of us not UK-native, could you fill us in on what exactly this license fee is, how its collected, etc? It sounds like its a levied fee on -everyone-, whether BBC-inclined or not?
posted by Ogre Lawless at 5:06 PM on July 17, 2003

vbfc, here in Australia, we have the ABC (guess what that stands for). Publically funded from general taxation (the old claim was "8 cents a day") not licence fees, but it continues to be a strong, independent voice happy to take swings at the government that provides its funding.

And Bluestone, I reckon the ABC does come pretty close to touching the Beeb.
posted by Jimbob at 5:16 PM on July 17, 2003

Tonight on BBC1
EastEnders - crap soap
My Family - crap sitcom
Auf Wiedersehen, Pet - very old repeat

BBC2
The Proms - jingoistic nonsense with some good music that would be just as good on radio.

The BBC does produce some great stuff but for the majority of the time it isn't showing it. In recent years it seems to be competing directly with commercial tv which seems to defeat the whole point of a license fee.

It's not a huge burden on the poor, who seem happy to pay oodles for SKY World packages without the blink of an eye (about £400 per annum.)

These would be the not-so-poor poor then.

Ogre-Lawless - the license fee is pretty much what you say - anyone who is capable of receiving a tv signal in the UK has to pay it by law and the money funds the BBC, a tv producer which does not have to (and is not allowed to) run commercials. It made sense when there was only the BBC.
posted by jamespake at 5:22 PM on July 17, 2003

Here's everything you need to know
posted by jamespake at 5:27 PM on July 17, 2003

BBC America become a favorite of mine lately, especially all the mystery series (Waking the Dead, Blood in the Wire, latest is Red Cap, though someone will need to explain Jonathon Creek to me) plus Coupling. Please keep Graham Norton and those fashion nazi twits to yourselves, though.
posted by billsaysthis at 5:48 PM on July 17, 2003

What pisses me off is the endless threatening letters "no record of you having a TV licence..... fine £xxx... etc". I get one of these a week.
Who else can spam you with such shit?
And I must stress that you need never watch the BBC, you can even have a box with BBC disabled, you've still got to cough for them.
And next thing some dude turns up with authority to search your house, to see if you've a telly hidden in the cupboard. Fuck that. I live in a poor area, the type of area targeted by the BBC bully boys. I wish the BBC (much as I love them) would spend some of the money they are extorting from single mums on £65 pw to solving the local smack and crack problem, and then we might all be able to sit down and relax to Radio 4.

Oh, and I think you get a £1 discount if you are blind.
posted by Joeforking at 6:35 PM on July 17, 2003

jamespake: You obviously know nothing about the Proms or you wouldn't have made that ridiculous comment. Quite apart from being the world's largest, longest running and perhaps most ambitious music festival, only a tiny proportion of the content (i.e. the second half of the Last Night) could remotely be called jingoisitic nonsense. I can only hope you were joking. There's hardly a glut of classical music on TV after all.

I don't have a TV so don't have to pay the license fee, but I would be happy to pay it anyway, as Radio 3 and 4 alone make it worth the price.
posted by cbrody at 6:47 PM on July 17, 2003

Oh and by the way joeforking, the concession for the blind is 50%, just in case anyone thought you were being serious.
posted by cbrody at 7:02 PM on July 17, 2003

Sorry, cbrody, I should have checked first, but it used to be a few years ago.
posted by Joeforking at 7:10 PM on July 17, 2003

Graham Norton is not a BBC 'act', as such, he comes from Channel 4, and BBC America just airs the show in the US. Anyone who finds Graham Norton uncouth would, however, be no drinking buddy of mine! (Only joking ;-)) And I'll start watching The Proms some more when they get some Philip Glass on there :-)

One way of making the TV licence more bearable is to get a black and white TV, as the fee is then about a quarter of the colour price, then retain a colour TV for DVDs/Playstation/whatever (this is legal).
posted by wackybrit at 7:12 PM on July 17, 2003

wackybrit, no it's not, if you possess a TV receiver you must have a licence for it. Quote from licencing website

If you use or install television receiving equipment to receive or record television programme services you are required by law to have a valid TV Licence.

I think the point being it doesn't matter what you are using the TV for, you need a licence just for possessing it.
posted by Joeforking at 7:31 PM on July 17, 2003

you need a licence just for possessing it.

Joeforking: Incorrect, and this has been proven in numerous cases. Even your quote backs it up.. to receive or record television programme services.. this does NOT include DVD/VCR or games console use. I know of someone who ripped the tuner out of their TV and the authorities agreed this meant no license necessary.. although you do not even need to go this far.
posted by wackybrit at 11:49 PM on July 17, 2003

We've just cancelled out TV license because we don't watch the damned thing. It's still set up in the living room, connected to the video and my now ancient PSone. No connection to the outside world, so they're happy.

The only strange thing they've said is that we aren't allowed to watch videoed recordings of broadcast TV.

So that's us £100+ pounds a year better off...
posted by twine42 at 1:06 AM on July 18, 2003

As Jimbob points out, in Australia (where I'm from) the ABC does okay being funded out of general taxation. Yes, there is a risk of government interference/blackmail, but that risk is just as present in the UK - it just happens in different ways. And over there, whenever the government does hack away at the budget there's an almighty outcry, and it becomes an election issue.

Compare that with the UK situation: by having the BBC funded separately from general taxation, it isn't accountable to the public. Not accountable enough, anyway. Would we accept that of any other major public institution? If the BBC is so great - which in a great many respects it is - it should feel able to make its case to the public for a budget of X million a year, just like every other essential public service has to. The ABC did that brilliantly with the '8 cents a day' campaign in the late '80s (although it's lost its way a bit in recent years).

And those who figure it's no big deal to fork over the equivalent of two weeks' worth of your total income when you're living a hand-to-mouth existence might want to readjust their concept of 'poor'.
posted by rory at 1:16 AM on July 18, 2003

I can think of better ways of saving £100 than getting rid of my telly. I'll just go without food for a few days...

Frankly, if it's the choice between paying £2 a week or suffering the advert breaks of American TV, then I'd rather pay the money. Why is it an episode of 24 only takes 45 minutes to show on the BBC? That means fully a quarter of all programming in America is adverts!
posted by salmacis at 1:17 AM on July 18, 2003

Why do people imagine America is the only alternative model? What about Australia? Canada? If you have a political culture that values public services, it will value its public broadcasters.

General taxation as a means to fund the BBC seems a little naive. General taxation is at the hands of politicians. They don't fund schools properly, what makes you think they'd give a flying fig about the BBC? It would be on it's knees in no time at all, and we'd have telethons for funding. No thanks.

Tying the BBC's financial fate to that of other public services would be a huge boost to the public sector as a whole. It would gain a powerful ally with an invested interest in resisting the sort of across-the-board cuts to spending beloved of economic rationalists. As it is, with the current quasi-user-pays system, the BBC is insulated from that sort of thing, as you point out. That isn't necessarily a good thing. When the Australian ABC started suffering the same budget cuts as the rest of the country, it raised public awareness of the impact of those cuts - you could see the evidence in the TV schedule. And it became an election issue. People had to make choices about where they wanted their money spent. That's not "naive", that's democracy at work.

And as for saying that no-one else coming close, look at tonight on BBC1: Open All Hours, a repeat of an ancient Ronnie Barker sitcom... EastEnders, standard soap... Auf Weidersehen, Pet, another repeat... the usual mix of the good, the bad and the ancient. I think you'll find that a lot of other national broadcasters come close to that.
posted by rory at 1:46 AM on July 18, 2003

That means fully a quarter of all programming in America is adverts!
Absolutely - when they show the Simpsons on BBC2, it lasts 20 minutes, not half an hour like it does on Sky.

If the BBC is so great - which in a great many respects it is - it should feel able to make its case to the public for a budget of X million a year

The BBC does try (and possibly fail) to be accountable, in it's annual report. I paid my TV licence two weeks ago, and the guy at the post office asked me what it was for - I replied "Radio 4 and Radio 5 live" - they're worth the licence fee on their own!
posted by BigCalm at 1:59 AM on July 18, 2003

People hate the idea of a licence because it seems like a tax but, as Blue Stone pointed out, they seem willing to pay hundreds for Sky or cable, often to watch programmes that before multi-channel t.v. they would have seen for free. It is hard to deny that a licence fee for the handful of BBC channels in a multi-channel world is an anomaly, but it is an anomaly that works - or has worked up till now. The BBC is in an invidious position - it has to compete for audiences with the commercial t.v. or it is accused of being a minority channel (and so the licence fee becomes even harder to justify), but the more 'commercial' it looks the weaker the argument for 'public' funding. It's one of those awkward British compromises which has worked, and frankly, I can't for the moment think of a better solution.
posted by rolo at 2:03 AM on July 18, 2003

auntie is great, I feel quite contented to pay my licence fee. There is nothing more infuriating than the constant harranging of adverts whilst trying to watch mindless t.v.
posted by johnnyboy at 2:14 AM on July 18, 2003

For what it's worth, I know that the licence fee will remain forever and ever, because most people in Britain do feel that it's an "anomaly that works"; all I was trying to do was indicate just how much of an anomaly it is, whichever way you slice it. It's a flat-tax user-pays system of funding, and yet the right wing opposes it and the left wing supports it, which goes against all usual political logic.

That said: I personally would be a lot happier with it if at least it was a two-tier system and not a flat rate; that is, if households in the bottom, say, 20 percent by income only had to pay twenty quid a year instead of £116, or something like that. Penalising someone simply because they possess a TV and can't come up with the readies to pay a £116 bill is iniquitous.

Of course, then it would have to be collected by a body with reliable access to household income data, like, say, Inland Revenue. And they might as well collect it when they're collecting other monies, like, say, income tax. So then it might as well be part of income tax. But whatever; the tax system has other anomalies, like NI contributions, so one more wouldn't hurt.

They should at least ditch the detector van crap, though. If it's a valuable national institution, be honest about it and tax everybody. Almost everyone owns a TV anyway.
posted by rory at 3:20 AM on July 18, 2003

They should at least ditch the detector van crap, though. If it's a valuable national institution, be honest about it and tax everybody. Almost everyone owns a TV anyway.

They should at least stop traffic wardens inspecting road tax, though. If it's a valuable national transport system, be honest about it and tax everybody. Almost everyone owns a car anyway.
posted by armoured-ant at 3:50 AM on July 18, 2003

Worth noting that the minions of MurdochCo are regularly trying/supporting legal actions against the licence fee such as this. I remember when Sky TV were starting up, The Sun (a News International 'paper) were touting the idea that if you only watched TV via a dish you could get away without paying the licence fee.

Also worth noting that if the BBC were ever forced into showing commercials, the income of the existing commercial channels would be shot to pieces.

[I seem to remember some research done into the costs of commercial terrestrial TV a few years ago but I'm darned if I can find anything. IIRC, the research found that the average household paid twice as much for ITV & Channel 4 (the commercial terrestrial channels in the UK, pre-Channel 5) because the cost of an average household's yearly shopping increased by £140 to cover the cost of TV advertising. The licence fee was £70 at the time.]

rory: If you want to stay in & watch TV on a Friday night in the middle of July, don't expect the brightest lights of Prime Time to come out & shine. On ITV there are 2 soaps & a repeat of A Touch of Frost. Viva le difference.

This is the time of year for low ratings as people are outside or on holiday. Wait 'til the end of the summer & you'll see lots of shiny new progs for the autumn schedule.

A lot of elderly folks who don't have 200 channel cable/satellite & who are't gambolling around in the sunshine quite appriciate repeats of Frost, Open All Hours & the like.


I always thought that the old 'British TV is the best in the world' chestnut was a load of twaddle until I actually got to watch TV in other countries. Boy was I wrong.

The BBC is a national treasure and I'm quite happy to pay a measly 9 quid a month for it.
posted by i_cola at 4:00 AM on July 18, 2003

They should at least stop traffic wardens inspecting road tax, though. If it's a valuable national transport system, be honest about it and tax everybody. Almost everyone owns a car anyway.

Bad analogy, because you need a road fund disc per vehicle rather than per address. Which tacks into the ideas of rory that you could add TV license onto council tax.

On a side track, I think the road fund license should be chased up more enthusiastically, and MOT and insurance should provide stickers that need to be fixed to the windscreen. A year ago my father taxed a car her borrowed from me, but did so with the wrong reg number. Post office didn't notice. DVLA noticed and asked for me to confirm the details. I forgot it and they never asked again. So one vehicle was taxed twice and one wasn't taxed at all. They said nothing.
posted by twine42 at 4:39 AM on July 18, 2003

rory: If you want to stay in & watch TV on a Friday night in the middle of July, don't expect the brightest lights of Prime Time to come out & shine. On ITV there are 2 soaps & a repeat of A Touch of Frost. Viva le difference.

I don't own a television.

They should at least stop traffic wardens inspecting road tax, though. If it's a valuable national transport system, be honest about it and tax everybody. Almost everyone owns a car anyway.

Fair enough. And I don't own a car.

I still benefit from the road network, though, so I should pay for it through a fair system of progressive income taxation, which would automatically take into account how much I benefit from it (in monetary terms, which is what we're talking about here: licences and taxes), and would protect those on low incomes.

Similarly, even though I don't own a TV at the moment, I benefit from the existence of the BBC in all sorts of ways - BBC radio, BBC online, BBC DVDs to watch on my laptop, and all the thousands and thousands of hours of BBC programmes I've seen in my life, including whenever I've stayed in a hotel or B&B in Britain these past couple of years. I would have no problem with supporting that as a UK resident by contributing to its budget through general taxation.

The car analogy breaks down in one respect, though: MOT inspections relating to road tax play an important role in keeping unroadworthy cars off the road, where they can be a menace to other drivers and the environment. Whereas owning a crappy old TV that barely works has no impact on other viewers or the airwaves.

Still, it would be quite possible to require that cars be inspected for roadworthiness, and charge a fee to cover costs, without making that fee carry the burden of maintaining the roads themselves. (I'd be surprised if it actually does, in fact—I expect most road costs are met from general revenue; I'm just addressing the implications of your point.)
posted by rory at 4:49 AM on July 18, 2003

tacks into the ideas of rory that you could add TV license onto council tax.

Not quite - progressive income tax, not council tax. I'm not a great fan of council tax either (another one that hits the poor hard), although I accept that property owners should pay rates of some kind.
posted by rory at 4:59 AM on July 18, 2003

Almost everyone owns a car anyway

Do they? The last figures I saw said there was an ownership level of around 450 per 1,000 in the UK.

I think that, progressively, sections of the BBC which are funded by licence fee money will be lopped off: certain services, such as BBCi, are having increasing trouble in justifying the fact that they paid for by British money to fund international access.

The corporation might have to change the way it is funded, or its transparency, or its huge bureaucracy in order to make itself more presentable for the British people; but I think most of them feel very attached to it, and realise the usefulness of the services it provides - even if they don't watch it particularly.
posted by blastboy at 5:05 AM on July 18, 2003

rory does it not? isn't a tax based upon the value of your house work as a mirror of your value [at least, in theory]?
posted by twine42 at 6:40 AM on July 18, 2003

Not really twine42. I live in Bradford and paid £24,000 for my house. No, I didn't miss a zero off. Head ten miles east to Leeds and add £50,000 for the same house.
posted by vbfg at 6:46 AM on July 18, 2003

Interesting theory, twine42, but as vbfg's example suggests, it's far too imprecise a way of determining someone's "value". You are not your beautiful house...
posted by rory at 7:02 AM on July 18, 2003

rolo said: People hate the idea of a licence because it seems like a tax but, as Blue Stone pointed out, they seem willing to pay hundreds for Sky or cable, often to watch programmes that before multi-channel t.v. they would have seen for free.

That's a common psychological trait. People would generally prefer to spend a lot for a perceived big gain, than lose a little on maintaining something they always had. This is why spending more money on new clothes is more fun than spending less money repairing the old ones.

rory said: Fair enough. And I don't own a car. I still benefit from the road network, though, so I should pay for it through a fair system of progressive income taxation

Good god, authoritarian governments love people like you who think they should pay more tax for some unknown reason. Even though you don't have a car, you already pay for the roads through the things you buy, Sir. When you buy your groceries, you're paying for the road tax of the trucks that delivered it, the diesel they consumed, etc. You don't need to be taxed even more for no reason.

In a true market economy, everyone pays for their share of used resources and taxes, right across the board, even if the end user isn't taxed directly.
posted by wackybrit at 7:40 AM on July 18, 2003

vbfg said: Not really twine42. I live in Bradford and paid £24,000 for my house. No, I didn't miss a zero off. Head ten miles east to Leeds and add £50,000 for the same house.

Therefore your house is of far lesser value than one in Leeds. There is no such thing as a bargain in a market economy.. simply people would rather live in Leeds than in Bradford, and so your property is worth less. Very few poor people buy expensive houses, and very few rich people buy cheap houses (to reside in, anyway). Therefore you can somewhat more or less judge one's net worth and 'ability to pay' on their property value, since one generally buys a property that is at a level their means can support.
posted by wackybrit at 7:46 AM on July 18, 2003

Except I bought this house because it was a low cost solution easy to reach work from, i.e. near the university, and 'good enough' for my purposes. The equivalent in Leeds costing £70,000 is the low cost housing solution and within easy reach of the University. My income is in the same bracket as those buying the equivalent houses in Leeds.
posted by vbfg at 8:27 AM on July 18, 2003

Good god, authoritarian governments love people like you who think they should pay more tax for some unknown reason.

Except we aren't actually discussing an authoritarian government, we're discussing a representative democracy which is kept in check by the people (even people like me) via the ballot box and in various other ways. But thanks for the implication that I'm some kind of gullible toady to authoritarians.

When you buy your groceries, you're paying for the road tax of the trucks...

Except, as I was exploring in that comment, why should roads be funded by a per-vehicle tax? Owning a vehicle is a pretty loose measure of one's road usage and impact. I don't particularly object to the existing MOT system, though, for the reasons I've already given: it doesn't just pay for roads, it keeps dangerous vehicles off the road.

I don't yearn to "pay more tax for some unknown reason". My arguments here are about replacing a specific, flat-rate tax (in all but name) - the TV licence - with a more equitable means of raising the same amount of money (or a different amount, if the people through their elected representatives so decide).

A tax system requires ways of minimising tax avoidance, which in the case of TV licences means TV detector vans and prosecutions; but given that only a tiny minority of households don't have a TV (about 2%), and assuming ways of reducing the impact on poorer households, it would be much simpler just to assume total TV coverage and make everyone pay for it - and if you're doing that, you might as well do it through general taxation. So yes, in this specific instance I would be willing to pay slightly more in tax just to remove this burden on the legal system, which would in turn save taxpayers' money.
posted by rory at 8:47 AM on July 18, 2003

Drawing those off-the-cuff suggestions together with some actual calculations:

In 2001 there were 21,660,475 households in England and Wales, about 88.5% of the UK population, which extrapolates to roughly 24.5 million households in the UK as a whole. If 98% of those have a TV, and assuming they all actually pay their licence fee, the total revenue is about £2.78 billion a year.

To raise the same amount through a scheme that kept the fee down to twenty pounds for the bottom twenty percent of households, you would have to charge the remaining households £137 p.a. instead of £116 p.a. If you did it through a tax return people would hardly notice the difference; if you raised the funds through actual income taxes the net increase for most people would be even less. And you wouldn't have people on sixty five quid a week ending up in court because they can't come up with the licence fee for a 14-inch telly.
posted by rory at 9:28 AM on July 18, 2003