Archive fee

The BBC could charge viewers a subscription to watch classic shows from its archive, the directorgeneral has said.

Lord Hall said the corporation was looking for ways to monetise its back catalogue following the closure of BBC Store, which allowed users to download BBC programmes for a fee. That service “didn’t work – it was an experiment and we got out of it quickly”, he said, saying that customers preferred on-demand services such as Netflix.

One option would be to add a subscription service to iplayer for older shows.