Row over BBC TV licence fee revolt
CAMPAIGNERS are accusing the BBC of publishing “inconsistent” figures about numbers of pensioners failing to pay the TV licence.
In a new twist in the row over the scrapping of the right to free licences for those aged over 75, pressure group Silver Voices says nearly 300,000 households have “mysteriously” disappeared from the corporation’s calculations.
Dennis Reed, director of the campaign group, said the BBC is downplaying the impact of the licence fee rebellion “by making false claims that nine out of 10 over-75s have paid up, and by stealthily reducing the number of households required to pay”.
Pursued
Research by the campaign group estimates that nearly 300,000 households have not been accounted for.
BBC chiefs say nearly 2.8 million out of a total of 4.2 million who previously received a free licence had “made arrangements” to pay the licence fee.
A further 260,000 households are being pursued for non-payment of the fee.
The corporation says around 750,000 households are still entitled to a free TV licence because they receive Pension Credit.
Silver Voices reckons the figures still leave around 300,000 households unaccounted for. Anecdotal evidence from their members suggests that local TV licence enforcement officers may be shrinking lists of non-paying pensioner households by either reclassifying the homes as “unlicensed”, with unknown owners, or marking them down as “not requiring a licence”.
Now Silver Voices says it will use the BBC’s enforcement approach as a key argument if legal actions against pensioners boycotting their licence payment reach the courts.
Mr Reed said: “The BBC stands damned by its own statistics…their inconsistent approach to enforcement will provide plenty of defence ammunition.”
A TV Licensing spokesman said: “This incorrect claim has been made before – it was wrong then and it’s wrong now. There has been no ‘disappearance’ of households requiring an over-75s licence, as all are accounted for with explanations in our most recent update.”
A recent update showed 222,000 previous holders of free licences had died by August last year and a further 97,000 were recorded as having died since then.
THE BBC is in danger of alienating those who should be its greatest supporters. Doing away with free TV licences for the over 75s is not just short-sighted but smacks of desperation from an organisation under pressure from competitors like never before.
Now the Beeb is accused of hiding the extent on non-payment from angry pensioners in an attempt to play down the impact of its controversial decision. The BBC disputes this.
What’s clear is that this is a messy situation and one that is entirely of the BBC’s own making.
A change of heart is what’s required. If that should happen there’ll be talk of having made a humiliating U-turn – but it also takes courage to admit a mistake.
We urge the BBC to be courageous and reconsider its policy.