Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Licence fee cost up by £1.50 from April 1
THE cost of an annual TV licence will increase from £157.50 to £159 from April 1, it has been revealed.
The fee is set by the Government, which announced in 2016 that it would rise in line with inflation for five years from April 2017.
The new annual cost equates to 43p per day, according to the broadcaster. Those buying or renewing a licence after April 1 will pay the new fee.
Those already paying for a licence on an instalment scheme which started before that date, such as via a monthly direct debit or weekly cash payments, will continue to make payments totalling £157.50 until their licence comes up for renewal. The cost of an annual black-and-white licence will rise by 50p to £53.50.
The licence fee model has come under fire recently amid criticism of the broadcaster over equal pay and diversity.
Free licences for all over-75s were abolished last year. New BBC director general Tim Davie said in 2020 that the licence fee model is the best way to fund the BBC, adding: “The vast majority of households think it offers good value.”
The Government has axed plans to decriminalise the non-payment of the licence fee.
NEARLY 580 years of combined history are wrapped up in the vanishing stores once lorded over by Sir Philip Green.
Burton can trace its roots back to 1903 when Lithuanian immigrant Meshe David Osinsky started a tailoring firm.
Burton once owned 400 stores, mills and factories, supplied demob suits for servicemen after the Second World War and was official suit supplier to England’s 1966 World Cup winning football team.
In 1964 Topshop began as a section of a store in Sheffield. In the 80s and 90s it was THE place for many kids to shop.
Green wanted to turn Topshop into a global phenomenon, hiring Kate Moss to front a collection then opening a flagship store on New York’s Fifth Avenue in 2014.
By 2019 all US Topshops closed. Green focused too much on it at the expense of brands, like Wallis and Dorothy Perkins.
His bigger failure was ignoring the online threat. Once young shoppers would save up to head to the high street.
Now, they’re browsing ASOS and Boohoo – the web giants who’ve bought Arcadia’s brands – on their smartphones.
They can send back what’s not wanted.
An explosion in buy-now-pay-later firms, led by Klarna, makes it even easier.
Arcadia launched an online venture, Zoom, in 1999 but didn’t see potential.
The loss of its shops leaves more holes in our high streets but the names live on online. While Boohoo and ASOS have snubbed the stores, they are buying something they don’t have: heritage.
When journalist Nadine White posed a legitimate question to equalities minister Kemi Badenoch, the MP posted the emailed request on Twitter.
Ms White received so much online abuse she was forced to restrict her Twitter account.
She’d asked Badenoch to comment on why she’d not taken part in a video featuring black cross-party politicians encouraging the take up of Covid-19 vaccinations. Hardly controversial, hugely important. For some reason, however, Badenoch dismissed the request as “creepy and bizarre”.
It brought to mind Health
Minister Matt Hancock talking to
Good Morning Britain’s Piers Morgan last month, when instead of accepting he was wrong to vote against free school meals for struggling families, Hancock’s squirming made that story far bigger.
Badenoch’s response means she continues to be the story.
Let’s see how much longer she can hold out before apologising.