Pensioners will march on BBC in fury at licence fee

FURIOUS pensioners are to march on the BBC’s headquarters in protest over its ‘cruel’ licence fee plans.

The demonstration, organised by the National Pensioners Convention, will target BBC offices up and down the country, including Broadcasting House in London, in a display of the anger felt by licence fee payers nationwide.

The BBC said on Monday that it would strip 3.7million pensioners of their free TV licences. At the moment, everyone over the age of 75 is exempt from the £154.50-a-year charge – amounting to 4.6million households.

But from next June the BBC will only give free TV licences to those over-75s who are on Pension Credit, a benefit claimed by 900,000 of the poorest.

Yesterday, Jan Shortt, general secretary of the National Pensioners Convention, described the decision as ‘callous’ and said licence fee payers of all ages are united in their fury.

‘The amount of anger we are seeing at the BBC’s decision, not just from pensioners but younger people as well, is absolutely amazing,’ she said.

‘This is uniting the generations, because we all know that if the Government and the BBC collude to take the free TV licence away from today’s older people, it won’t be there for the pensioners of tomorrow. We have growing rates of poverty and loneliness among our older generation – and this decision is callous and cruel.’

The demonstration, which will take place next Friday at noon, comes amid a growing backlash over the decision. More than 600,000 people of all ages have signed petitions calling for free TV licences to be saved for everyone over 75.

Some pensioners have vowed to go to prison rather than pay, amid fears that many elderly people who depend on the TV for company will no longer be able to access it.

Yesterday, it emerged that BBC director general Lord Tony Hall and chairman Sir David Clementi will be hauled in front of the House of Lords Communications Committee and grilled over the controversial move.

And Channel 4 newsreader Jon Snow waded into the debate, saying the licence fee should be halved for all over-75s. ‘It should be cut in half for anybody over 75 although I think there should be a conscience clause that anybody who can afford it should pay it because it’s nothing to people who are wealthy, and it’s a great deal to people who are poor,’