BBC review raises idea of 'scrapping licence fee' for subscription service
A panel of experts tasked with reviewing the BBC's future have raised the idea of scrapping the licence fee in favour of an optional subscription service from 2020, it has been reported.
The Sunday Times claims the radical plan was mooted by some members of a 12-strong centenary review panel of economists, consultants and academics who were invited to give an outside assessment of the BBC's future.
One member of the review panel, David Elstein, a former Sky and ITV executive, was quoted by the Telegraph as saying: “It is socially unjust that so many are fined and indeed go to prison for not paying the licence fee.
“And it makes more sense too for the BBC to move to subscription from 2020, which is about the date when set-boxes go, and standard definition is phased out to high definition.”
The panel did agree that the licence fee, which currently costs £145.50 a year, should stay in place until at least 2020, rising with inflation during that time. But the BBC denied that their report had gone so far as to recommend scrapping the licence fee altogether in place of a subscription service.
The BBC's finances are a source of great scrutiny at present after the corporation this week confirmed its intentions to make its youth TV channel BBC Three online only.
Yesterday Danny Cohen, director of TV at the BBC, outlined the extent of the cuts facing the corporation and refused to give assurances that BBC4 would be safe from the axe.
He said: "The reason we made this change for BBC3 is because we face a series of financial cuts the like of which the BBC has not had to cope with before."
BBC Three will lose its television slot in 2015.