By Jeremy Hunt MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport.
Earlier today David Cameron announced that we will be opposing the 2% increase in the BBC licence fee due to come into effect this April. Every little helps, and when times are tough for families up and down the country the BBC should show leadership and voluntary decline the increase which amounts to £3 for every household with a colour TV.
The current licence fee settlement took effect in 2007 – when economic circumstances were quite different. They were considered generous at the time. Now, with nearly every commercial broadcaster cutting its programme budget, it cannot be argued that the BBC needs the rise to stay ahead in the market. In fact this year, for the first time ever, the licence fee income could be a whopping £1 billion more than the entire advertising-funded TV sector put together.
Nor should the BBC be facing anything like the cost increases previously predicted. Production companies are hardly going to be jacking up their prices, and organisations like the BBC should be taking this opportunity to root out unnecessary expenditure, whether on the £14m taxi bill, the £3m spent on public affairs or the 50 executives paid more than the Prime Minister.
We support the BBC. But the BBC, in turn, exists because of public support for the licence fee system. Declining to take up this year’s increase would be the best possible way to maintain that support in tough times.
