Troubled scene
Sir: J. W. M. Thompson, who generally writes such amusing good sense, really drop- ped a danger last week ('Spectator's note- book', 28 February). To write about the BBC that we should 'abolish the absurd licence fee and provide adequate money from taxation' is absurd. The services of the BBC to the public are entirely commercial, an exact analogy being the service to the public of the railways. No one ever suggested that the public should pay for the railways out of taxation, and travel free!
We are all bound by words, and 'commer- viall- it associated in our minds with ftv
which in fact is exactly the reverse. It is the BBC which directly markets its wares to the public for money, and those who neither look nor listen are perfectly entitled not to pay, and would very much resent being expected and made to pay out of taxation for what they don't want.
By its very nature the major problem and difficulty for all radio and television is the collection of revenue. For fifty years the BBC has employed—at enormous expense—the help of a debt-collecting agency, the GPO, which alas has been perfunctory and indiffer- ent. The real answer would be to allow the BBC full rights and facilities to collect its own revenue—at which they could hardly make a worse showing than the Post Office. But only under such conditions could the 'licence' system be dropped.
I am a member of the BBC staff, but I write on a matter of public interest as a current fl 1 licence holder. Six choices, col- our, stereo, VHF an' all, for just over 7d a day ... not bad.
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