THE BBC

I DO NOT LIKE THE BBC BECAUSE IT is biased and it demands its income on penalty of either a fine or the imprisonment of any citizen who refuses payment. In other words what is known as the license fee, is in reality another tax, and like all of the other taxes, it is a criminal act to avoid paying it.

Of course you can go without a television set, which is something only the people in the poorest regions of, what was once known as the third world, have to do. But there is no other corner of the world, to my knowledge, that demands you pay a tax just to own one.

I am sure that those who work for this institution see it rather quaintly as a uniquely British concept, like cheese rolling or, for many, the unfathomable rules of the game of cricket. The BBC would like to be seen as part of such a British tradition that goes back centuries: in other words an institution whose modus operandi appears somewhat eccentric to the outside world, but for all of that, a much loved and integral part of our culture, supported by the majority of the British people.

Well fair enough; if it is as popular as the BBC claims and I have no evidence to the contrary; then why does it not function by public subscription freely given; and not demanded through taxation backed up by the law?

At the moment the BBC receives over £3 billion in taxes, and I bet by the time this coalition government exhausts itself in five years time, its income will have risen to £4 billion or more - despite any conservative promise given before the last election to reign in its munificence, on the back of the belt-tightening we are told to expect. All politicians find the BBC useful to them. For every political party is nowadays lead by a liberal consensus, the kind of which the BBC is there to serve.

WHICH BRINGS ME TO the issue of the BBC’s bias. The BBC today weaves the spell of multiculturalism into almost every programme they show (especially children’s programming). I believe that multiculturalism is an unworkable ideology like socialism and communism. What the BBC seeks to do, like state television in the old Soviet Union, is to socially engineer its acceptance.

The BBC’s bias is not a party political one, but a small ‘l’ liberal one. The whole edifice of that institution was high-jacked from its original purpose in the 1960’s to entertain and educate. Even then it may not have been completely free from ideological considerations (small ‘c’ conservatism then being in vogue), but even then I would have objected to being given a demand by the state to pay a tax on my television set. Is it not enough that we have to pay VAT, due to be increased in January to 20% on every new television bought? But that we should also have to pay a yearly tax on its ownership is bizarre to the rest of the world and to be resented.

This is a ridiculous state of affairs which no other country tolerates, and hopefully never will. Only the BBC, backed by successive governments, has been allowed to survive for so long. Let the people choose freely how to spend their money, after all it is their money. If the BBC is the much loved institution numerous celebrities have described it as, then it will survive by private subscription.

But why should I not have a choice as to what I wish to watch? Apparently to mouth such a wish goes against the state’s determination to keep the BBC in operation. There appears to be a consensus within all of the major political parties that for their own support of a multicultural society, the BBC must continue.

What after all does the BBC represent. No-one can deny that this institution has a broad spectrum liberal agenda. And no-one can deny that it is also the wish of the three main parties to pursue such a liberal agenda.

So, for all of the political parties, the BBC represents a publically funded mouth-piece. The BBC is not a party politically biased institution but a liberal one; which exempts millions of British people. Which is why those of us who do not share such an agenda are forced by law to hand over our hard earned cash to support it.

If forcing someone to pay a tax on the ownership of a television set is deemed right by the liberals who undoubtedly support it; then it is an illiberal act in the first instance. The BBC is an institution that was created when state control was in fashion in this country under the Attlee government.

HOW THE BBC SURVIVED FOR so long under its present arrangement is due to working class sentimentality that goes back to such programmes as Dixon of Dock Green in the late1950s. It is on the back of such over-romanticising that the BBC’s reputation has been built. At the beginning, the state had to take a hand in the building of the modern television network. The BBC then served this purpose.

But when the independent sector kicked in using advertising there was no need for the BBC to exist. Yet our politicians persisted and built the BBC into the Gormenghast we see before us today.

When the Independent sector produced shows such as Robin Hood, Ivanhoe, and William Tell, I can remember nagging and my poor father into renting a new aerial so that we could receive the Anglia television network, which included all of the above programmes free.

For the independent sector relied solely on income from advertisement, just as it had always done in the USA.

The BBC has no place in the modern world, unless it relinquishes its funding from the taxpayer and chooses to do what all other broadcasters do and seek a private living. The BBC is a relic waiting to be given its last rights. But it has many celebrities who have grown wealthy on its existence, and who wish to continue receiving at some time in the future the taxpayers bounty.