Effect of Coronavirus on Licence Fee.
Like all other organisations, the BBC has been affected by the Coronavirus and the lockdown declared by HM Government on 23rd March 2020. Programme production schedules were hit and social distancing became evident on news and live studio programmes.
On 23rd July 2020, the BBC published the following statement on their website:-
" Pensioners aged 75 and over will have to start paying the TV licence fee from 1 August 2020, a service they had previously been receiving for free. The change was initially due to come into force from 1 June but was delayed by two months due to the coronavirus outbreak. The only over-75s who won’t have to pay are those who receive pension credit – which government figures suggest will benefit around 1.5m households. However, around 590,000 of those who are eligible to claim pension credit are currently missing out on the benefit and may end up paying when they don’t need to."
It seems evident that news about those over the age of 75 paying the full licence fee was clouded by news about the Conronavirus and there was little mentioned by the media when letters were being sent to pensioners in August and beyond.
One must wonder if the media would have printed more about the licence fee if the virus had not existed.
There was no known mention of the fact the BBC disregarded other sections of the entertainnment industry like cinemas, theatres and other shows where concessions are given to all old age pensioners.
Another fact apparently not considered is the wage earning family who live with a pensioner receiving Pension Credit, this enables the whole household to benefit from the pensioner's free TV licence.
The BBC would benefit if they gave free licences to pensioners who live alone which would be easy to administer from Information on Council tax records.