The licence fee is not the Government’s to spend

Responding to the launch of the BBC consultation period to decide how licence fees for over-75s should be paid for, Liberal Democrat Culture spokesperson Baroness Bonham-Carter said:

I welcome the BBC’s public consultation into the TV licence fee concession for older people.

The underhand way in which the Tories made the BBC take on the costs of funding free TV licenses for the over-75s was reprehensible. This was something the Liberal Democrats successfully blocked during the Coalition Government.

The licence fee is not Government’s to spend. It is not public money, but the public’s money which should be used to invest in BBC content.