BBC licence fee update

Who envies those who have to claim pension credit JillT I am sorry they are in that position. It's alright for you go on about your state pensions and private pensions you can afford it. You are lucky you can say you would be happy to pay the £154.50 per year.

The people who are going to feel it the most are the people who have to rely on the state pension alone. I am not old enough for my state pension yet at 62, and I still work, but will get a occupational pension to go with my state pension, but some of my friends will not be so lucky and although worked all there lives will not have a private pension.

You and others are really out of step with public opinion on this one. Yes people on pension credit should get it, but so should people on state pension alone.

You have misunderstood what I said rafichagran, perhaps I phrased it badly. What I was referring to was several previous posters who were rather annoyed that they did not qualify for pension credits because they have adequate income and felt that they were being penalised for having saved or invested for their retirement. You will find this is a common theme on GN when wr discuss anything to do with means testing. I certainly was not boasting about my income, far from it, I was saying that I am fortunate. I hope this has clarified my views and settled it in your mind

I might be wrong here, but I thought that if a retired person only has their state pension to live on, and absolutely not another bean, that this qualifies them for pension credit, and the amount payable depends upon if they have any personal savings or not, and how much they have in savings. I realise I may have this wrong, but perhaps someone could enlighten me.

The worst hit will be those just above means testing level, living alone with a small private pension who are housebound with illness or disability. They are already being hit by increasing social care costs on top of increased utility and food bills.

The TV is their companion, they cannot use bus passes if mobility is poor. About 3 million do not have a TV due to having to budget carefully & those who need a food bank are often expected to give up their licence. They can listen to the radio.

Like winter fuel allowance & bus passes these were given in place of increasing the state pension. We have the smallest state pension in Europe, Germany is three times greater.

The younger generation need to fight for a better state pension as their pension investments will be dire after we brexit. They will be relying heavility on a state pension.

Thanks for qualifying that JillT Sorry if I misunderstood.

There is a need to look at the ridiculous payments made to most of those employed by the BBC and also to sort out the payments made to the Bosses and Directors. As it is a public funded organisation none of the Bosses and directors, including Mr Hall, should be paid more than the Prime Minister.

maddyone
If you're entitled to the full state pension that's it but if your pension entitlement falls short of the full pension, you can apply for pension credit which will top you up to £167.25 pw for a single person. That amount is just pennies short of the full pension of £168pw.
There will be deductions for having savings of more than £10k and they will want to see bank statements.
Carers allowance is calculated as income.
If your partner is under state pension age you will not be allowed pension credit under the new rules (May 2019)
Look on the Yougov website for more info.

People with illness or disability will be eligible for allowances.
Anyone with a state and even a small private pension who is 'housebound' can surely afford £3pw for a tv licence. They aren't spending money eating out or splurging on new clothes, manicures, or hairdressing appointments.
Not all pensioners are on the breadline and it's hardly fair to give all pensioners a free licence.

Hm999
I think some of your info is wrong re watching catchup on other channels.
See BBC website and TV licencing website.

gillgran
You will not have to pay for the months that you would have got free ie: Oct '19 -June '20.

Typical of the BBC. It has always been very political and as we are probably near to another general election people will blame the present government, not the BBC. Ii’s about time they reviewed the salaries of the likes of Gary Linekar and Claudio Winkleman.

Bugger

Oh GabbyG ?????

I think some of your info is wrong re watching catchup on other channels.
See BBC website and TV licencing website

“Licensing” my dear!.

Thanks Gabriella, so obviously the pension situation for over 75s will be very different, as they are not on the new pension rate. Therefore I assume that a person on the full old pension with no other income and no more than £10000 in savings would be on pension credits.
They definitely need the free television license then as they would be able to claim pension credits.

Pension credit can be confusing but on Moneysavingexpert.com there is a very good explanation about the 2 parts of it which is certainly clearer than other sites and maybe it will help some people. This is the Martin Lewis site.

BBC have to fund it from somewhere as government have taken away the funding for over 75s. So they need to axe something else to fund it. BBC2? radio stations? You decide!
It’s £3 a week for licence fee.
And those on pension credit won’t have to pay.

Hmmm. I’ve always been a Tory voter, but after reading this, I might have swung to vote Labour if it were anyone but that ghastly Jeremy Corbyn.
Don’t know why they couldn’t have just pushed it back to 80 instead of 75.
I agree with other posters, cut the saleries of the big names, some will move to ITV but the ones that are long in the tooth will stay, there isn’t that many positions available for presenters.
It’s a difficult one, my MIL who is 94, is not short of a penny and could afford it, but many of her friends could not and I imagine would be ashamed to ask if they were applicable to any scheme that would entitle them to it.
Anyway, now to catch up on Gentleman Jack and Killing Eve, they are producing some fantastic shows about women at the moment. Nothing like that in my day!

I'm told by UK family, 'I hope NZ TV is better than ours, they only show rubbish here.'

As far as I know, NZ gets the full, dismal round of Idols, 'reality' shows, American rubbish stuff and soaps - in fact, exactly what the UK gets. As well as some excellent documentaries and costume dramas from the BBC.

NZ doesn't have a license fee. I don't have a TV.

^Free licences were given to the over-75s as part of a Labour government programme to reduce pensioner poverty. Fifteen years later that government funding was cut by the Conservatives.

Ever since then, the BBC has been pondering if it can afford to take on the bill. It's a cost that's rising every year as the number of pensioners continues to grow. In 2020 it's estimated there will be around 4.6 million households with at least one pensioner.

This then is a compromise; around a third of the cost will be borne by the BBC and two thirds passed on to 'wealthier' pensioners. The elderly are by far the biggest consumers of the BBC's output, the average age of BBC TV's audience is now over 62, the question is how far younger licence fee payers should subsidise these older viewers.

As consumption of traditional TV by younger viewers continues to drop there could well be questions about why they are being expected to pay for a service that the heaviest users get for free.^
Part of David Sillito’s, the BBC’s own media correspondent’s analysis.
I have to say I agree with the argument about younger viewers subsidising older viewers.

I absolutely do agree that pensioners who are over 75 and can afford to pay for their license should do so, no question about that. But the argument given that younger people shouldn’t subsidise older viewers is not acceptable to me. Younger people have always subsidised older people, it has been so ever since the inception of the welfare state. When we were younger we paid taxes and insurance, as well as our
professional/private pension contributions, and our contributions paid for the pensions, health services etc used by primarily older by people. That’s how a welfare state operates. It was ever thus. Many, many of us older people are still paying tax. When we were young, we paid income tax at a much higher rate than people do now, 31% in fact in the 70s was the basic rate. Younger people support the older, more vulnerable people. That’s how it is, and it works.
In any case, free licenses for the over 75s was only introduced twenty years ago by Gordon Brown. Even at the time I thought it ridiculous that it was applied to all over 75s. It was blatant vote buying in my opinion, but poorer pensioners should and will still receive a free license, quite rightly.

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Hypocrisy writ large

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Not ok.

Another

maddyone things were very different in the early days of the Welfare State. There were proportionally far more younger people than older people, and generally people were far less affluent, particularly older people.
But that was then, and this is now.
The truth is that not only are there far more people over retirement age, but most of them are affluent enough to be taxpayers. (The BBC article implied that only 20% of people of pensionable age were eligible for Pension Credit)
‘Pensioner Poverty’ has been replaced for many by the affluent, cruise-going, several-holidays-and-short-breaks-a-year lifestyle.

Meanwhile, our young people struggle to own their own homes and struggle to balance work and family life because they have a large mortgage or they are paying large rents.

It’s they who should be receiving help, not old people who don’t need it.

janeainsworth there is such a thing as plain old entitlement. And why shouldn't there be?

I'm not convinced by all this "young folks can't buy home" stuff. Perhaps if that they learned to cut their cloth to suit their coat from an earlier age? And there are more affordable homes now coming onto the market.