JAMIE ANGUS: Forcing people to pay the licence fee is damaging public support. The BBC has to find an alternative

Published: 00:37, 15 July 2026 | Updated: 02:06, 15 July 2026 Even the most ardent fan of the BBC has to face facts. The days of the licence fee are over. Last year, 539,000 households stopped paying the £174.50 fee, a much faster drop than expected and an increase of more than 75 per cent on the previous year's 300,000 slump. To lose funding at that rate is clearly unsustainable. Little wonder that the incoming Director-General, Matt Brittin, who took the helm in May 18, says the Corporation is facing a 'moment of real jeopardy' and that the licence fee funding model 'ties us to the past'. As its annual report is published this week, the BBC should be celebrating how its global audience has risen to over half a billion people for the first time. But the bad headlines keep overwhelming the good. The report reveals the highest paid BBC star was Scott Mills. The Radio 2 presenter was on around £745,000 before he was dismissed for misconduct last year. Meanwhile, deep dismay greeted the recent proposals to cut international current affairs and the midnight news on Radio 4, as part of cost-cutting that will see 2,000 job losses over the next three years. Can it be right that the BBC is continuing to buy up old movies and sitcoms for iPlayer while core news services, including the vital World Service, are being axed? All this is happening at a time when competition in the industry has never been tougher. Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Disney are pushing up the cost of producing programmes faster than the rate of inflation, because they can afford to pay more. The BBC is trailing in the race. Where once it produced the hardest-hitting TV in the world, now it is watching rivals pick up the awards – from ITV's Mr Bates Vs The Post Office to Netflix's Adolescence. A new generation of viewers has a plethora of options the BBC has to compete against. Director-General Matt Brittin on his first day in the job in May. He has admitted that the Corporation is facing a 'moment of real jeopardy' 'The Corporation is not going to win by outspending the rest, so it has to spend smarter. And it has to find a better alternative to the licence fee,' writes Jamie Angus The Corporation is not going to win by outspending the rest, so it has to spend smarter. And it has to find a better alternative to the licence fee. The element of compulsion, with every household that watches or records live television under a legal obligation to pay the licence fee whether they watch the Beeb or not, is damaging public support. Government borrowing restrictions mean the BBC can't simply double its debts and hope to make back the money with a raft of new shows. But there are other solutions. One radical idea is for the BBC to become a mutual organisation, like a building society, so people can invest their own capital in future productions. They'll get their money back, with interest, if and when the shows make a commercial return. The BBC's hardest of hardcore supporters, those who listen to Radio 4 for scores of hours every week, would pay the licence fee twice if they were allowed. People who love the BBC should be able to pay a higher licence fee voluntarily – and by the same token, the basic compulsory licence fee should be lower than it is now. If it could be paid through household utilities or mobile phone bills, that would reduce the administration involved in charging viewers. The Government should take back full funding for those parts of the World Service not in English. Is it really right that the licence fee is now paying for TV channels in Arabic and Persian while UK audiences are having their own local services cut? Most radical of all, the BBC needs to reduce the number of TV channels and radio stations. These are hugely expensive to maintain, and in the digital era they are arguably as anachronistic as the fee itself. As people switch from live viewing and listening to online streaming, there will be no need for separate channels. BBC Sounds and iPlayer serve up everything in one place, just as Netflix or Amazon Prime do. My mother, for instance, loves tuning in to Gardeners' World every week, but does it really matter whether it's on a live television channel or on a streaming platform? By spending much less of its money on channels and distribution, the BBC could push every penny into the content itself. For the past decade, the view has taken hold high up inside the BBC that having people spend increasing hours on iPlayer is the best way to keep them on side for paying the licence fee. That's narrowly true – but it's putting the cart before the horse. The purpose of the BBC is not to perpetuate the licence fee. It's to provide compelling quality content that enhances the national conversation and engages the people who pay for it, for the benefit of all. Jamie Angus is a former editor of the Today programme and a trustee of The Henry Jackson Society. Tory MP Patrick Spencer was being 'a bit of a pest' before he groped breasts of two women at London's Groucho club, court hears